Spartanburg area high school students learned Thursday, Nov. 14, that Meeting Street Scholarship Fund, a private scholarship program, was expanding to Spartanburg County offering qualifying students the opportunity for a free college education. (Jessica Holdman/SC Daily Gazette)
SPARTANBURG — James F. Byrnes High School senior Mariela Osorio received her acceptance letter from Anderson University to pursue her dreams of becoming an elementary school teacher.
Then it came time for her and her parents to start thinking about how they were going to pay for it.
“It’s sinking in more now,” Osorio said. “It’s progressing through the year and I’m stressed out about money. You apply to a bunch of scholarships but you don’t know if you’ll get them. So you don’t know if you want to commit yet because of how much money it is.”
Osorio’s mother isn’t working, leaving the family to solely rely on her father’s income from his job at a car parts manufacturing plant. And Osorio still has a 14-year-old sister coming through school behind her.