No Cubicle, No Student Loans—Andrew Kinsey Accomplished His Goals

When Andrew Kinsey enrolled at NIU in the fall of 2020, he had many goals, but two of them were especially important. He wanted to pursue a career that would not find him sitting at a desk in a cubicle, and he wanted to graduate without taking out student loans.

Kinsey graduated from NIU in 2025 with a degree in music education and percussion performance, and he did it debt-free.

Kinsey, of Bartlett, Illinois, chose music education because he wants to help others foster a fun and healthy connection to music, in the way his family and teachers provided that for him. He chose percussion performance because of his love for playing and sharing music and the opportunities it afforded him to play in a wide range of ensembles that included the NIU Philharmonic Orchestra, the NIU Steelband, the Wind Ensemble, the NIU Percussion Ensemble and more.

Choosing NIU to study music was an easy decision for Kinsey. Both of his parents, Eric and Denise Caliendo, are Huskies; his stepsister Nina Caliendo is a 2022 graduate of the School of Music; and his older brother Christian played in high school band days on campus. Andrew Kinsey made frequent visits to NIU to see his siblings perform—and liked what he saw and heard.

Kinsey said seeing how loan debt can delay travel or buying a home were motivations to seek out as many scholarships as possible. He encourages NIU students to go to MyScholarships to investigate their options. Kinsey met the requirements for many more types of aid than he originally expected.

He also found funding in some unlikely places.

As a drummer he played regularly at a church in Bartlett and was encouraged to apply for an educational grant through the church, something he didn’t know existed, and found there are more sources of community grants for college students than most know about.

Kinsey also has worked part-time at Starbucks since he was in high school. “Having a part-time job and going to school is hard, but it’s doable,” he said. “It allowed me to save up money each semester for tuition. There’s a social aspect to any job, which gave me another group of friends, in addition to the ones I made at NIU.”

Another tip Kinsey has for students who are applying for scholarships is to save their essays, because they could come in handy again.

“Sometimes you’ll apply for a scholarship that asks a very similar question to one you’ve already written about, and instead of starting from scratch, you can customize a previous essay to meet the requirements of another.”

“There’s a social aspect to any job, which gave me another group of friends, in addition to the ones I made at NIU.”