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Earth Day 2023 will land on April 22nd this year, right around the corner! For better or for worse, this planet is our home. It’s ours to take care of.   In the middle of your semester, you may not have much time to think of your carbon footprint. Not to worry, in honor of Earth Day, we’ve collected some ways you can live sustainably as a student.     Use what you have – then recycle it  The best part about living sustainably is that the number one rule is the most affordable of all: use what you already have. Consuming less is one of the biggest ways to reduce environmental waste. It will also save you money! By waiting to buy until you’ve completely used up a product, you will find yourself making fewer purchases. And don’t forget to rinse out and recycle what you’ve finished!   Not sure how to recycle? Find out what the recycling guidelines are in your area and where your nearest drop-offs are here.    Make sustainable swaps  As you begin to use up products you already have over time, try researching greener alternatives to replace them with. For single use items, (tissues, cotton buds, etc.) try shopping for biodegradable replacements that won’t stay in landfills forever.   Challenge yourself to choose items that contain less plastic in their packaging, such as glass, aluminum, or cardboard.   Explore sites like Earth Hero that act as a database for all types of sustainable products. You can filter your searches by ethics such as cruelty free, vegan, or zero waste!    Take baby steps  Living sustainably isn’t easy. There’s a lot of changes involved, and it can be intimidating! Remember that no one expects you to become an environmental expert overnight. Even the smallest changes can decrease your carbon footprint and the waste accumulating in your community's landfills.   You can start your sustainability journey by taking baby steps. Keep some reusable shopping bags in your car for your next trip to the store. Bring your own to-go mug to your favorite coffee shop. Choose for receipts to be emailed to you instead of printed at the register. The opportunities to live green are endless!  Need more Earth Day inspo? Try listening to an eco-savvy podcast! How to Save a Planet is a great one.     Reduce the packaging from your grocery trips  Next time you run to the supermarket (with your reusable bags, of course), consider buying some of your most used items in bulk. Purchasing your groceries in bulk eliminates packaging and plastic waste that end up in the trash. This new way of shopping can save you money and takes up less space in your home.   Not sure if that’s an option in your area? Check out Litterless for a list of bulk grocery stores and compost sites by state.     As cliché it sounds, there is no “planet B”. Protecting our home and community happens one change at a time. Each sustainable swap you make can save up to thousands of not-so-eco-friendly purchases in your lifetime. The process is tricky but so worth it for Earth. Give living sustainably as a student a try – Happy Earth Day! 

There are several ways to get student loans, with a cosigner or without. Read how to get a student loan here to learn more.

Subsidized and unsubsidized loans are part of the federal direct loan program and offer students various loan options. Learn more.

Congratulations to Harsimran Sandhu, our $10,000 Pursue Your Dream Contest winner! We asked students to share their ambitions in a 30-90 second video and explain how they plan to use the money to reach their dreams. Harsimran won over the Ascent team with his heartfelt submission about growing up as a first-generation college student with a passion for storytelling through film.  You can watch Harsimran’s winning video here – and continue reading to learn what he’s been up to since winning the contest.    How Harsimran turned his dream into a reality  Harsimran describes his motivations behind his submission by explaining, “Our parents worked so hard to get us here; what are we going to do with it? And there is very much a stereotype of immigrant parents being like, ‘Hey, don't follow your dreams…be a computer engineer or doctor.’ But I wanted to shine light on the opposite end of that.”  Since winning the contest, Harsimran is has been busy producing a film inspired by his life experience. He hopes to connect with similar students through his story. The $10,000 reward from Ascent helped Harsimran fund the completion of his film and cover entry fees for film festivals around the world.  Why he’s sharing his story to inspire others    His mother was one of his motivations behind the film he is working on, and its title, Pulp. “One of my biggest sources of inspiration was this idea that food is how our cultures show their love. Growing up every morning, my mom would peel me an orange and just set it next to my desk. And she wouldn't say anything. And that's definitely one of the biggest themes in this movie is our main character, Jasmine. She's struggling with this idea of, ‘Of course, I know my mom loves me, but does she really? It was never said in that way.’"   Prior to entering Ascent’s contest, Harsimran struggled to feel comfortable pursuing his true passion – film. His parents made great efforts to give him the opportunity to attend college. He didn’t want to throw that away by choosing an unpredictable career path. As a result, he decided to become a business major, hoping to eventually land a traditional, stable career.  But Harsimran wasn’t sure this was the right journey for him. Grappling with feelings of guilt over potentially disappointing his parents and simultaneously wanting to use his educational experiences to pursue his passions left him at a crossroads. Harsimran talked through his ideas with his parents to help them understand what he truly wanted out of life. He hoped they would see that even though there were potential risks in choosing a less traditional career, there were ways to minimize the danger. And they understood. Harsimran wants others in similar situations to understand is there are people out there who can relate to the experience. “I really don't want this to be a story just to be a story. I want it to connect with people. I want people to hear about my story, hear this story, they feel less alone in this world.” He hopes to show others that “we put a lot of pressure on ourselves to succeed, and we just need to know that it'll be okay.”  No matter who you are, you can achieve your dreams.    Advice for other student filmmakers and beyond  Harsimran learned about the Ascent Pursue Your Dreams Contest by being active and engaged at his university. His advice to other students looking for a path to their dreams is, “Be proactive. Communicating with others at your school and beyond can pay off, opening doors you didn’t even know existed.”  The Pursue Your Dreams Contest may be over, but Ascent is proud to offer over $80,000 in scholarships for college and career training students every year. Apply for a scholarship today or follow us on Instagram for more scholarship opportunities and tips for students. Watch the video below to see Harsimran meet the Ascent team and connect with him using the links if​​ you’re interested in keeping up with his journey.  Website (under construction): https://hsandhu0186.myportfolio.com  Instagram: @simasandhini  TikTok:@harsimransandhu173  Instagram for the film: @pulp_shortfilm   [embed]https://youtu.be/tSWq_R6Q8aI[/embed]

