North Carolina Woman Will Use Lottery Win To Pay For Nursing School

I love it when good things happen to good people.  This North Carolina woman will use her recent lottery win to pay for nursing school.  As a matter of fact Sara Wilkerson could not even believe her eyes when she got the news that she won a huge prize.

Here is a little bit about Sara's win according to the North Carolina Education Lottery: Wilkerson, 41, is currently in nursing school. She won the grand prize in the second and final Holiday Spectacular second-chance drawing on Feb. 8. The drawing also offered two $10,000 prizes, and 100 prizes of $500. There were 9.5 million total entries in the drawing.

She got word that she won via email and she could not believe it.  Her mom was incredulous but she assured her mom that she thought it was "legit".  And indeed it is!  Sara won $150,000 dollars!  Scotland county, where Sara is from received almost four million dollars last year from the North Carolina Education Lottery.

This North Carolina woman collected her prize late last week and after taxes and fees there is still a nice sum.  She took home $106,875 dollars.  So what will she do with her new windfall.  She is in nursing school and plans to use the money toward her education and she also plans to save some.  To learn more get details right here.

There are some states that are luckier than others. There is no doubt about it. North Carolina made the list of 15 lucky states in the United States, according to OLBG. Everyone has fantasized about winning the lottery, whether it's the Mega Millions or the Powerball. Whether you're planning a lavish vacation, buying a house, treating a loved one, giving to charity, or all of the above, when we buy a ticket we always have a little bit of hope and our imaginations go wild when we hear about the unclaimed winning ticket...

When it comes to winning big on the lottery, which states are the luckiest? To determine where in America has the greatest likelihood of winning the big bucks, OLBG analyzed all lottery winners in the U.S. with a jackpot of $300 million or more. You can see the top 15 states below.

California was ranked 12th luckiest state despite having the highest number of big lottery winners, primarily because the state has such a large population that there are very few lottery winners, and the average winning ticket for a California winner is only $190.5 million.

North Carolina has won a whopping $1.1 billion between both lottery winners, making its average winning ticket $550 million, the highest in the country. As a result of its higher population, North Carolina didn't quite capture the title by itself, with a lower percentage of its population winning than New Hampshire.

In terms of lottery jackpot winners, New Hampshire and North Carolina share the gold for the luckiest states. Residents in New Hampshire have won a total of $693.7 million, which is an average of $346.85 million per winning ticket. As one of the states with the highest percentage of people who have won over $300 million, New Hampshire has the third smallest population.