<p>This happens at our school also–that a couple of people will win a lot of scholarships and they are rarely the top kids in the class. Through my volunteer work at the high school, I get to see how these kids are chosen.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>These kids are motivated to find out about scholarships and will take the time to fill out the myriad applications, write essays, get recommendations, whatever it takes. It is WORK! [My D filled out 2 applications and said, “I’m done.”] The kids I have known NEED the money to go to college. Helps with the motivation factor!</p></li>
<li><p>The kids fit the profile that the organization ask for. Many scholarships have funky requirements–you have to be Italian, or play an instrument, or your dad has to be a veteran, whatever. Not everyone fits within the parameters specified by the organization.</p></li>
<li><p>One of the big requirements of the local scholarships around here is NEED. That’s why most of the top kids don’t get the big scholarships. Our school is full of kids whose parents make less than $40K a year. Harder to play the “needy” card when your family makes 3 times as much.</p></li>
<li><p>The kids who have won scholarships are “story” kids–they’ve overcome something big in their lives to succeed, they are passionate about a community service cause and have done some major work (usually self-initiated and ongoing over many years) on behalf of the cause, etc. It’s something that makes for a great essay that will impress the judging panel.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Academics are just a small part of what community groups are looking for when it comes to doling out this money.</p>
<p>More power to the kids who get a lot of these awards. If you look below the surface, you’ll find that there is a great story there.</p>
<p>This should be a lesson to everyone out there on the importance of applying for lesser known local awards. In undergrad one of my friends was involved in giving out a $3000 scholarship for sophomores and juniors in a materials science program that belonged to a certain professional society within Pittsburgh. She lamented to a bunch of us how nobody was even applying for the scholarship (maybe 20-30 people were even eligible in the first place). I figured it was worth the effort to give the application a shot, got my two recommendations and wrote up some essays and wound up winning! Not because of me being a spectacular student, but because I was the only person that applied!</p>
<p>OP . I am with you re it not making sense for basically a rich kid to get/go after scholarship money. Last year, our D (val) was getting caught up in the “race” for scholarships. I told her to stop; she didn’t need the extra work and (at that time) she didn’t need the extra $$. We thought we had her covered in her 529 (turns out she only will have 3 years now!) I digress…
I told her to leave the amounts for people like her friend; child of a divorce scrambling for every $$ to get to her dream school.</p>
<p>And the weird part … I am with some of the other posters that say “He went for them, he deserves the $$!”<br>
Well, I bet his parents went for them and he merely signed the forms, but that is just me and mean since I know nothing.
I can tell you there are scholarships going begging. My mom’s DAR chapter works hard to raise their $1000 scholarship every year. Requires a history essay. They distribute the forms to the local schools. Last year they received not a single essay. Part may be the history teachers assuming DAR is racist (it isn’t BTW) or snooty or something and not telling the kids about it. But I KNOW there are kids in those schools that $1000 would have made a big difference in their school choices.</p>
<pre><code>So, while I, too, do not applaud greed; I can’t blame the kid for playing the game as it is set out. I most certainly agree that it is a shame that many kids are locked out of resources in yet another way. They are locked out by bad HS, bad neighborhoods, and lack of information on those going begging scholarships.
