Insureon Announces Winners of Small Business, Big Impact Scholarship

Joseph Katula and Margaret Manto each receive $2,500 for essays on their favorite small businesses.

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May 01, 2015, 09:00 ET

CHICAGO, May 1, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Insureon, the nation's leading online provider of small business insurance, today announced the winners of its latest scholarship competition: Margaret Manto of Charlottesville, Virginia, and Joseph Katula of Yorkville, Illinois. Their essays were chosen from a pool of nearly 200. Both will receive $2,500 toward their educational expenses.

Joseph, who plans to study biomedical engineering at Case Western Reserve University, wrote about Yorkville Laundromat, which supported him in his efforts to provide clothing for the children of Yorkville. During the foreclosure crisis, Joseph saw that children in his county whose parents had lost their jobs and homes often lacked basic necessities. He and his siblings founded Yorkville Cares 4 Kids, an organization to collect clothing from schools' lost and founds and distribute it to food pantries for pickup. Before distribution, Joseph and his siblings wanted to clean and repair the clothes. Enter Yorkville Laundromat, which donated washing machine time when Joseph's family's machines couldn't handle the load.

Margaret, who will attend MIT, wrote about Atlas Coffee, a café owned by her mother that she's worked at for years. In her essay, she described her mother's drive, resilience, and hard work as she kept Atlas Coffee running even when circumstances (including the closure of a nearby bridge) made that difficult. A student of robotics and an arranger for her a cappella group, Margaret described how her mother's attitude of going the extra mile to make things work has guided her academic career.

"What really struck us about these essays was the commitment to service," said Ted Devine, Insureon's CEO. "Serving customers, serving a community, serving a larger goal – that's obviously a guiding principle they learned from the small businesses they admire and something that's invaluable to businesses that want to engage with the people and communities they serve."

For complete essays and information about the winners, visit the InsureonU scholarship page. The next scholarship essay competition opens on Monday, May 4: http://www.insureon.com/insureonu/small-business-scholarship/.

About Insureon

Insureon, the nation's leading online provider of insurance for small businesses, offers six scholarships per year through InsureonU. To promote growth in the small business community it serves, it runs Small Business Heroes, which offers grants to small-business owners.

SOURCE Insureon