Like many other students in America, Scholly.com founder Christian Gray was struggling to find ways to pay for a college education. Gray grew up in a single-parent, poverty stricken home in Birmingham, Alabama. As a student, he little access to necessary scholastic resources, such as computers. While the high school student faced more challenges than most, he did not allow these problems to stop him; in fact, he used them as motivation to earn what would eventually amount to 1.3 million dollars in scholarships. Out of his hardships and hard work, Scholly.com, the scholarship search engine, was born.

The idea for an organized search engine specifically for scholarships came from Gray’s personal experience tirelessly searching for scholarships. The process was like trying to find a needle in a haystack. Gray, an entrepreneurial-minded high school student at this point, recognized the need for a more organized database that provided students with as many scholarship opportunities as possible. After finalizing and implementing his idea as a young adult, Christian pitched his business to the “sharks” on ABC’s Shark Tank and landed a joint deal with Daymond John and Lori Greiner. Almost immediately after Christian’s appearance on Shark Tank, the Scholly app was ranked #1 for more than three weeks.

Gray’s story is an inspiration not only to young entrepreneurs, but to less fortunate students who need to see someone in a similar economic or familial situation succeed. The businessman shows that despite your background, hard work and perseverance make just about anything is possible.