Category Archives: scholarships

scholarships, test prep

Test Prep Week: Can Test Prep Help You Win Scholarships?

 

win scholarships

Why is test prep important? We all know that colleges use these test scores to evaluate a student’s ability to do well in a college environment. But is there more to taking time to prepare for standardized tests? Yes. In addition to good scores enabling you to apply to your dream college, good scores can also help you win scholarships.

You can win a scholarship if you are a National Merit finalist

The #1 way test prep can affect your scholarship chances is with the PSAT. This test, if scored well, can put you on the National Merit finalist list. You don’t have to be the winner to earn a scholarship. Many colleges award full-ride scholarships to National Merit finalists. Students often look at this test as a “practice” test for the SAT, neglecting to prepare. But it is so much more. Few students prepare for the PSAT so your odds of scoring higher than most students in your state are high if you take the time to study and prepare.

For more information on the PSAT, read my article for TeenLife Magazine: 10 Reasons the PSAT Is Not Just a Practice Test and a guest post from Anthony-James Green of Test Prep Authority: The Ultimate Guide to the PSAT

Colleges use these scores to award merit scholarships

It stands to reason that colleges will use these scores to determine who receives merit aid. Students with higher scores not only get bumped up in the acceptance line, but also receive priority consideration when it comes to scholarships.

Private organizations often ask for standardized test scores

According to Lauren Gaggioli of Higher Scores Test Prep, “Some scholarship advisors estimate over 60% of scholarship applications require test scores these days.” And, she’s seeing even higher percentages up to 75% recently.

The scholarship application process is becoming more and more competitive each year. If you want your student to have an edge, plan and prepare for these standardized test.

 

Scholarship Friday, scholarships

Scholarships with January 2016 Deadlines

scholarships with january 2016 deadlines

It’s almost the end of December and it’s time to share some scholarships with January 2016 deadlines. Just in time to spend your holiday break applying for scholarships.

Cappex list of 17 Scholarships with January deadlines

About.com list of 97 College Scholarships with January deadlines

JLV College Consulting list of 82 Scholarships with January deadlines

This list should keep you busy over the holiday break!

 

Scholarship Friday, scholarships

Scholarship Search Extravaganza

 

scholarship search

It’s Scholarship Friday here at Parents Countdown to College Coach. Today I’m sharing my best scholarship search tips from TeenLife.com.

Five Steps to a Winning Scholarship Application

Once you find the scholarship, even if you qualify, it’s important to “package” yourself to get the attention of the scholarship judges. Here are some great tips that should help you when completing your scholarship application.

Read the article at TeenLife.com

How to Search for STEM Scholarships

If your student is considering a STEM college major, there are scholarships available specifically for these majors. But the key is knowing where to look for them.

Read the article at TeenLife.com

6 Better Ways to Search for Scholarships

It’s easy to get overwhelmed with the scholarship search. Where do you start? How to you find them? What method should you use?

Read the article at TeenLife.com

How to Use Pinterest to Find a Scholarship

Pinterest for scholarships? You bet! There are numerous boards on Pinterest highlighting scholarships. I have a scholarship board and so does Monica Matthews. Here’s how to use Pinterest to find scholarships.

Read the article at TeenLife.com

Raise.Me: A New Way to Earn Scholarships in High School

Cash in on grades, volunteer activities, community service, and other high school projects and see the scholarship dollars add up.

Read the article at TeenLife.com

5 Uncommon Ways to Find and Win Scholarships

You know the drill for the scholarship search: use the search engines and ask your high school counselor about scholarships. But don’t stop there, use these five unusual ways to search and apply for scholarships.

Read the article at TeenLife.com

Scholarship Friday, scholarships

Scholarship Friday: Comprehensive List of Full-Ride Scholarships

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full-ride scholarships

 

There is great discussion among parents about whether or not scholarship applications are worth it. I happen to be one who believes they are. My daughter attended an expensive private university based on the scholarships she won from outside sources and from the university itself. Those scholarships allowed her to attend a school that was financially out of reach. Hence, I’m a firm believer in the value of scholarships.

Here are 3 reasons I believe ALL college-bound students should apply:

  • Scholarships help reduce the cost of college-Free money is always better than money you have to repay.
  • Many times, the effort required on your part is minimal-Numerous employers hand out money to worker’s kids without requiring much more than a one-page application. Grab that cash!
  • Your family might not qualify for need-based aid-In this case, scholarships can eliminate the need to dip into savings or retirement to fund college expenses.

