Scholarships

Michigan Auto Law Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship

2024 Injury Survivor Scholarship Winner, Elizabeth Yockey

The Michigan Auto Law Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship is an annual scholarship that our attorneys offer college students who were innocent victims of car accidents earlier in their lives and who have bravely overcome their injuries while pursuing an education.

Our annual scholarship of $1,000 is awarded to one winner. The deadline is December 31st.

Through our Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship, we strive to honor those innocent victims injured in an automobile crash as they continue to courageously persevere through their own medical recoveries and as they push forward to continue their education. We have witnessed some amazing stories of human resilience. These people have already achieved so much and we are excited for what they can achieve in the future.

Our hope is also that by recognizing outstanding young people who have overcome serious challenges, that we can provide inspiration and hope to others who are also going through a difficult recovery after a car accident.

This Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship has special significance to us. As auto accident attorneys, we wanted to create a scholarship based on our own experience helping innocent automobile crash victims. An automobile crash can be a life-changing event. Often, an initial injury is compounded by how people are subsequently mistreated, often by their own insurance companies when they are denied benefits or when they are cut-off from necessary No-Fault benefits like wage loss or being able to see a doctor to treat for injuries.

This year we are honored to recognize Elizabeth Yockey who is a second-year engineering student at the University of Washington as the winner of our 2024 Michigan Auto Law Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship.

Congratulations to Elizabeth. We applaud your perseverance and strength of character. We are grateful to you for sharing your inspiring story with us and with countless others. We applaud you for the hope you bring.

To learn more about the Michigan Auto Law Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship and the challenges that our 2024 scholarship winner is facing with courage and determination, please read on.

What is the Michigan Auto Law Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship?

As attorneys, we understand how difficult it can be to recover after a serious car accident injury.

This is especially true for young people in the prime of their lives.

In order to recognize their struggles overcoming hardship and acts of heroism and hard work, Michigan Auto Law offers its annual Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship to college students who were innocent victims of car accidents at some point in their lives and who have overcome their injuries to pursue an education.

Our attorneys have been helping innocent people injured in auto accidents for more than 50 years, and want to lend a hand to those who have survived serious crashes and who are demonstrating resolve and determination to rebuild their lives.

Our Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship serves as an important reminder that each and every person injured in an auto accident is a person, not a number or a claim. Today, most of the insurance industry uses injury claims software that dehumanizes people by putting a dollar value on a case. When personal injuries and pain and suffering are given an average, or median dollar settlement value based on a given geographic area by a computer program, we lose sight of the most important thing of all: what a life-altering car accident means to a person who’s life has now been upended.

Eligibility and selection criteria

Applicants for the Michigan Auto Law Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship must:

  • Be a U.S. citizen or permanent resident;
  • Be currently enrolled as a full- or part-time student in an accredited college or university within the United States;
  • Have innocently sustained injuries from a car or truck accident at some point in your life (i.e., you were not at-fault in causing and/or contributing to the accident that resulted in your injuries); and
  • Have a cumulative GPA of 2.75 or higher.

Selection is based on the overall strength of the application and how that applicant has overcome the challenges he or she has faced from being injured in a car accident.

Application requirements

The application deadline for the 2025 Auto Law Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship is December 31, 2024.

The Michigan Auto Law Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship is a competitive process.

Applicants must submit the following items:

  • A completed application;
  • A copy of the police report from the motor vehicle accident that resulted in the applicant’s injuries. If a copy cannot be obtained from the police department or from their online system, other forms of acceptable proof can be a report from the applicant’s auto insurance company, or a medical or physical therapy document. Any document in lieu of a police report should include the applicant’s name and list or otherwise indicate that the applicant’s injuries were caused by or were the result of a car or motor vehicle accident;
  • An essay of not more than three pages describing the car accident, the applicant’s injury or injuries, and how the applicant has worked to overcome his or her injury or injuries.

How to apply

If you are interested in applying for this scholarship, please complete the Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship Application.

All application materials can be sent by email or faxed on or before the December 31, 2024, deadline. PLEASE NOTE: Files sent via email must be in PDF or Microsoft Word (DOC) format.

Fax to the attention of the Michigan Auto Law Scholarships at (248) 254-8088 or email the completed Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship application, and required documents to [email protected]

For questions, please send an email to [email protected].

Apply today.

Meet Elizabeth Yockey: Winner of the 2024 Michigan Auto Law Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship

Just as a big, exciting, new chapter in Elizabeth Yockey’s life was opening, a terrible event threatened to close the book on her dreams.

While stopped in highway traffic on her way to her third day of school as a first-year engineering student at the University of Washington, she was rear-ended by a negligent driver going 60 mph.

Afterward, Elizabeth wrote in her personal statement, she was “out of it mentally” and her “memory and cognitive functions were severely affected.”

In the following days, she began to suffer from brain fog, confusion, memory loss, balance issues, neck stiffness, headaches, depression, anxiety, dizziness, and nausea.

What Elizabeth did not know at the time was how the accident and her resulting brain injury would cause her to experience life in a way that other traumatic brain injury survivors know all too well.

“I never thought it was possible to lose oneself until I experienced a traumatic brain injury,” she explained.

Then, she added, “Unfortunately, people around me did not seem to understand the extent of my condition.”

Elizabeth described transforming from a person with an “adventurous spirit and curiosity” who was “full of life,” “used to smile brightly,” and “love[d] passionately” to someone who was full of “anxiety and depression” and who felt “disconnected from everything and everyone around” her.

She also described the challenges she faced – and faced alone – to pursue her engineering studies. She had to coordinate with her professors and the school to arrange for class, studying and test-taking accommodations. And she had to struggle to do the schoolwork – which had previously come to her so easily.

“I was forced to continue with school despite my condition,” Elizabeth wrote. “I was studying ten hours a day for something that would take me two hours” before her TBI.

Eventually, she had to drop most of her classes because the impairments from her brain injury made it impossible for her to keep up with the workload.

But Elizabeth never quit.

She refused to let the effects of her TBI and her academic challenges “derail [her] dreams.”

She did this by setting “small goals” for herself and “remapping” her plan until she gradually started “getting back to [herself] again, taking on a greater course load, getting her “GPA back to where it belongs,” and landing a highly coveted internship.

Lost as Elizabeth felt at one time, it’s clear she has found herself and her way once again:

“I am now back on track for my dreams, and more determined than ever. Although life has not gone as I originally wanted, I am proud of myself for pushing through the personal struggles and setbacks. I have learned to work hard, love, and support myself, and I am determined to continue pushing toward my goals.”

Have you been injured in a car accident? Call Michigan Auto Law for a free consultation

If you or a loved one was injured in a car accident and you have questions about your legal rights to pain and suffering compensation, economic damages and auto No-Fault insurance benefits, you can call toll free anytime 24/7 at (800) 968-1001 for a free consultation with one of our experienced car accident attorneys. There is no cost and no obligation. You can also get help by visiting our contact page or you can use the chat feature on our website.

Car Accident Injury Survivor Scholarship
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