The Office of Scholarships and Financial Wellness educated students about common scams they are being faced with through their Financial Literacy Insight, Growth, Help and Teachings program, which aims to help students take control of their financial wellness.
The ambassadors of the FLIGHT program hosted a tabling event at the Thad Cochran Center on Feb. 4, raising awareness on the recent scams that have been targeting students. They warned students about some signs of possible scams, immediate steps to take if you have fallen victim to a scam and credit recovery after the fact.
Some of the common scams that have been targeting students are job scams, collaboration scams and giveaway scams. Job scams are fraudulent, rising employment offers designed to steal money or personal information, often promising high pay for little effort. Red flags include being asked to pay upfront for equipment/training, receiving unsolicited job offers, urgent hiring pressure or receiving checks to purchase items.
Collaboration scams, often targeting social media influencers and creators, involve fake offers for brand partnerships, free products and high-paying gigs designed to steal money, personal data and account access. Key red flags include requests for upfront fees, emails from private accounts and excessive pressure to act fast.
“As a musician, I have had legitimate outreach before where I have collaborated with people,” Maddie Prattini, a graduate student hosting the table, said. “And I have had people saying they would pay me, where they send a check for too much money.”
Prattini explained that the scammers then ask for a refund of the excess money when the initial check was bad all along, which causes the victim to lose money.
“Considering the age demographic of an average student, most scams come through Instagram, Snapchat or another social media platform,” Zeke Jackson, an undergraduate ambassador for the FLIGHT program, said. “There is a GroupMe scam currently targeting artists and creatives.”
FLIGHT ambassadors is a student organization designed to enhance the financial wellness of USM’s undergraduate students. The ambassadors utilize research and a peer-to-peer education model to increase the knowledge of financial awareness across Southern Miss. With the help of the FLIGHT initiative, which aims to assist students in the Southern Miss community on their journey towards becoming financially stable.
Prattini emphasized the importance of having programs like FLIGHT in helping students succeed in college. She highlighted that not all students have the right resources to be financially literate before they start, and FLIGHT aims to help students with that. She shared her own experience as a first-generation student and emphasized the importance of having resources like FLIGHT for succeeding. FLIGHT will also be hosting a scholarship series, where they show students the best methods to find and apply for scholarships.