I have 4 kids. My oldest of which is heading to college in the fall. It’s been a whirlwind experience trying to navigate the whole application process for college and for scholarships. Even though he’s already been accepted and we put money down already we’re still having to take more steps that need completed before he actually starts. Guys he has new student orientation on the 19th! He still has to do some kinds of counseling session in regard to his student loans he qualified for. The whole pandemic thing made this process a little weirder too.
When I thought of the whole scholarship process I thought of it as filling out scholarship application after scholarship application hoping to get just one. Don’t get me wrong, there still plenty you can apply for on your own but the one he got was already applied for when we filled out the FAFSA. Let me explain.
Every year before starting college until college is finished you need to fill out the FAFSA. It’s important to fill it out completely and honestly. This helps schools make decisions on awarding scholarships and financial aid (among other things).
My son actually got a decent yearly scholarship from his college thanks to the FAFSA. As long as he keeps his GPA decent he’ll have the scholarship all 4 years.
My son’s high school also had their own form to fill out for scholarships specific to his school and the area. Colleges will sometimes offers scholarship awards to high school graduates for specific majors too. This was one form to fill out to determine scholarships for many.
In both of these scenarios only one form was needed to throw his name in the hat for many scholarship opportunities. These are the two major things to do . But, it doesn’t have to stop there. You can seek out and apply for individual scholarships as well. There are scholarship specific to majors, hobbies, religion, heritage, geographic area and more.
The David Ebrahimzadeh scholarship, for example, is a scholarship to recognize students seeking a degree in real estate! They’re accepting applications now. So don’t discount your career path in regard to scholarship opportunities.
Also local businesses, clubs, and even your own workplace may offer scholarships. My son applied for a scholarship through my husband’s place of work.
This post is sponsored by Diamond Links. Any opinions expressed are my own.
My son got a scholarship from his high school for $1,000 a year, which definitely helps. He qualified for around $1,100 from FAFSA his freshman year but none since. I try and try to get him to apply for scholarships and he doesn’t.
I hear ya. That might be the hardest part. My son had to have the application filled out for his high school the end of March. Of course that’s when everything went crazy with the pandemic and they started virtual learning. They extended the date to get the application filled out by a week or so. I kept nagging my son about getting it filled out. He says he did. He never got any scholarships from the school. At this time I don’t know if he just didn’t qualify for any or if he never actually filled out the form. I sent him links to a couple because I occasionally get emails asking me to promote their specific scholarship (small like $500 or $1000 but every dollar helps right?) but I honestly don’t know if he filled any of those out. Thankfully the FAFSA we did together and that’s how he got the $3500/yr one from his college.