Jeremy Herndon

When I was a kid, just getting out of high school and looking to go to college, I had to apply for college scholarships to help me pay for my college education.  I was also lucky enough to get some grants and student loans to help me with tuition costs.  It took a long time to pay off the student loans, so I recommend to any and everyone that they should try to get as many free college scholarships and grants that they can scrape up to help them with their college expenses.

Many scholarships are based on prior academic achievement, but some can be won by entering competitions, or signing up for free scholarships offers that involve earning points and redeeming them.  However you can get a scholarship, today’s student really should check out all of the different options.

One of my nephews was really fortunate to be given full scholarship to the college of his choice, but he earned that through a lot of hard work in high school.  He never got a grade lower than an “A” his entire scholastic life!   And he took as many advanced placement classes as he possibly could take, and participated in community service organizations and played on several sports teams.  His scholarships have been hard won, but his work paid off – he is getting his college education for free!  Scholarships are a great thing!

Today I got what I call a “phishing phone call” from someone that I think was trying to scam me out of giving out credit card information to them. They claimed to be from Citibank, but the caller ID simply said that it was “Out of area.” They were calling with the pretense of lowering my credit card interest rates, but in order to take advantage of the offer they wanted my credit card numbers. My wife told me not to give them any information at all.

I thought it was a legit call, but my wife was really skeptical, so I pressed them further for information. They said that they could lower my interest rates if my credit card debt was at least $3,000 and my interest rate was at least 12%. Well, I told them that my highest rate was 7.99% so they said they couldn’t help me and hung up. I wonder if it was legit or a scam? I guess I’ll never know for sure.