Save Up Program

Responsibility, Initiative, Solutions and Empowerment.  This is what makes one a RISER and the undeniable magic of the RISE Foundation and its signature program Save Up.  Commitment to stay the course and allegiance to all things financially responsible, self-initiated, focused towards solutions and boldly empowering.  Any RISER knows they have found the Save Up magic when they begin to yearn to teach others the knowledge, they have attained through Save Up.  Ms. Terry shared her powerful RISE journey with the foundation recently at the South City Phase I celebration and she sure has big plans for her family’s financial future. 

 Terry is a former housing resident of Foote Homes, where she lived for sixteen years. As a result of the Hope VI revitalization efforts she relocated to South Memphis and is renting a home there.   She is a single mother of five children and has two school age children ages 15 and 16, who attend Booker T. Washington High School. Her 21-year-old son will be graduating in May 2019, from Lane College.

Terry attended high school until the 12^th grade. Her mother passed in her 12^th grade school year and this resulted in her dropping out of school. She then had a sister who passed a few years afterwards.  With no other family member providing support, she never found the inspiration to complete her GED.  With the help of RISE, she is currently working with her case worker at Urban Strategies and will be attending GED classes at South City Resource Center.

 She has been employed full-time for two years at Service Master, where she works as a custodian at Holmes Elementary.  RISE teaches program participants to transform their passions into marketable profits.  Terry has a talent for cooking and desires to turn her passion into a micro-enterprise business with the help of the RISE Save Up program.  She has dreams of traveling the country and discovering new culinary delights.  She is very excited about cooking and believes she can use her talent to earn extra income.

 Ms. Terry was referred to RISE by her case worker at Urban Strategies. She said she decided to try the Save Up program because she is determined to do something to improve her life and become a better role model for her children. She feels that her biggest challenge in the program will be consistently saving, but she is committed to work hard to achieve her goal. She states her children have helped her stay focused on completing the financial literacy program. One lesson she has learned while participating in the program, is the importance of budgeting and creating a spending plan. She states her kids are very supportive of her goals and that saving has now become a family-oriented goal.

Terry is a RISER that found the Save Up magic.  In addition to becoming a business owner, her long-term goal is to purchase a home for herself and her children. She is confident that the information she has learned from the RISE Save Up program will ultimately help her prepare for the home ownership process. Your donations to the RISE Foundation make it possible for families like Terry to overcome barriers, break down stigmas and reach for a hand up and not a hand out.  Please consider supporting a future RISER by making a contribution today.

Links:

• RISE Foundation Inc

Many times in life we start a project expecting one outcome and we end up getting another.  Ms. Kendra, a family service worker for a local nonprofit experienced this revelation after completing her financial education courses through the Save Up program. She first learned about RISE while researching local resources to recommend to the parents of the pre-k children her agency serves. Once she became familiar with the Save Up program, Kendra wanted to go through the program to see if it really worked.  Not only did it work and met the needs of her clients, Kendra decided that this program would be of great benefit to her family as well.  As a mother of a 16-year-old girl, she wanted the stability of homeownership for her daughter. 

After attending the rigorous six-week financial education workshop, Saver’s Club meetings, Homebuyer Club meetings, and completing her savings goal, Kendra felt that RISE had properly prepared her to become a homeowner. The moment she had been working so hard for had finally arrived and on October 5, 2018, she became a first-time homebuyer.   Kendra remarked that “The biggest challenge was staying focused on my goal of finding a decent quality home within my budget. However, I learned to trust and utilize all the tools that RISE provided me. I learned how to budget, save and comprehend the home buying process. Knowing what questions to ask really helped me to feel more confident during this process.”

Becoming a homeowner has come to mean more to Kendra than just buying a home and providing shelter for her family. Kendra says, “when I purchased my home, it gave me a feeling of self-worth that is indescribable. Overall, it is so empowering! I plan to continue to refer my clients to the RISE Save Up program.” With a big smile on her face, Kendra then asked, “when is the next orientation?”

Please make your tax deductible contribution to the RISE Foundation today and directly change the communities of Memphis family by family, the RISE way.