in addition to simple donations to education, the florida lottery has, along with the florida legislature established the bright futures scholarship program to help students pay for college. since the program's inception in 1997, the florida lottery has contributed more than $3.9 billion to send over 600,000 students to college. the florida bright futures scholarship program consists of three levels of awards. the first is the florida gold seal vocational scholars award, followed by the florida medallion scholars award, and finally the florida academic scholars award. once the student is in college, these awards must be renewed by maintaining a minimum 2.75 gpa for florida gold seal vocational and florida medallion scholars awards and a 3.0 for the florida academic scholars award. each award has additional hours requirements to maintain.