Bad luck with scholarships

Paying for College
1

<p>Okay, well I moved from the UK to the USA in 2007. Back in my old school there were no clubs or community service or big sports teams to participate in. There was netball and soccer...that was it....</p>

<p>Anyway, so I started off in the USA junior year, I was a member of Interact Club, played badminton, and that was it.</p>

<p>Now that I'm a senior I'm more used to the US system and so I've done a lot since then..</p>

<p>-3.67 GPA
-Middle Eastern heritage (this is not mentioned on fastweb)
-Played badminton (not mentioned on fastweb either)
- Interact Club member (Junior and Senior year), International Club member (Senior year),
- CSF commitee Leader (Senior year)
- Italian Club secretary (senior year)
-Father is survivor of cancer
-I am left handed. XD
-I am Christian</p>

<p>...I don't know what else to put. But the scholarships I've applied for aren't big ones and I've only applied to, like, 5....</p>

<p>And I'm not that big on essay scholarships, I don't have enough time for that crap. -_- lol</p>

<p>I just don't know where to find genuine scholarship sites that could be of really big help. Besides fastweb.com, I mean.</p>

2

<p>

</p>

<p>Pay me now, or pay me later.</p>

3

<p>Many students have better luck with local scholarships. (Some require essays, so you can resist that, but it’s a fact of life.) Check with the counseling/guidance office at your high school. They are usually the best source for local scholarship information. They may not be for the largest amounts of money, but they’re easier to get and if you get several it can really add up.</p>

4

<p>yeah…I found 3 from the local ones…but…yeah… :/</p>

5

<p>The kids at our local high school who got a lot of local scholarships applied to at least 30 of them and were willing to write essays, get recommendations, whatever it took. It is a lot of work! But they were pretty motivated.</p>

6

<p>I agree with ellemenop, last year my son applied to 30-40 scholarships and was awarded three of them (500, 2K and 6k-renewable) . More than half of the ones he applied to required essays, teacher recs, etc. It was very time consuming but in his case worth it. FYI he was not a top student by CC standards, but very very involved in the community.</p>

7

<p>I found some books at our local public library that had long listings of scholarships. I didn’t find any that met my D’s particular attributes but you might find something there. There have also been a few threads on CC that have long lists of scholarship websites. You might try a search or look under financial aid. </p>

<p>On the essays my D keeps saying that she can’t bear to write any more essays. But then she takes a little break and gets started at it again. And her English teacher keeps editing them for her and giving encouragement so that helps.</p>

8

<p>Yeah but…due to certain circumstances I have been unable to participate in the community…I haven’t been here long…not much I can talk about in a community-helping based essay.</p>

<p>For example, there’s a Lowe’s Scholarship, and the essay required is basically asking how you’ve helped your community. There’s nothing I can really write about. :confused:</p>

9

<p>Let’s say it takes you 40 hours to do the “crap” to apply for 30 scholarships, and you get just ONE for $1,000. That is the equivalent of $25/hour - tax free.</p>

<p>That is about 1/2 of what they expect you to earn during an entire summer.
That is close to what a lot of kids get for College Work Study for a semester or the year.</p>

<p>You can either do the “crap” now or later.</p>

10

<p>…</p>

<p>You didn’t read my previous post. :(</p>

<p>No one is getting it, I’ve asked for help regarding the fact that I haven’t been able to do much in the first place, and I want to look for other websites besides fastweb.com</p>

<p>I don’t need people telling me off about the time I could use for essays, that’s not what I’m here for. I don’t mean to start a dispute but the problem is I DON’T REALLY KNOW WHAT TO WRITE ABOUT. </p>

<p>I’m not your average over-acheiver that manages to get a 4.0 with a SAT score of 2200 and ACT score of 30, that is able to fit in 5000 (yes I’m exaggerating) hours a week of community service. :/</p>

11

<p>I read your previous posts. It seems…</p>

<p>-You have been “unable” to help your community (you say this is because your old school had no community-helping club?).
-You consider the application requirements, such as essays, to be “crap.”</p>

<p>So you now would like to receive scholarships. Scholarships that do not require that you have given anything to your community and that do not require essays.</p>

<p>That is not “bad luck.”</p>

<p>Like other parents who have responded to you, my student applied to approximately 40 scholarships, found MANY opportunities to help her community (even without a “club” - she just went into the community and offered to help), spent hours writing dozens of essays, took the hardest classes available and worked her tail off in them. She was awarded five of those scholarships.</p>

<p>I guess you would call that “good” luck?</p>

<p>It seems the only scholarships that meet your requirements are the ones that are scholarship “drawings,” where all entries are equal and the winner is drawn. Here is an example: [Scholarship</a> Application - $10,000 Scholarship Drawing](<a href=“http://www.studentloannetwork.com/10K/]Scholarship”>http://www.studentloannetwork.com/10K/) Do an internet search for “Scholarship Drawings.” Unfortunately, there are so many entries to these drawings that the odds of winning tend to be even lower than the many local scholarships that require essays.</p>

12

<p>**okay I get your point, I don’t need people to use sarcasm, quotes, and throw stings…but you guys still don’t get it. I don’t find scholarships that match me for who I am and what I do. That is what fastweb.com is all about.</p>

<p>My best friend is African-American, and so, she put that on her profile on fastweb.com and found a lot more than I did.</p>

<p>You guys seem to be purposefully missing out everything else I said in my post. The first person to reply did that, took out the essay quote and completely missed out all the other information I put in. I understand that it’s better to try and write these essays, I don’t need 10 people telling me the same thing. Please.**</p>

