You might have read about how the Lenfest Scholarship impacted Carolyn Beatty's life in the Donor Honor Roll section of the Spring 2010 issue of Straight from Sherman. Here's the full story.
“Remember, you don’t choose chiropractic; it chooses you.” These words spoken by alumna Nalyn Marcus and a talk given by Reggie Gold were enough to finally convince Carolyn Beaty, after attending three Career Days, that Sherman was where she needed to be.
Working as an IT professional at the University of South Carolina Upstate in Spartanburg, Beaty passed the Sherman College sign nearly every day on her way to work. Curiosity led her to the college’s web site, where she saw a promotion for an upcoming Career Day.
“I was making good money but wasn’t really content in what I was doing,” Beaty says. “I had been e-mailing the admission office at Sherman for a while, but after that third Career Day, I went back to work on Monday and gave my two-weeks notice. It was a pivotal point for me, that one statement.”
Beaty says she had a little money saved up and was not extremely concerned about financial aid and loan burdens. After a year at Sherman, she started looking for ways to supplement the increasing costs she faced.
She even considered abandoning her dream because as the money dwindled, her stress and budgeting woes increased. “I thought about leaving to get a full-time job to save some money and come back, but I knew if I did that, chances were high that I wouldn’t make it back,” Beaty says.
She was thrilled when she was awarded the Dawn K. Lenfest Scholarship, established by a Pennsylvania College of Straight Chiropractic graduate who feels passionately that students should be able to focus on establishing their careers rather than on debt retirement when they graduate.
“I already had withdrawal paperwork ready but hadn’t submitted it,” Beaty says. “I was really contemplating it, and it was a life decision: stick with chiropractic college or go back to what I knew with computers and IT.” The scholarship made it an easy choice for her, and she tossed the withdrawal paperwork.
“The scholarship made a huge difference,” Beaty said. “I could focus all my attention on why I came to Sherman. I worked to perfect my craft, get involved in the community, be a good intern, focus on studies, and get everything I could out of the program academically. It brought me back to the reason I came here -- to be a vessel for chiropractic.”
Since then, Beaty says, her education and the Lenfest Scholarship have taken her to another level: they have changed her thinking about philanthropy. “I saw what the generosity I had been shown did in my life, and now I am looking for ways that I can impact profession I am going to pass it along and pay it forward –- and that’s what I’m most excited about now,” she says.
“I had always thought about giving away a percentage of my practice earnings, but now I also cannot conceive being in practice and not giving away a portion of my business to people who don’t have the financial means to experience what chiropractic can offer. The Lenfest Scholarship taught me this lesson in philanthropy.”
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