Scripps Fall 2021 Student Mutual Aid Fund

This GoFundMe is organized by Nobody Fails at Scripps, a collective of 20+ student organizers who are looking to support fellow students as they continue to deal with the devastating effects of this pandemic. Your contributions will be distributed in the form of need-based grants to students facing hardships such as housing and/or food insecurity, unexpected medical bills, loss of employment, mental and physical health, and restricted accommodations. 

Background: 

Our mutual aid fund was created at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic when students were given 1 week to get off campus. Some were rendered effectively homeless, and many students with on-campus jobs were left without full compensation and without a reliable source of income. COVID-19 has continued to impact our community, and as we’ve returned to campus this fall for the first time, students are facing continuing and new financial hardships, exacerbated by a lack of institutional funding or support. While the COVID-19 pandemic is far from over, most other efforts to support students financially are long gone and there is no other source of funding in our community for large expenses, including medical bills, rent, food, and school payments. This will be our group’s third round of fundraising - since June 2020, we have raised a grand total of 109, 369.61 and distributed a total of 84 grants. Since we’ve returned to campus, the need for support and funding has continued to be clear, as we have already filled two very urgent requests (as of 9/10) and have another three urgent requests that we hope to fill by 9/13. 

Which students will benefit from this funding?

Nobody Fails at Scripps released a funding interest form to gauge students’ financial needs this fall. The form closed on September 5th and over 20 students filled out the interest form. We have since opened the official application, and from the applications we’ve received:

• 84.6% of respondents are First-Generation and/or Low-Income
• 76.9% of respondents identify as BIPOC 
• 85.7% of respondents have one or more family members who have lost a job or had reduced employment as a result of the pandemic
• 92.3% of respondents are financially independent or are expected to contribute towards their household’s income
• 69.3% of respondents have had their source of income decreased or terminated   due to the pandemic

Estimated Costs:

As explained previously, funding resources that were or are currently available to students are limited in their scope and ability to provide relevant financial relief. Based on the demonstrated need from our interest survey, we project that a budget of at least $40,000 will fully meet students’ needs for the fall semester. The needs for the summer include rent, food, transportation, utilities, wifi, assistance for family bills, as well as medical bills, including medication for pre-existing conditions, mental health services, and supporting family impacted by COVID-19. As the full consequences of COVID-19 continue to unfold, we are organizing this campaign to be able to meet current and impending needs of Scripps College students to stand in solidarity with members of our community who are most at risk.

Our Timeline:

We hope to have all necessary funds by September 26th so that we can distribute them to students as soon as possible and before we are too far into the semester. We plan on distributing funds starting September 27th to have all funds distributed within 3-4 weeks of that, depending on the stated urgency of each request.

Funding Allocation - Our Ranking System:

We understand that we are requesting a large amount of donations, so we want to be transparent with our funding system. Students will be required to rank their requests according to our need scale from 1-5.

Level 1 Need:

• Short-term, Immediate, One-time funding need (e.g. flight tickets)

Level 2 Need:

• Have an income, but need support with recurring bills (e.g. rent, utilities, etc.)

Level 3 Need:

• Do not have an income for the fall and looking to support themselves alone

Level 4 Need:

• Do not have an income for the fall and looking to support others/their family in addition to themselves
• 1 or more family members lost a source of income due to COVID-19 

Level 5 Need:

• Do not have an income for the fall, looking to support others/their family in addition to themselves
• 1 or more family members lost a source of income due to COVID-19 
• Also have COVID-specific medical bills or other extenuating circumstances

Fund Allocation Process:

1. A student requests funding from our fall form which was released on September 9th and the deadline for submissions will be on September 15th. 

2. The request is anonymized by a single volunteer whose role requires them to identify the person who submitted the request. Students will be referred to as Student 1, 2, etc.

3. All volunteers on the Mutual Aid Committee will see the anonymized requests and determine funding allocations using the ranking system described above. Students will be notified whether their request was approved (and how much was approved) in the week following application submissions. 

4. The funds are transferred through Zelle, Venmo, or checks from the 3 students under whom the venmo accounts and GoFundMe are registered. The single volunteer with un-anonymized student information will then coordinate with these 3 volunteers, giving them each a list of students and the amount to be transferred to each. These volunteers will contact each student to coordinate the transfer of funds.

Concurrent Fundraising Efforts:

We are also collecting funds through the following Venmo accounts: @ScrippsMutualAid-1 @ScrippsMutualAid-2 @ScrippsMutualAid-3 

If you have any questions, please contact [email redacted] or @nobodyfailsatscripps on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. 

In Solidarity,

Nobody Fails at Scripps