Overview
In 1947, a Minnesota-based lumberman named David Tozer established a scholarship fund to help students in need that are graduating from high school in the Kanabec, Pine, and Washington counties of Minnesota. Tozer had a desire to provide financial support to worthy young people in Minnesota who wanted to obtain a post-secondary education.
Headquarters: Lake Elmo, MN
Number of Scholars Impacted: 400-500 per year
Dollars Awarded Annually: Over $1M
Year Established: 1947
Highlights
- Tozer Foundation needed a modern scholarship management tool that gave them access to the financial data they desperately needed.
- Kaleidoscope helped them capture and report on data and gave them tools that streamlined and improved the application experience for students and reviewers.
- Tozer found a true partner that they can rely on for many years to come.
Challenge
Back in 2015, Tozer Foundation President Tracey Galowitz began looking for a way to manage the scholarship application process digitally. In the years prior, she and her team had been manually reviewing up to three hundred physical applications for each scholarship cycle. As she explains, applicant files would get organized into big banker’s boxes and passed around to different people throughout the reviewing process.
“Those boxes would get brought to one person to review them all in a set period of time, then they would go to the next one,” said Galowitz. “So it would take us about a month and a half for each of us to review all 300 in our allotted time slot.”
They eventually started using more digital tools to manage applications but still found it hard to keep up with how students preferred to communicate and apply for scholarships. So they began looking for a partner who could provide them with a true scholarship management portal.
Unfortunately, the provider they turned to was not able to give them the tools or data they needed to address their challenges and support the growth of their program.
“They promised for two years in a row to give us an online application that never, ever materialized,” said Galowitz.
Solution
After feeling frustrated by promises left undelivered by their previous vendor, Galowitz and her team began searching for another solution and eventually reached out to the team at Kaleidoscope.
From day one, Galowitz appreciated and recognized the deep experience the Kaleidoscope team has when it comes to building and managing scholarships for organizations.
After working with the team to identify the biggest challenges and opportunities, Kaleidoscope put a plan in place. The team began working quickly to bring the solutions Tozer needed to have in place for the upcoming cycle.
“We contacted Kaleidoscope in October of a scholarship year, and we typically go live in November, said Galowitz. We were able to get up and running with Kaleidoscope by January—a miracle. They jumped right on the issue, understood the issue, and were well-versed in remedying the issue,” she added.
There were three main priorities for Galowitz and her team when they approached Kaleidoscope:
The first priority was to gain access and visibility into scholarship data and financial data. They wanted to understand where the money was at any given time and who it was helping.
The second priority was to create a better experience for applicants. They wanted to help graduating students avoid wasting time by applying for a scholarship they were not eligible to be awarded. They also wanted to make communication with applicants easier.
The final priority was to build a relationship with a partner who truly understands scholarships and the work that must be done every year to accept and review applications, award recipients, and report on data.
Results
Kaleidoscope has delivered the tools and partnership that Tozer has been in need of for some time. They’ve experienced numerous tangible benefits, which are outlined below:
Trusted, Accessible Partner
Kaleidoscope became a trusted partner for the entire Tozer team, helping them modernize their application process, communicate more effectively with students, and solve challenges as they arise.
“We were given a Kaleidoscope employee to work with right from the starting blocks,” said Galowiz. “That contact person has always been available—always. To me, the measure of a good partner isn’t how everything is going during smooth, easygoing times. The measure is what happens when there’s a problem. And their team has always been responsive when we needed them. They’ve been phenomenal. It’s been just a great experience,” she added.
Better Experience for Applicants
Thanks to the application builder provided by Kaleidoscope, Tozer can help students quickly understand whether or not they are eligible for the scholarship earlier in the application process. A few initial questions can help students decide whether the full application is worth completing, which can save them a lot of time during a period when they are likely applying for many different scholarships across organizations.
“I never wanted someone to go through all the work of filling out an application only for us after it’s done to say, well, you have too much Estimated Family Contribution, you don’t qualify,” said Galowitz.
“So what I love about Kaleidoscope is you get those questions out right at the beginning of the application. We never would have been able to do that before,” she added.
Data Visibility
Perhaps most importantly, Tozer can now track awarded dollars throughout the process, which was imperative to them and the people running their financial department.
“In the past, we were not able to get real-time information about where the money we gave for the scholarships was at any given time,” said Galowitz.
“We never could say how much money was still in that other vendor’s hands and how much money was really out at the schools for the benefit of each student. It was amazing to us that the prior vendor could not reconcile what money they were holding, and it’s very frightening,” she added.
“I think that in and of itself is a reason to use Kaleidoscope,” said Galowitz.
Wrapping Up
As a final thought on the value of working with Kaleidoscope and using their platform, Galowitz shared, “I cannot endorse this company with any stronger recommendations.”
“We’re in our second year, and it feels like we’ve worked with Kaleidoscope for five. It’s been a great, comfortable fit,” she added.
Interested in launching your scholarship program with Kaleidoscope? Schedule a demo, let’s get started!
