Welcome to Raising Knights! Chances are that you've arrived here from a search for "scholarship for police officers children" or something similar. This post gets more visits than any of my other ones. As a service to other LEO families, I will continue to search and add to this list as I can. Thank you for stopping by!

My husband is a police officer...supporting a family of seven. If you know anything about cops, you must know that their salary is not commensurate with the stress and risk involved and most work an extra job just to make ends meet. With my oldest almost half way through high school, I have begun to look into all of our options regarding college. Of course, the biggie is, how will we pay for it? There are many scholarships available to children of fallen cops, most state agencies have them, so I won't list those here. But what about those with law enforcement officer {LEO} parents who are still alive and actively serving?




STRIVE - Scholarships to Recognize Intelligence, Vision, and Excellence from the Police Officer Defense Fund. Any child of an active, retired, or killed-in-the-line-of-duty law enforcement officer is eligible.

ESA Youth Scholarship - Awarded by the Electronic Security Association. "The program was created to promote goodwill among the electronic systems industry and police and fire officials by providing college scholarship awards to their deserving sons or daughters."

 

Law Enforcement Children's Scholarship - Awarded by Wives Behind the Badge.

America's 911 Foundation, Inc., College Scholarship Fund - Available to children of active First Responders (EMS, Fire, Police), volunteer or paid. There are 15 $2,000 scholarships available. 

 

For Members of Law Enforcement-related Organizations

Blue Knights Scholarship - Blue Knights International, Law Enforcement Motorcycle Club awards five $1000 scholarships each year to children or grandchildren of members.

The Jeanne E. Bray Memorial Scholarship - Awarded by the National Rifle Association. Dependent children of any current or retired police officer who is an active NRA member or who was killed in the line of duty and an NRA member at time of death are eligible.

For Specific Cities or Geographic Regions

Ronnie Williams Foundation - There are three scholarships available for high school seniors living in Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, who are either a child of a law enforcement officer or want to go into law enforcement.

 

FOP Scholarships - Fraternal Order of Police. I was unable to find information on the Grand Lodge's site, but check with your state or local lodge for more information. I did find one for Kentucky.
VPCF College Scholarship Program - Virginia Police Chiefs Foundation awards scholarships to dependents of active police officers in the Commonwealth of Virginia, who are enrolled or have been accepted into a college.
Battle of the Badges Scholarship Fund - For children of active police officers or firefighters serving in Reading, PA or retired or deceased police officers or firefighters who served in Reading. 

Andrew Winzenread Scholarship - Available to all high school seniors who are children of Indiana State Police Officers and who intend to pursue post-secondary education. 

DPOA Scholarship Fund - Eligible recipients must have a parent or step-parent employed by the Detroit Police Department.
WLEOA College Scholarship Program - Eligible recipients must have a parent who is an active member of
the Wisconsin Law Enforcement Officers Association.

AMT Member Child Scholarship - Eligible applicants must be the legal child of an active duty or retired Association of Montana Troopers.
Dearborn Ranch Scholarship for Children of Montana Highway Patrol Officers

Third District Police Partnership Law Enforcement Scholarship - Eligible recipients must be children, biological or adopted, of active Police Officers assigned to St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department's Third District.

Please follow links for details on scholarships/applications. I'll keep adding to it as I come across them. If you know of one that I don't have listed or you find that a link has changed or is no longer active, please leave a comment for me. Thanks!

Challenging Opportunities for Homeschoolers

Surprise! This is not about the challenges OF homeschooling. This is about academic and physical fitness challenges for homeschoolers to participate in. You don't have to belong to a homeschool group to do any of them and your child can achieve recognition, awards, and scholarships. Not to mention that it looks great on a transcript.

If you went to public or private school in the United States, I'm sure you remember doing the President's Fitness Challenge. Sit-ups. Pull-ups. Sit and reach. One mile run. Ring any bells? As homeschoolers, your children, between the ages of 6 and 17, can participate too. You can click here or download the free educators' booklet to see what the requirements are. Your homeschool can go it alone or if you want to try for state recognition, organize other families from your homeschool group (at least 50).

Feeling left out, Mom or Dad? You can participate right along with your children with the Presidential Active Lifestyle Award. You have to buy your own award certificates and patches, of course, but they are very inexpensive (starting at less than a dollar). My older boys are participating this semester with my husband leading them. They have a distinct advantage because Papa Bear used to be a drill sergeant. P.E. credit, check!

The Congressional Award is a personally challenging, non-competitive program for 14-23 year olds. It involves four areas: Volunteer Public Service, Personal Development, Physical Fitness, and Expedition/Exploration. Your student sets his/her own goals, works at their own pace, can build on their own achievements along the way, and have the opportunity for scholarships. Your child would work with a mentor of your choosing (you or a trusted friend) to help keep them accountable and motivated. This looks like an awesome opportunity for a young person who loves to be challenged and is willing to take initiative. P.E. credit, check! Community Service, check! Creatively Named Elective, check!

