Ready for Success Scholarship Programme Celebrates 10th Anniversary

Assisted by over 1,000 individual donors and over 45 companies the Bulgarian Charity Aid Foundation, BCAF, has been providing annual scholarships to young girls and boys with excellent grades who have lost one or both parents for 10 years now.

"Donors are people who believe in your dreams and goals. That you get support is important but being part of a community is even more vital, Deiana Kostadinova, Secretary for Social Affairs, Youth and Sports of President Rosen Plevneliev told scholarship winners.

In 10 years the Ready for Success scholarship programme has granted 1028 scholarships totalling over BGN 1.5 million, all provided by donations.

"We believe in your dreams. Keep following them", Dimitar Ivanov, manager of Vega Medical , a supporter of the programme, said.

120 young people will get high achievement scholarships in the 2015/2016 academic year.

The top longtime partner of Ready for Success is the International Women's Club, which has been donating funds from the very start of the programme providing over 250 scholarships to date. This year International Women's Club set up a special fund within the programme. Ready for Success is also backed by the American Chamber of Commerce in Bulgaria, the Bulgarian-American Society, Intracom, BNP Paribas, ContourGlobal, Bulstrad. We extend our thanks to the Orphan foundation that we launched the programme with 10 years ago.

This year, over 180 eligible youth applied for the programme: university students with grades over 5 and school students with grades over 5.50 who have lost one or both parents. The one-year scholarship amounts to BGN 2,000 for students and BGN 1,000 for school students. Youth with no parents rarely have the finances to continue their education and often drop out as they have to work to survive.