Everyone’s tech journey looks different. For Rain Robinson, his journey started with a Full Stack Engineering bootcamp. Rain used his bootcamp experience to build a platform to educate others through his own interpretations of lessons he learned along the way. Below, Rain answers a few questions about the tech industry and the platform he’s created.   Why tech? What made you choose this field?  Before working in tech, I worked in the music industry. I worked my way up from an intern to a Digital Brand Manager. This involved a lot of tech in the form of crafting digital experiences for artists' audiences. Many of these digital experiences revolved around website building or gathering data. Through these experiences, I fell in love with building websites and learning about how the technology worked.   Once Covid hit, the music industry took a dive. I kept working in the music industry for a while after things began to shut down, but I was overworked, overstressed, overwhelmed, and had a clear vision of what it would mean for my life if I wanted to be successful in the music industry. There were sacrifices there that I didn’t want to make to reach the level of success I wanted to. So, I tapped back into my passion of learning more about tech and started messing around with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. I decided to enroll in a bootcamp and take my passion more seriously.   Share some of the roles you have been involved in throughout your tech career.  During my 3-year career in tech, I’ve held positions as a Manual Quality Assurance Engineer, a Software Engineer in Test, and a DevOps Engineer. However, my bootcamp was for Full Stack Engineering.  Talk for a minute about your personal brand – how did this come about?  When you’re learning something, the best way to solidify your knowledge of the topic is to teach it. This got me thinking that if I really wanted to retain everything I was learning, I should start a blog discussing the topics I am learning. By doing this, I’m consolidating my understanding of a topic by forcing myself to think through the topic in a blog article. Blogging allows me to open myself up to networking opportunities like this one with Ascent and demonstrate my knowledge to potential employers.  While building a platform for your love of the tech industry, what have you learned along the way?  A lot of people are deterred by the fear they can't offer anything unique when starting their own platform. But that’s not true. It may seem like everyone you follow is talking about the same thing. This is because the algorithms have deduced what you like and show you the content they know you’ll engage with. This gives us the appearance that everyone online is talking about AI and ML and ChatGPT. But there are people in your circle that don’t see the same content you do. Having that realization gave me the confidence that I can have a unique take on what I’m learning and the wayI present it will be different from someone talking about something similar.   Additionally, it’s great to have a chronology of what you’ve worked on in your career as well as already written out how-to guides. You have your own handbook of topics you can refer to.   What was your college experience like in your area of study?  I originally went to college for Environmental Science but then switched to a Philosophy major. I then transferred to Berklee to finish my degree, ultimately landing me with a Bachelors in Music Business and Management. After working in the music industry for 10+ years, and Covid coming around, I then went to a bootcamp for Full Stack Engineering.   From the moment I started, I was fascinated. I knew that I loved learning, which is another reason I chose tech. There is an infinite amount to learn, and I knew I loved puzzles. During my bootcamp, I was taught how I could approach the puzzles and patterns in tech and push myself to learn more. The experience instilled in me a sense of growth mindset: the mindset that states that you just don’t know how to do something yet. This is a powerful tool in defeating imposter syndrome. The experience also left me with a sense of hope. It showed I could do something really challenging (8 hours of coding every day in addition to homework and practice problems) and still really love the process.   Did you have any mentors or role models that helped you to be where you are now?  Yes, there are many people I thank often for giving me the ability to be where I am today. I think mentorship is a crucial part of anyone’s career and personal development. If you have goals you’ve set, there are people out there that have achieved that goal and can guide you to the endzone. Otherwise, there are people who just have more experience and can offer general advice to help you make difficult decisions in your life. Either way, it’s important to have a support network you can turn to for advice.   Any advice you would give to a student considering the tech industry?  This advice was given to me when I was considering the tech industry as a new career path: If you enjoy puzzles, the proposition that you can always learn new things, and challenging yourself to be at least 1% better than you were yesterday, then the tech industry is a wonderful place for you.   The second bit of advice I’d give is you don’t need math. Don’t let that turn you off from a promising career in tech. My wife and I often joke about the fact that I got a B in math for musicians (essentially an accounting class) and I’m now a Software Engineer.  Also, just get your foot in the door. I didn’t know anything about SDET or DevOps when I started coding and now that’s my focus in tech. If you are eager to learn and provide value to the company, you can start out anywhere and still obtain a position you love. When starting out in tech, whether self-taught or coming from a bootcamp, you’re often not exposed to the Software Development Life Cycle. There's always much more going on in each company than what you learn in school.  Do you have any career goals for the year 2023?  This year I’m challenging myself to learn DevOps more in depth with each quarter having a loose theme. The first quarter of the year is dedicated to Ruby and Chef - a configuration management tool. The rest of the year is split between learning more Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) tools, AWS infrastructure and Infrastructure as Code (IaC), and Dockerization. Many of these tools and technologies I already work with daily or weekly but want to get a better grasp on their full capabilities.   Here at Ascent, we love promoting our people. Where can you be found? Drop some links and share any upcoming projects!  Checkout my blog rainswerld.com for articles on topics and tools I’m learning about. Follow my Instagram @tech_with_rain for short form content about what I’m learning.  