Looking for a contest in a specific academic area? Looking for scholarships? Homeschool Buyers Coop has a free up-to-date list of contests and scholarships available to students. Wait until you have a chunk of time to sit and go through them. It's a long list. Leave no stone unturned by checking out these unusual scholarships. Homeschooling presents its own challenges, but being excluded from exciting and rewarding opportunities isn't one of them. Sometimes, you just have to put more effort into finding them.

Menu Plan Monday 1/3-9/11

Christmas break is over! Time to get back to our school work and a regular schedule, as much as possible. We haven't been eating fish very much lately so I'm going to try a new recipe on Tuesday. My guys are tired of lemon-pepper salmon. I'll be posting my recipe for Turkey Sausage this week too.

Monday

Breakfast: Soaked oatmeal

Lunch: Turkey sandwiches & fruit

Dinner: Chicken Pot Pie

Tuesday

Breakfast: Smoothies

Lunch: Refried bean and cheese quesadillas

Dinner: Fish sticks & oven fries

Wednesday

Breakfast: Pancakes & Turkey sausage

Lunch: Baked potatoes & salad

Dinner: Chicken Tortilla Soup

Thursday

Breakfast: Scrambled eggs & toast

Lunch: Tuna sandwiches & fruit

Dinner: Italian Chicken & Vegetables

Friday

Breakfast: Soaked oatmeal

Lunch: Egg sandwiches

Dinner: Vegetable Beef Soup

Saturday

Breakfast: Waffles

Lunch: Turkey sandwiches & fruit

Dinner: Tacos & Mexican Rice

Sunday 

Breakfast: Smoothies & Blueberry Oat Muffins

Lunch: Salmon patties & salad

Dinner: Spaghetti w/turkey sausage

Healthy Snacking

With the start of a new year and resolutions being made, I thought I would share a list of healthy snacks for those of you desiring to make healthy changes to your family's lifestyle. Diets for losing weight really only work for the short term, so it's important to make changes to your whole family's daily diet. It will benefit more than your waistline. By instilling healthy eating habits now, while you still have control over what your children eat, you are giving your child the gift of health. Here are some tips before I go any further:

Tip #1: If you want your family to stop eating junk food, you have to STOP buying it. Period. If it's in the house, they will choose Cheetos and Twinkies over yogurt and fruit every time. 

 

Tip #2: Believe me, you are NOT depriving yourself or them. After a period of eating good food, the junk food won't taste quite as good. And if you are feeding them healthier stuff at home, you won't feel as bad when they eat less nutritious things at a party or you eat fast food every once in a while.

Tip #3: Fruit Loops and Lucky Charms are junk food, not a healthy breakfast or a snack food. Adding vitamins and a little whole grain to a vat of sugar and artificial colors doesn't make it healthy. 

Tip #4: Yogurt that is colored like a rainbow, tastes like Key Lime Pie or Chocolate Fudge, or comes in a tube is more like a dessert than a nutritious snack. It has too much sugar, artificial colors, and artificial flavors. If it's artificially sweetened, that just makes it less healthy. Buy a large container of organic plain or vanilla, low-fat yogurt and add fruit and honey to flavor.

We are a family of snackers. So when we made the change (actually, a series of changes) to healthier eating, I had to come up with several healthy alternatives to tame my snacking beasts. I aim for natural, whole foods as much as possible and staple foods that have had minimal processing. In order to maintain my sanity and harmony in our home, I also purchase some convenience foods. But these convenience foods must meet specific criteria to be considered worthy of being eaten by my family.

Here are many of our regular snacks:

