The Horatio Alger Society (H.A.S.) funds one (or more) "Strive and Succeed" awards every year to graduating high school seniors who have overcome significant adversity in their lives. The Strive and Succeed recipient(s) are selected by the convention host(s) for that year and will be graduating seniors local to the hosting city.
In Horatio Alger's time, the United States was the land of opportunity: through hard work, perserverance, ethical conduct, and some luck, any immigrant, poor farmer's son, homeless street child, or any other underprivileged young person could rise to economic comfort and respectability.
This is still true today: no other country at any time in history has consistently offered the same social and economic mobility as the United States. The H.A.S. attempts to instill an awareness of this uniqueness to Strive and Succeed award recipients in hopes of further encouraging them to rise to success.
Click here to read about the 2007 Strive and Succeed Award winner.
If you are interested in making a donation to the 2008 Strive and Succeed award and you have a PayPal account, please do the following:
If you do not have a PayPal account, please contact Robert E. Kasper, or send your donation check (made out to 'Horatio Alger Society') including a note that the check is a donation for the 2008 'Strive and Succeed' award, to: