College Tip of the Week #17: Scholarship Applications
Paying for college is difficult! Price is often a consideration when choosing the college you want to attend, so applying for scholarships is a great way to help you afford that more prestigious school rather than let cost dominate your decision. Here are a few tips to help you find and obtain scholarships:
Apply early! The last thing you want to do is to start applying for scholarships a month or two before your first year of college. Some online scholarships allow you to apply from even your freshman year, while most traditional scholarships allow you to apply from junior year. If you start from the beginning of high school, you will have plenty of time to receive scholarships before applying to colleges and making your decision.
Utilize scholarship matching sites. Sites like Scholarships.com and CollegeBoard’s Scholarship Search can help you find scholarships specific to your background, abilities, and passions. Just be careful to visit safe websites that will not ask you to pay to send your application.
Ask your counselor! Your school counselor is a wonderful resource for finding scholarships that are local and even specific to your high school, so start talking to them about possible scholarships as early in your high school career as you can.
Apply big and small. While national scholarships are more widely known and may even provide larger scholarship amounts, local scholarships that are less known to many students are likely to be less competitive and easier for you to receive. Therefore, apply for a variety of scholarships that are both large and small, as you never know which ones you will actually receive.
Ask around. Ask your parents to see if their job offers scholarships, or even ask your own boss at your work if they offer college scholarships. You may be surprised to find more opportunities that you did not know about.
Have Recommendation Letters ready. A lot of college scholarships require recommendation letters from community members or teachers who know you well. Just make sure to provide them details about your scholarship, your resume, as well as how your strengths and qualifications relate to the scholarship.
Give your essays attention and care, just like you did for College Applications!
Apply your same strategies for writing College Essays to your scholarship prompts as well. If you need some guidance, please check our our tips for writing an essay in our College Tip of the Week #14: College Essays
Ask us for help! As college students who have applied for many scholarships, we are a wonderful tool to help you start saving money for college. Please visit our services page to get started, and then schedule a session in the appointments tab.
