Scholarships

Everyone is always talking about scholarships.  There are many statements floating around out there about scholarships

• I want to go to college on a 'full ride' music scholarship
• I want a basketball scholarship
• My daughter (or son) needs to apply for every single scholarship that there is.
• There are over XX million dollars a year in unclaimed scholarship awards

Let's talk about the facts.

• A scholarship is a sum of money that is awarded to an individual for the sole purpose of further education.
• Scholarships come from a variety of places- private corporations, colleges, organizations and associations.
• Scholarships are given  to encourage students to pursue further education, but within that reason:
• Colleges use scholarships to attract commited students
• Businesses may use scholarships to interest local and global community
• Organizations may use scholarships to encourage more interest in their field
  
• Every scholarship has different 'eligibility standards or criteria, meaning that not every scholarship can be applied for by every student.  Some are only for girls, some for boys, some for a certain GPA, some for students in a certain sport or activity, some for students that have a job during the school year, some for students that have over 100 hours of validated community service.  Consequently, not every student can apply for every scholarship
• There are very few "full rides"- or scholarships that pay the entire sum of going to college.
• You should never pay for scholarship opportunities...there are scholarship scams out there that will offer to find you $100000 in scholarships for a fee of $60, or $600, or even more.  This is a scam.  
• You should never have to pay a "processing fee" for a scholarship.

National Scholarships                                      State and Regional Scholarships                                                Local Scholarships

This link will take you                                                 This link will take you to a page with                                        This link will take you to a page
to www.fastweb.com;                                                a listing of state and regional scholarships                               with links to local scholarship
a scholarship search for                                           and links to their scholarship forms, if available                                forms.
national scholarships