Overcoming the Odds: No student loans, secured $8 million dollars in HBCU scholarships.

Two-time Emmy and Three-time NAACP Image Award-winning television Executive Producer Rushion McDonald interviewed Douglass Fort.  He founded The Blerd Academy (Black Nerds).  It’s a wealth building program that helps High-Achieving Black-American youth get scholarships to HBCU’s. They have secured over $8 million dollars in scholarships!  Please welcome to Money Making Conversations Master Class Douglass Fort.

Why did you start the Academy? What are some outcomes of the Academy? Why should the Black-American community highlight our nerds?

· Since 2016 Fort has secured $8 million in scholarships for 63 high-achieving Black American students. Full-ride and tuition-only scholarships to HBCUs through graduate school.
· PJ’s sister, Marissa, also went through the program. She graduated Cum Laude from Hampton University with a degree in Accounting, earned a Master’s degree from Columbia University all debt-free, and now works for Deloitte in New York City.
· Other success stories: A Tennessee State U graduate now works in the front office for the NFL’s Chicago Bears.
· Two are Obama-Cheskey Voyager scholars.
· Fort says: “We don’t talk enough about Black scientists, mathematicians, and doctors. Only 1% of athletes make it to the NFL. We’re hustling backward having our kids focus on sports over education.”
· Criteria for the students he assists: a 3.5 GPA, a 28 ACT score, or a 1300 SAT score for a full-ride scholarship, or a minimum 3.2 GPA, a 23 ACT score, or an 1130 SAT score for tuition-only scholarships. AP and/or Honors classes, community service, and school leadership is also beneficial.
· Since the 2023 U.S. Supreme Court ruling of Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President and Fellows of Harvard College and Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. University of North Carolina struck down Affirmative Action in college admissions Fort has been busy.
· Several HBCUs saw a surge in applications, including Washington D.C.’s Howard University, Clark-Atlanta University, which outpaced the University of Georgia, and Florida Agricultural Mechanical University (FAMU).
· Fort says: Parents just don’t know there is money and resources at these institutions for their high-achieving students, but they should because their kids have excelled in the classroom, and they deserve it.”

MONEY MAKING CONVERSATIONS TALKING POINTS
Guest: Douglass J. Fort, Founder, The BLERD Academy
· Grew up in East Palo Alto, California
· Liked school but got caught up in the streets
· Was shot as a teen.
· A childhood friend suggested he apply to Jackson State University. When he was accepted, hesitated, but did go.
· Graduated from JSU. A Criminal Justice Major/Urban Affairs/Development minor. After graduation, he returned to East Palo Alto where he started the violence prevention program, For Youth By Youth.
· Worked with law enforcement to help clean up Black neighborhoods.
· His son received a full-ride athletic scholarship to Morehouse College but turned it down to play Division 1 Football at a PWI, and never played.
· Doug was heartbroken that his son turned down Morehouse. A close friend told him he had to get over it and focus on kids who wanted the HBCU experience.
· Founded The BLERD Academy, a combination of the words Black and Nerd in 2016 in Oakland; a non-profit wealth-building program that assists high-achieving Black American students graduate, debt-free from more than 100 HBCUs.
· Found the first BLERD while working at a Bay Area JSU Black College Expo booth. It was 6’5 honor roll student, Phillip Patrick Jr. who had a 3.6 GPA and 28 ACT score. Fort offered him a full-ride Presidential scholarship to Jackson State on the spot.
· Phillip Patrick had played baseball all his life and thought he would have to continue playing in college on scholarship. When he received the full-ride, he told his mother he no longer wanted to play baseball, he wanted to be a brain surgeon.
· Patrick Jr. majored in Biology Pre-Med and graduated from JSU in 2020. He is now in the 3rd year of a five-year medical program at UC Irvine Medical School where he will receive his Master’s in Public Health and Medical Degree in Cardiac Anesthesiology. UC Irvine is fully financing his medical
degree. He is engaged to a fellow Blerd who graduated from Howard University and is in Medical School at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. Also debt free.
· Fort advises his kids to leverage their B.L.E.R.D and secure their bag of money through graduate school.
· He is especially passionate about young Black men from tough neighborhoods like he came from.
· He is a big proponent of kids buying property as early as possible.
· Fort says: “This is a spiritual calling. My mission is to rebuild our community, and it starts with young men because they are the ones who will be the providers for their families. We exist as an organization to build a healthy community that is Black, Educated, Resourceful, and Determined, and we are doing it one B.L.E.R.D at a time.”
· Website: www.theblerdacademy.com, Instagram: TheBlerdAcademy

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