Applying for scholarships, in my mind, is a no-brainer. But the BEST of the scholarship money train is the full-ride scholarships. If you can tap into that money, your student can attend college with little money woes and graduate debt free.

Our friends at LearnU, an education news site that strives to help people stay current on the most newsworthy topics in education, education technology, education legislation and the private education marketplace, has compiled an extensive list of full-ride scholarships (competitive, academic, and National Merit Finalist). Use the list, plug your son or daughter in, and start looking at these colleges to tap into that FREE money!

Full-Ride Scholarships: List of Scholarships for Full Tuition/Full Rides

essays, Guest Posts, scholarships

Online Resources to Craft a Great Scholarship Essay

 

 

scholarship essay

Writing an essay is always a challenge. You need to come up with a great idea, organize your thoughts into a concise, easy to follow structure, find supporting resources, and find the right words to make it all make sense. When you are writing an essay for a scholarship, it can be even trickier. There’s more on the line. These online resources will help you write a thoughtful scholarship essay to give you the best chance of success.

Essay Punch

Essay Punch is an interactive tutorial that takes students through all parts of the academic essay writing process. You will work with writing prompts to practice the organizing, writing, editing, and publishing stages of the process.

Thesis Builder

Your thesis is arguably the most important part of your essay. Without a strong thesis, the rest of the paper cannot take shape. And if your thesis isn’t well supported, your paper will likely fall flat. So, it’s very important that you construct a strong, easy to defend thesis. Thesis Builder will take your topic and help you come up with a great thesis.

Ask Petersen

Julie Petersen is an ESL tutor with an awesome website to help writers at all stages of the writing process. The website features educational articles, sample essays, study guides, and tools to help you succeed. There’s also a blog that offers writing tips and student life hacks. So, once your essay gets you into college, you can continue to flourish.

Help.PlagTracker

PlagTracker will make sure your scholarship essay is completely free of plagiarism. If you used any sources as references, even if they were re-written in your own words, it’s possible that the similarities will still be strong and show up as plagiarism. PlagTracker eliminates these sentences and replaces them with original content so your essay is 100% you own.

Step By Step Essay Writing Guide

Imagine that you’re stressed, extremely busy, and panicking because your essay is due tomorrow and you haven’t started yet! If this is the case, head over to EssayMama blog, and read their step-by-step guide to composing an essay in a pinch.

Teen Ink

This online magazine features articles and essays written by students. You can find fiction, non-fiction, and poetry. Use the site for inspiration for your own essay ideas or become a contributor.

Hemingway Editor

When you are writing a scholarship essay, it might be tempting to write long, eloquent sentences to show off your intelligence. This can easily backfire and can actually make it hard for your readers to understand your writing. Hemingway Editor will scan your document to make it readable. It will find any confusing or long sentences so you can re-write them. It will also point out instances of passive voice so you can change them to a more assertive active voice.

Citation Machine

When you’re writing an academic essay, you need to include references to show your research. But creating the references page is time-consuming and tedious work. Citation Machine can easily build your reference page for you. All you need to do is choose your citations style and medium and enter the data in the pre-determined fields.

 Writing.com

Become a member of Writing.com (for free!) and you’ll be able to make an online writing profile, get writing tips, and receive feedback on your writing from other members. There are also contests and writing activities to keep you motivated and help improve your writing.

Do you feel better prepared to go out and write that killer scholarship essay? I hope so! Don’t expect the process to be easy. There will be bumps along the way. You’ll get frustrated and want to quit. But remember that there are tools, tutors, and other students to help you through the process and keep you focused. Visit one or more of these sites for inspiration, organization, advice, samples essays, and even one-on-one help. So, go out there and get started. What are you waiting for?

Scholarship Friday, scholarships

National Scholarship Month: Kicks off with a $5000 Scholarship from Sallie Mae

 

To celebrate National Scholarship Month, Sallie Mae is offering student’s the chance to win $5000 toward the cost of college. All you have to do to be entered is to register for their scholarship search engine.

Here’s a short video on how it works:

Don’t pass up the chance to win FREE money for college!