<p>And if you guys are going to keep whining about the fact that I **said<a href=“notice%20past%20tense%20here”>/b</a> am reluctant to do essays, maybe you could try and give me some tips on what to write and how to write them. :confused: I don’t know what to put in them and how to make them look good…I’ve only ever written one and that was rushed and it wasn’t limited like the Lowe’s Scholarship, which is due March 16th. </p>

<p>Don’t tell me to ask my acamedic co-ordinator I’ve done that and she hasn’t really helped. She said our English teacher was supposed to talk to us about that (that was like 2 or 3 months ago too) and he didn’t.</p>

<p>Sorry for sounding rude and hesitant, but what I was asking for in my first post hasn’t been answered. Is there any other website that can help me, which is similar to fastweb, because, LIKE I SAID, the choices that you can choose for your profile doesn’t help me because I am much more of a minority, as I am Middle Eastern, and most people don’t play badminton, as it isn’t listed as a ‘sport.’</p>

13

<p>uhm. ok i hope i don’t instigate a long reply post.</p>

<p>1) scholarships . com<<< generic sounding, but i found some good local scholarships from there
2) scholarship bulletin from counseling<<< my best source of scholarships. terribly local, and usually on require you have some GPA and live in some area and thinking about going to college
3) if your school sucks at giving bulletins, try looking for nearby school bulletins. I actually keep up with 3 school scholarship bulletins and I’ve gotten a lot I would have missed had I just kept to only my school’s bulletin</p>

<p>Good luck. Sorry you didn’t get your appropriate responses from CCers.</p>

14

<p>alamemom gave you the answer. Assuming you found a scholarship for Middle Eastern Heritage, they are going to want you to write something to tell them about yourself. Unfortunately, you said you don’t want to write an essay. If that is your criteria (and we all read it was), then there is not much left. When you apply to schools, they will “automatically” submit you for scholarships they offer that don’t require essays. So, you don’t need us to tell you about those.</p>

15

<p>thanks…</p>

<p>I haven’t found a scholarship for Middle Eastern heritage…</p>

16

<p>Some critera are just not going to be a fit. My daughter has been applying widely for scholarships, and pretty often she is not exactly who I think the scholarship givers are looking for. She has not been a community service person particularly, her main EC (music) is not something she plans to major in or compete in. When she’s asked to write about “obstacles she’s overcome” she has to admit she hasn’t really had the same difficulties as other kids. She can’t compete with kids who’ve battled illnesses, lost parents, had learning challenges, had to support their families, make their way on their own, or anything like that.</p>

<p>She does have great grades and, fortunately, she’s not adverse to cranking out those essays, but I don’t think a whole lot of money is going to turn up for her, honestly. That’s okay. If a scholarship is looking for a kid who’s done a ton of community service, then those are the kids that should be in contention for that scholarship. If you haven’t, it’s nothing negative about you, it’s just not who they’re looking for.</p>

<p>I mean, I know you already know all this. I’m just saying there may not be a whole lot of scholarships that are going to be so specifically suited to you that you stand a good chance of getting them. The ones with the broadest guidelines and are most open to students who are not super-students or volunteers or artists or whatever, particulary big national ones, are going to have tons of applicants and any single student’s chances of getting them is going to be quite small.</p>

<p>If you can’t find anything for middle eastern students, you might want to look for ones aimed at Christians, also check with your church and see if anyone there, or other parents there with college-aged kids know of anything. I couldn’t say for sure, but specifics like having a parent who had cancer, being left-handed, and playing badminton probably aren’t going to turn up much. Does your dad belong to a profession or a union that might have scholarships for dependents? Are you particularly interested in pursuing a certain major? I see a number of local and regional scholarships in our area for students going into medicine, horticulture, teaching, and math and science related fields. You might look for something like that, but it will probably be best to look in your geographic area.</p>

<p>Scholarships can be scarce for a lot of kids who don’t fit the usual scholarship-candidate profile. You can apply, but you can’t count on anything turning up. It’s very important to have a Plan B for how you’ll afford college, or alternative college choices that would be more affordable without getting scholarships.</p>

<p>Sorry I don’t know of any other big websites with comprehensive lists. Most of the students I know have not found those websites like fastweb to be particularly helpful, although I’m sure they are for some.</p>

17

<p>This link: [Schools</a> Awarding International Financial Aid](<a href=“http://www.internationalstudent.com/schools_awarding_aid/]Schools”>Schools Awarding International Financial Aid) looks like it has scholarship links for international students who want to study in the US. (Forgive me if that’s not you.)</p>

18

<p>No, that’s not me. I’m a Permanent Resident of the country.</p>

<p>Thanks for your previous post though, that was nice of you, and I already am taking that into consideration (The plan B stuff.)</p>

<p>It’s just hard for me, it is, and I don’t know what to do. =|</p>

19

<p>

</p>

<p>That’s ironic considering the academic co-ordinators at my school have stressed that there is a scholarship specifically for left-handed people…yet they haven’t said where anyone could find it. I mean, I can’t just google “left handed scholarship” some websites are fake.</p>

20

<p>The left-handed scholarship so often mentioned by counselors is specific to Juniata College and is only awarded to sophomores, juniors and seniors currently attending Juniata:

[Juniata</a> College - News - That's a Wrap: Juniata Student Uses Duct Tape for Tuition Payment](<a href=“http://www.juniata.edu/services/news/index.html?SHOWARTICLE+2959]Juniata”>http://www.juniata.edu/services/news/index.html?SHOWARTICLE+2959)</p>