Billy Crystal After graduation from Long Beach High School in 1965, Crystal attended Marshall University in Huntington, West Virginia, on a baseball scholarship, having learned the game from his father, who pitched for St. John's University. Crystal never played baseball at Marshall because the program was suspended during his first year. He did not return to Marshall as a sophomore, instead deciding to stay in New York to be close to his future wife. He attended Nassau Community College with Janice and later transferred to New York University, where he was a film and television directing major. He graduated from NYU in
HOPE Scholarship of the HOPE Scholarship. June 29, 1998: The Council on School Performance releases a study that concludes: "We found that recipients of Georgia's HOPE Scholarship are more likely to remain enrolled in college, have higher college grade point averages and have earned more credit hours than students without the scholarship." September 1, 1998: Five years after its inception, the HOPE Scholarship has awarded 319,000 students more than $580 million. November 3, 1998: Georgia voters elect to create a Constitutional amendment protecting the HOPE Scholarship Program from legislative and political tampering. May 17, 1999: For the second year in a row,