Wednesday, October 30, 2002

Texas Sophomore Casts a Webwide Net in Seeking Help With College Costs By SCOTT CARLSON Near the end of the summer, Nick Howard read a story in his local newspaper about a woman named Karyn who had racked up a $20,000 credit-card debt, then set up a Web site to take donations to help pay it off. Her scheme was working -- donations were pouring in. If Karyn could persuade complete strangers to help her atone for her addiction to Gucci handbags and pedicures, Mr. Howard thought, why couldn't he get people to help pay his college tuition at Texas A&M University? His roommate thought it was a good idea, and put up about $180 to pay a designer to create the site and to pay for a year of Web hosting. By mid-September, Mr. Howard, a sophomore, had a simple site called SendNick2College.com, which carries the marketing tag, "Make the world a better place. Send a kid to college." So far, he's gotten about $300 through friends and a few strangers -- far short of the $40,000 he says he needs to escape college debt-free, but more than he thought he would get. The site makes no effort to say that Mr. Howard's is any kind of hardship case, although he does promise not to spend money he is given on beer. "I would like your money so that I am not in debt when I finally finish my college years," he says. Donors can send a check to a post-office box or use PayPal, an online payment service. Most of the contributions have come from Mr. Howard's friends. "My grandparents gave me $10," he says. So why is Mr. Howard's cause better than Karyn's credit-card debt? "Well, she misused her credit cards," he says. "I mean, I don't even own a credit card. This is going straight to school. ... And there's a good feeling when you give something to somebody." Of course, not everybody has been sold on this feel-good pitch. Lane B. Stephenson, a spokesman for Texas A&M, says the university looked into SendNick2College.com to make sure that Mr. Howard wasn't using university servers or computers for his site. Officials made no formal objections, but "the bottom line was that it was not something that the university embraced," he says. Texas A&M gives out more than $250-million in grants, loans, and scholarships every year. "We think it would be more appropriate for students to go through the traditional channels for financial aid." The press has disapproved, too. The Reporter, a student newspaper at Minnesota State University at Mankato, heard about the site and editorialized: "How sad that we have a society with people living in the streets and struggling to eat and we dish out money to college students who either spend money irresponsibly on clothing and the like, or choose to go to a school where a four-year tuition tallies at $40,000, and then want people to feel sad because he can't afford to go to this school." An article about the site in the San Antonio Express-News begged: "But really, Nick, isn't it all just a tad tacky? In light of the financial devastation so many families experienced in the wake of Sept. 11?" Perhaps Mr. Howard's site is tacky, but it's probably less tacky than the crop of cyber-beggars that have popped up since Karyn's plea appeared, including one site dedicated to the purchase of a Hummer, the all-terrain vehicle. Mr. Howard's site is not even the first of its kind. Two years ago, Allyson Levy, who is at Northeastern University, started a site to help pay her college tuition. Ms. Levy has since shut her site down, however, and said Tuesday that she did not want to comment on it or on SendNick2College.com. Mr. Howard says he has considered the negative reactions to his site, and chalks them up to envy. "All my friends would like to have a site like this," he says. Still, he has kept pictures of himself off the site because he's afraid that people will harass him, either in person or online. "People might change stuff in the picture and post it somewhere." Asked what he plans to do with his degree, Mr. Howard says he'd like to go into sports marketing. "I'd like to be a successful entrepreneur -- you know, being able to actually see the success from working hard instead of seeing somebody else get the results from my hard work." Easy-to-print version E-mail this article

International team begins new map of human genome, seeking variations within large blocks of DNA California appeals court backs professor in dispute over his demanding approach to teaching President of Quincy U. resigns after trustees question accuracy of his résumé Britain gives college students best return on investment in education, report says Using high-speed links, researchers transmit sensation of touch across the Atlantic Texas sophomore casts a Webwide net in seeking help with college costs