Legislators Help Women Pursuing a Second Chance

(Posted 2/25/2008) - The Conference of Women Legislators (COWL) a not-for-profit organization and a bipartisan coalition of women legislators in the Illinois General Assembly, announce their 2008-2009 Scholarship Award Program.

COWL created the scholarship program as part of its mission to promote economic independence, community service and leadership development. State Representative Connie Howard, Chairwoman of the committee, announced that scholarships of $2500 each will be awarded. These college scholarships are aimed at helping women who are earning their college degrees, later in life in some cases. State Representative Sandra Pihos is a member of the committee.

“One of the gaps in the state college aid programs is assistance for women who may have had their education interrupted by plans to start a family or who never had a chance to start college until later in life. These non-traditional students don’t fit neatly into any programs,” Pihos said. “Rather than pass a law to create a new grant, we started raising money to fund scholarships on our own. It’s a pilot program that has been quite successful.

Scholarship applicants are required to enroll in an accredited college or university for a minimum of seven credit hours to qualify, making the scholarships available to a part-time student. In addition to academic achievement the scholarship committee also considered volunteer or paid community service work that benefited women in transition. The deadline for applying is April 11, 2008. Awardees will be notified of the decisions by April 30, 2008. Scholarship applications may be downloaded from the COWL website at www.cowlil.com .

The majority of the charitable funds raised by the group come from annual fund-raisers, such as “Capitol Capers”, featuring performances by lawmakers from around the state.