Scholarship Friday, scholarships

Scholarship Friday: Creepy Halloween Scholarships

halloween

Although these scholarships have been deemed “creepy and freaky”, any scholarship that gets you FREE money for college is anything but creepy and freaky. In honor of Halloween, here are two of the creepiest.

Are you fascinated with paranormal activity?

The New York-based Parapsychology Foundation offers young ghost hunters and those with interest in the paranormal several scholarships. There are 5 annual awards with varying deadlines

  • The Annual Charles T. and Judith A. Tart Research Grant of $500
  • The Annual Robert R. Coly Prize of $1000
  • The Annual Eileen J. Garrett Scholarship of $3000
  • The Annual Frances P. Bolton Fellowship of $3000
  • The D. Scott Rogo Award for Parapsychological Literature of $3000

You can open the PDF file attached to the link for the foundation to get all the details of each and the deadlines.

Are you a Walking Dead fan?

The Zombie Scholarship Committee from Scholarship Experts wants to know your plan to avoid the zombies, where you would hide (or maybe you don’t need to), and the top five things you would bring to stay alive.

The 2014 Zombie Apocalypse Scholarship is underway, and they are giving one successful “survivor” $2,000 towards his or her college education. Do you think you have what it takes to make the cut? But you better act fast—today is the deadline for this year’s scholarship. For those of you who are making a list for the future. Put this one on you calendar!

Scholarship Friday, scholarships

Frame My Future Scholarship from DiplomaFrame

frame my future scholarship
2105 Grand Prize Winner-Olivia Nguyen

The Frame My Future Scholarship Contest is unlike most of the traditional scholarships, there are no essays to write, no grade or academic requirements—it is all about creativity.

Students are challenged to create a visual entry, whether it is a photograph, collage, painting, illustration, poem, short story—any single piece that demonstrates what he/she would like to do in their personal and professional life after college.

Entrants are asked to follow the theme: This is how I Frame my Future.

Entry Period:

October 14, 2015 – March 8, 2016

Prizes:

Five $1,000 scholarships and commemorative Frame My Future frames will be awarded to 5 Winners, plus a $1,000 donation check to the Grand Prize Winner’s 2016 attended college/university

19 Finalists will also be awarded commemorative Frame My Future certificates

For more rules and information about this contest, visit the main contest page: www.framemyfuture.com

Scholarship Friday, scholarships, Uncategorized

Scholastic Art & Writing Awards

 
CallforSub_Poster_9_16_15

The Scholastic Art & Writing Awards—the nation’s longest-running and most prestigious recognition initiative for creative teens—are now accepting submissions for the 2016 program year with new scholarship opportunities provided by Neiman Marcus, The Herb Block Foundation and RBC Capital Markets.

For 93 years, the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards have identified the early promise of some of our nation’s most accomplished visionaries including alumni Andy Warhol, Truman Capote, Sylvia Plath and more recently, Stephen King, Richard Linklater, Zac Posen and Lena Dunham. Each year, exhibition, publication and scholarship opportunities are made available to students in grades 7–12 honored through the program for their original creative work in 29 categories ranging from architecture, photography and poetry to painting, video game design and more—with opportunities expanding each year.

These awards don’t just apply to seniors–7th through 12th graders are eligible to apply.

New to the 2016 program year:

  • A special Editorial Cartoon category sponsored by The Herb Block Foundation to promote awareness of the editorial cartoon medium and provide three young artists with $1,000 scholarships for their outstanding work;
  • The Neiman Marcus Fashion Award and The Neiman Marcus Jewelry Award to provide one artist in each category with $1,000 scholarships; and
  • The RBC Flaunt It Award to provide two $1,000 scholarships to students whose work showcases and celebrates individual differences.

For all the details read the the full press release with the link for the contest information.

Scholarship Friday, scholarships

Netting Big Bucks from Niche Scholarships

 

niche scholarshipsShirag Shemmassian, an admissions consultant, was able to graduate debt free by using this interesting method – niche scholarships. It’s amazing how much money students can earn from niche scholarships that provide a nice chunk of money and are significantly less competitive!

 

To help students and parents identify scholarship opportunities they may not have been aware of, he created a Niche Scholarship Finder worksheet. He’s generously offered to make this worksheet available to my readers.

 

Go to this link below, enter your email address and download your free copy–and start winning those niche scholarships!