Alumni Profile: Shawntelle Fisher Photo courtesy of UMSL Daily
Profiled in UMSL Daily in May 2015, Shawntelle Fisher is one of the most amazing people to complete the Honors Certificate. She graduated in spring 2015, with degrees in Media Studies and Educational Studies, as well as a Social Work minor. And she did all of this while she was also getting SoulFisher Ministries, her non-profit organization that supports children of incarcerated parents and women recently released from incarceration, up and running. Dan Gerth and Ed Munn Sanchez were fortunate to be able to catch up with Shawntelle last September at Drake’s in Ferguson. What is it that brought you to UMSL and the Honors College? It was summer 2013 and I was preparing for graduation from St. Louis Community College at Flo Valley and I was a member of the Phi Theta Kappa Honors Society. They have the Missouri Academic scholarship competition, which provides a full tuition scholarship for your next degree. And I actually won the competition! So it was a no-brainer; I’m going to UMSL for free! Then, through the UMSL application process, I heard about the Honors College. I spent a lot of time in the writing lab at Flo, and I thought Honors would a great opportunity for me to continue growing as a writer, not ever knowing that I was going to be running a non-profit, writing grants, etc. And I was accepted. Then you’re at UMSL and the Honors College, and you start enrolling in a huge number of classes. You completed 102 credit hours in 4 semesters and 2 summers! Two degrees, a minor, a certificate, and a 3.98 GPA, right? [Laughing] Yes! How in the world did you do that? You completed 24 credit hours one semester. I had to petition to take this course overload. They [College of Arts and Sciences] said “absolutely not.” And so I’m upset now because I know what I can do. You all don’t know me well enough to say what I can and what I can’t do! And so a college administrator said that when a graduate student wants to take a course overload, they have to put it in writing and be able to articulate why. So I did, and they granted it. And after that, they just automatically approved everything [laughing]!
Why so fast? And why so much? Because I was older than the rest of the students, and I didn’t have a lot of time to explore, like they did. I was also getting the SoulFisher Ministries up and running. And so I was just really trying to move as quickly as I could through my program. But, while still, you know, maintaining a strong academic standing. It took a lot of perseverance. It took a lot of sleepless nights. It took a lot of early mornings. But I was able to do it and do it well. You were also active in a lot of student organizations too, right? UMSL Ambassadors, Golden Key, Phi Kappa Phi. I helped with the Honors Alumni Trivia Nights too. I just felt that it was important to not just be engaged in my outside community, but to also be engaged with the campus community too. It didn’t seem like networking at the time. I was just doing it because I liked the organizations and their missions. But now when I reach out to people on campus, they always respond with “Sure I’ll help. I remember you. What can I do?” Even the Chancellor! He knew me because I was always right next to him as an Ambassador. So when I started asking him for sponsorship assistance, especially with our gala or gold tournament events for the Ministries, he said “of course.” When I graduated, I had so many different tassels, sashes, and other robe accessories that they wouldn’t let me wear all of them! You were already starting SoulFischer Ministries while you were at UMSL too,
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right? Can you tell us a little bit about the process? I incorporated it while I was at Flo Valley. It was after a leadership course there that I wrote up and pitched the business plan, which didn’t get great reviews at the time. But I persevered and we started major operations while I was at UMSL. In 2013, I reached out to a CPA that I found online. I just googled “CPAs” and just called and asked “how do you do a 501c3?” And we talked, and he liked the ideas. He helped me finish the application and in 2014 we had 501c3 status. Since then, we’ve just taken off. We started programming in the fall of 2014. That year I think our annual budget was $15,000. Last year, our budget was $1.3 million. That’s how SoulFischer Ministries was started. We were amazed when reading about all of the grants you have received since the organization started. I think I read about a recent one for $350,000. That was partial funding for one year. We actually got $1.5 million for over 5 years, which was a DESE [Department of Elementary and Secondary Education] grant. There was also a $500,000 DOJ [Department of Justice] grant recently. Do you write the grant proposals? I do. I’m the grant writer charged with that, as the CEO. So I write all of our grants, watch and monitor all of the grants, report on all the funding, report to the auditors, and all of that. What’s your recipe for success?