  {"id":103594,"date":"2019-09-18T16:33:09","date_gmt":"2019-09-19T02:33:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=103594"},"modified":"2020-01-13T15:09:31","modified_gmt":"2020-01-14T01:09:31","slug":"uh-bookstores-15-to-finish-winners","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2019\/09\/18\/uh-bookstores-15-to-finish-winners\/","title":{"rendered":"<abbr title=\"University of Hawaii\">UH<\/abbr> Bookstores provide free books to 15-to-Finish winners"},"content":{"rendered":"<span class=\"span-reading-time rt-reading-time\" style=\"display: block;\"><span class=\"rt-label rt-prefix\">Reading time: <\/span> <span class=\"rt-time\"> 2<\/span> <span class=\"rt-label rt-postfix\">minutes<\/span><\/span><figure id=\"attachment_103597\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-103597\" style=\"width: 250px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/system-bookstores-textbooks-2019.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"250\" height=\"350\" class=\"size-full wp-image-103597\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/system-bookstores-textbooks-2019.jpg 250w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/system-bookstores-textbooks-2019-93x130.jpg 93w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/system-bookstores-textbooks-2019-214x300.jpg 214w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 250px) 100vw, 250px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-103597\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Joshua Hooper with his free scholarship books<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>This semester 19 students from University of <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Âé¶¹´«Ã½<\/span> campuses across the state were selected as winners of free books as part of the <a href=\"https:\/\/15tofinish.com\/bookstore-promotion\/\">15-to-Finish <abbr title=\"University of Hawaii\">UH<\/abbr> Bookstores Promotion<\/a>. This program encourages incoming freshmen to take 15 credits per semester or 30 credits in a year to graduate on time.<\/p>\n<p><abbr>UH<\/abbr> M\u0101noa civil engineering sophomore <strong>Joshua Hooper<\/strong> saved more than $350 on his textbooks this semester. &ldquo;Getting free textbooks was unexpected and I was surprised when I found out,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;This really helped to save me money this semester, and I was able to get the hardcover textbooks that I wanted, which I find makes it easier for me to learn.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>When <abbr>UH<\/abbr> Maui College student <strong>John Denver Maglaya<\/strong> stopped by the bookstore for his free books worth close to $300 he said, &ldquo;I\u2019m really appreciative as it is very helpful. This scholarship will help me pursue my degree and succeed through the semester and it will also help promote better studying.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>All freshmen who earned at least 30 credits last academic year and were in good standing (minimum 2.0 cumulative <abbr title=\"grade point average\">GPA<\/abbr>) by May 31, 2019 were eligible for a drawing to win free textbooks for the fall 2019 semester. Winners were randomly selected from a pool of more than a thousand eligible students across the university system. Incoming freshmen completing 30 credits or more this 2019&#8211;20 academic year will be eligible for next year\u2019s drawing for free textbooks.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;We appreciate the <abbr>UH<\/abbr> Bookstores\u2019 willingness to partner with us and promote the 15-to-Finish campaign,&rdquo; said <strong>Donald O. Straney<\/strong>, <abbr>UH<\/abbr> System vice president for academic planning and policy. &rdquo;The evidence shows that students who take 15 credits each semester, earning 30 credits per year are more likely to graduate, and they also will graduate on time (four years for a bachelor\u2019s degree and two years for an associate degree). Additionally, they earn better grades, are more likely to continue on to the next semester, and to complete more of their courses,&rdquo; he said.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;This is our sixth year in partnering with the <abbr>UH<\/abbr> System\u2019s 15-to-Finish initiative and we are proud to be able to award free textbooks to these deserving students,&rdquo; said <strong>Tricia Ejima-Zane<\/strong>, <abbr>UH<\/abbr> bookstores director. &ldquo;This important program is one of the ways that the bookstores give back to our university community.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/15tofinish.com\/\">15-to-Finish campaign<\/a> is part of the <a href=\"http:\/\/blog.hawaii.edu\/hawaiigradinitiative\/\"><span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Âé¶¹´«Ã½<\/span> Graduation Initiative<\/a>, a systemwide initiative to increase the number of <abbr>UH<\/abbr> graduates to meet the state\u2019s 55 by \u201925 goal, which strives to have 55 percent of working age adults hold a two- or four-year degree by the year 2025. For more information about the promotion, <a href=\"https:\/\/15tofinish.com\/bookstore-promotion\/\">go to the 15-to-Finish website<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Winners were randomly selected from a pool of more than a thousand eligible students across the university system.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[315,460,9,60,947],"class_list":["post-103594","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community","tag-15-to-finish","tag-uh-bookstore","tag-uh-manoa","tag-maui-college","tag-uh-system","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103594","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=103594"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103594\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":103600,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103594\/revisions\/103600"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=103594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=103594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=103594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}