What does the scholarship fund?

This scholarship offers financial assistance to people wanting to attend the COTC, CREF’s world-renowned, comprehensive training on compost operations. Attending these 5-day, on-site trainings can be a financial barrier for some, especially for start-up companies and individuals from underserved backgrounds. In order to enable more people to benefit from attending a COTC, up to two scholarships are offered for each scheduled training, as funding allows.

Apply for a Scholarship

Applicants must provide their submission no later than 6 weeks before their desired course’s start date; deadlines for each course are posted on the first page of the application. If you would like to be considered for more than one upcoming COTC, a separate application must be submitted for each. Application review takes into account financial need and the impact that attending a COTC will have on an applicant’s career and/or the industry overall. This scholarship will cover 50% of the registration fee cost.

SCHOLARSHIP ELIGIBILITY REQUIREMENTS

1. All applications must be completed entirely in English.
2. The names of scholarship recipients who are foreign citizens will be checked against the Specially Designated Nationals List, which is a terrorist watch list maintained by the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC).
3. Applicants must not have a family or business relationship with any director or officer of the CREF.

Application Questions

APPLY HERE

Tumar and Chris with COTC facilitator, Shawn Bruckman

Recent Awardees

The latest recipients of the Cary Oshins Scholarship were Christopher Trullaz (from Durango, CO) and Tumar Tolkynkyzy (from Astana, Kazakhstan). They attended our October 2023 training in San Marcos, TX. Click the link below to learn more about our awardees to date!

Meet the Cary Oshins Scholarship Winners

Celebrating Cary’s Legacy

In spring of 2023, Cary Oshins retired after serving many years as CREF’s Education Director. Over decades, Cary dedicated his career to creating and growing valuable, meaningful education programs for the compost industry and beyond. Cary was instrumental in developing and launching the COTC with input from industry experts, and acted as the lead facilitator for more than 40 trainings.

Cary was an advocate for increased access to composting education programs and diversity in the industry. To honor his hard work and dedication, CREF launched the Cary Oshins Training Scholarship upon his retirement to continue his vision of making exceptional composting education available to anyone who is passionate about sustainably managing organic resources and creating amazing compost.