As scary as the word "taxes" may sound, it’s never too early for you to learn to do your own taxes, and you might even get some extra dollars in your pocket.

College has been some of the best few years of my life and I've learned a lot along the way working toward my own success.

  Everyone’s path to a career they love looks different. No one knows this better than Cruz Sanchez, a bootcamp graduate who found his way into the tech industry with the help of Ascent’s career training loan program. Below, Cruz shares with us some insight into his process of getting involved with bootcamps and what his work looks like today.   Why tech? What made you choose this field?   Well, to be honest I didn't start down this career path initially. Once I graduated high school, I thought I would be a welder and mechanic for the rest of my life. In 2018 I found myself working for a company I hated and was looking for a way out of the blue-collar industry. I heard about TrueCoders on the radio one morning and decided to give it a shot. Growing up, I always wanted to be a video game developer or work with computers in some capacity, but I thought you had to go through a 4-year degree program, so I didn't pursue it; I would later find out that isn't the case.       What was your educational experience like in your area of study? Which programs have helped you get to where you are now?   Prior to TrueCoders, I only had a High School Diploma. I was and still am strongly against going to college unless you're planning on being a surgeon or something like that. The only program I have ever done in this industry is TrueCoders.      How did you go about finding your loan and what advice would you give to someone else looking to fund their own bootcamp experience?   I learned about the Ascent loan once I started the application process to join TrueCoders. I highly recommend using Ascent to fund your tuition for attending our class. The process is very straightforward, and the terms are great for students with just about any budget. If you cannot get funding alone, you can reapply with a credit-worthy co-signer, like I did.      While building a career for your love of the tech industry, what have you learned along the way?   The biggest thing I have learned is that software developers can solve just about any problem thrown their way, and that's not limited to just coding-related problems. Being a software developer changes the way you think about and approach an issue; in addition to that, you have the skills to find an answer to just about any question.     Do you have any career goals for the year 2023?   One thing I love about being with TrueCoders is that I can positively impact people's lives. I always said that if there is someone that is feeling the way I did about my career in 2018, I want to be able to assist that person because I know how it feels to be in that situation. My goal is to better as many lives as I can.    Here at Ascent, we love promoting our people. Follow Cruz on his LinkedIn to learn more about the work he does and his journey into tech.  

If you could go back in time to be an incoming freshman again and give yourself one piece of advice, what would you tell yourself and why?

A cosigner is someone who takes legal responsibility for a loan in addition to the primary borrower. Learn more about student loan cosigners.

If you're attending graduate school, our step-by-step guide will help you figure out where to start with the loan application process.