• Fresh or frozen fruit - To save money, buy extra berries when in-season and freeze.
• Fresh veggies - Serve with yogurt Ranch dip or hummus.
• Air-popped popcorn - Drizzle with extra virgin olive oil and season with sea salt, lemon pepper, chili powder, nutritional yeast, or your favorite seasoning.
• Organic apple slices or celery and natural peanut butter 
• Fruit smoothies - To add extra nutrition, throw in a few baby carrots, ground flaxseed or chia seeds, yogurt, or probiotic powder. 
• Organic tortilla chips and salsa, black bean dip, or guacamole - Love the salsa at your favorite Mexican restaurant? Ask for the recipe or buy some to take home. It will keep for several days to a week, usually.
• Hummus and pita chips or whole wheat pretzels
• Fruit salad - Combine your choice of chopped apples, pears, oranges or mandarin orange slices, halved grapes, pineapple chunks, diced peaches, and seasonal fruits in a large bowl. Cover and refrigerate to let juices mingle. Add sliced bananas before serving.
• Organic string cheese 
• Hard-boiled eggs - Boil a half dozen or more one day a week to have on hand for snacking, egg salad sandwiches, chef salads, or egg sauce over toast. 
• Organic yogurt - Make your own yogurt. Sweeten plain yogurt with honey or maple syrup or stir in fruit preserves. Replace sour cream with organic whole milk plain Greek yogurt. You can make your own Greek yogurt by straining plain yogurt through cheesecloth.
• Yogurt parfait - Layer yogurt, granola or muesli, and your choice of fresh fruit in a bowl or cup.
• Green salad - Experiment with a variety of greens other than iceberg lettuce, add chopped veggies, dried fruit, nuts/seeds, vinaigrette or homemade dressing. Copy your favorite salads from restaurants. Get kids to eat more salad by setting up a salad bar at home with all the fixings and let them make their own.
• Granola - Homemade is better than store-bought, easy to make, and customizable. 
• Trail mix - Mix up your own by combining your favorite nuts, seeds, dried fruits, coconut, dark chocolate chips. One of our favorites includes almonds, pumpkin seeds, dried cranberries, coconut chips, and dark chocolate chips.
• Nuts and seeds - Raw, roasted, or soaked and dehydrated. Try pecans, walnuts, almonds, cashews, pumpkin seeds, hazelnuts, Brazil nuts.
• Whole grain muffins - "Healthify" a favorite recipe by replacing all or some of the oil with applesauce, reducing or replacing some of the sugar with honey, or substituting whole wheat pastry flour. Try my banana, blueberry oat, or pumpkin chocolate chip muffins.
• Natural peanut butter (or other nut butter) on whole grain toast - Spread a thin layer of nut butter on warm toast, it just melts in. Yum! Make your own peanut butter.
• Natural applesauce - Read the ingredients because most applesauce has high fructose corn syrup added. Choose organic or make your own applesauce.
• Frozen juice pops - We like homemade with 100% juice or leftover smoothie, but there are several organic/natural ones at many grocery stores. 

Do you have a favorite healthy snack? 

Do you have any questions about making healthy changes to your family's diet? 

My Cup of Tea

A friend introduced me to the loveliness of hot tea about 12 years ago. We worked together in a cubicle in an accounting office and Sam was the type of young woman every one else envied. Always put together. Perfect manners. Confident. At ease with anyone and always knew what to say in any situation. Educated. She was working on her masters in Political Science, I believe. She had been an Army brat and had traveled the world with her family. She even kept a toothbrush kit in her purse and brushed her teeth after lunch every day. Sophisticated is the word that comes to mind when I think of Sam. And, of course, she drank herbal tea. 

While I worked there, I seemed to get sick quite often. It was in an old annex building for a hospital and I'm quite certain it (and we) suffered from "sick building syndrome". I'm sure that it didn't help that I ate out of the vending machine daily. I wasn't yet a healthy food convert. Sam kept tea bags stashed in her desk drawer along with a mug and a bottle of honey. She encouraged me to try some hot herbal tea with honey once while I was sick. It was wonderful and ever since then, I have been a tea drinker. Even my sons love hot tea now (except my oldest). Papa Bear prefers sweet iced tea and never really cared for hot tea until he spent his time in Afghanistan, where it's a daily custom and it would have been rude to refuse. They call their tea "chai", even though what Papa Bear drank was an Earl Grey blend. He even brought his little glass mug and several boxes of tea home and enjoys a cup on occasion, reminiscing.

Well, the inspiration for this post is my raging sore throat. Each winter, our family gets one really nasty bug that everyone in town seems to be sharing and we have had it the past couple of weeks. It started with NG, who had a mild case, then spread to IB, then LJ and M2 developed croup, then Papa Bear...and, now, I have it. My throat is so sore that I can barely swallow and am scared to cough even a little. My husband thinks it's a little strange that I have been scratching my neck like crazy too. Coincidentally, I had to take Levi to the minor emergency care center last New Year's Day for strep throat. The first thing I did when I got out of bed this morning was boil some water for tea. One of my favorite teas right now is Chai green tea with raw honey and a little almond milk. With the first swallow of that warm, spicy, sweet drink, my throat felt so much better. I was already thinking about my second cup before I finished the first. More Chai? Or peppermint? Or chamomile? I have considered more complex teas, such as Traditional Medicinals' Throat Coat, but they contain herbs that are not recommended during breastfeeding.*

I love a cup of hot tea. It just makes me feel calm and relaxed, even when the little tornados are whirling around the house undoing everything I just did. Well, as long as I close my eyes while drinking it. Some people prefer coffee or sodas, but not me. Coffee leaves an unpleasant aftertaste and will upset my stomach. Sodas just aren't good for you. Period. And do you know what I choose when I want something cold to drink that isn't water or juice? Sweet iced tea. 

Are you a tea drinker? What are your favorite varieties?

*Please do the research before taking any herbs if you are pregnant or breastfeeding or have any underlying health conditions. Natural does NOT always mean safe.