</code></pre>
<p>I also learned at the awards ceremony to take the scholarship/award thing with a grain of salt. My D refused “to give them ammo to use” by not reporting anything about her scholarships, academic honors etc etc. She was called up a few times, but at graduation there were people SHOCKED that she was the val since “She didn’t get very many awards at the assembly did she?”</p>
<p>Outside scholarships usually have parameters sometimes general - i.e., need based - and other times quite specific female, accepted into an engineering program. Outside scholarships usually require work on the part of the applicant i.e. an essay. Many outside scholarships give a one-time award ranging from 500 dollars to several thousand dollars. Multiple scholarships are needed to fund college costs. </p>
<p>The young man in the OP mentioned received 12 outside scholarships. I would be curious to learn if he only applied for the 12 he received or if perhaps he applied for 18 or 24 or … My guess: he applied for more than the 12 he received. Regardless, work went into getting the scholarships.</p>
<p>Outside scholarships serve a purpose in that they look beyond the athlete or academic superstar. In the case of the young man with the 12 scholarships: adopted minority into a non-minority family, good student with good SATs (a B student IS a good student and middling SATs are not bad SATs), an extracurricular that he founded and that benefits charities. As long as he did not apply for need based scholarships and instead applied for scholarships that reflected his particular attributes, then he deserved a shot at those scholarships.</p>
<p>The money angle interests me somewhat. Both my daughters have summer jobs - good ones. Are there students who need the jobs more than my girls? Without doubt, but does that mean that the girls shouldnt have pursued work this summer. No. I guess I feel the same way about the outside scholarships: just because the young mans family can afford to send him to college doesnt mean that he shouldnt contribute to his college education should he choose to do so - either through a job or finding some outside funding.</p>
<p>Ending on a positive note, maybe other parents will note the scholarships for future reference and next year and the next after that, students who had no idea that a particular company or foundation even gave a scholarship will apply.</p>
<p>There has been a similar discussion on the College Class of 2013 (or was it on the High School Class of 09?) thread. I find it interesting that sometimes the criteria for the awards are mentioned, and sometimes they are not. Our high school has a Gates Milennium Scholar this year (two last year). They make a big deal about the scholarship, but nothing about two of the key requirements (needy, for certain minorities only). Why not publicize what this scholarship is about? There was another scholarship that could only go to an African American male. That was noted. Financial need is a factor in many local scholarships (at least it was when my older S applied five years ago). Yet at the senior awards night last week, only a few scholarships were mentioned as having a need component. Yet I’m sure that many did have that component. </p>
<p>And then there was the big faux pas (to me!) of mentioning the GPA and SAT scores of one young woman, a friend of my son, who had won a ROTC scholarship…they weren’t that high…yikes!</p>
<p>We were so happy that S couldn’t apply for any of these local scholarships (he has no need, and I figured that kids with need should get them). He got a full ride merit scholarship from a LAC that includes tuition/books/fees/room and board/personal expenses. He didn’t need to chase after local scholarships. </p>
<p>As far as the college consultant, well, they are out there and people hire them to do all sorts of things. Perhaps some of them even write the college application essays and the scholarship application essays.</p>
<p>"Yet at the senior awards night last week, only a few scholarships were mentioned as having a need component. Yet I’m sure that many did have that component. </p>
<p>I don’t see a reason to mention the financial need component of the scholarships. I think that would embarrass many recipeints.</p>
<p>I experienced a similar situation at S1’s senior award night. One of the vals (there were 20-24!) got called up time after time to recognize her receipt of one scholarship after another. She almost seemed embarrassed. I was thinking that all of her awards might even sum up to more than the COA of the top state school she’ll attend in the fall. </p>
<p>I had the thought at the time “why does she get all these scholarships where there are so many other deserving students?”, and realized what I was really thinking was “why didn’t S1 get any of these?”. Well, two points: 1) I realized I was envious and quickly banished that thought and 2) S1 couldn’t be bothered to apply to these scholarships.</p>
<p>When a kid applies to any individual scholarship, there’s no guarantee he/she will receive it. Those kids who cast a wide net are doing the right thing. Why not apply for every scholarship for which the kid is eligible? More power to these kids who take the initiative to identify and do the hard work of getting scholarships.</p>
<p>Both high school that my girls attended asked seniors to let them know about any scholarships or awards they received. </p>
<p>My middle DD won 13 scholarships and they were a lot of work - essays, interviews, etc. She also applied for some she did not receive. Several seniors won 10 or more so she wasn’t the only one who was out there applying. She also won a state award for full tuition, but wasn’t really interested in any of the school instate and we knew we were moving cross county by the acceptance deadline anyway. She declined that one and it went to a runner up.</p>
<p>I see no need to mention race, need or ethnicity for the scholarship. Often it’s in the name, and if you’re interested for a younger student you can look up the eligibility requirements. </p>
<p>If the award is for something amazing like actually curing cancer, then that should be pointed out. Otherwise a simple, Congratulations to the winner of the John Smith Scholarship or Future Female Astronauts of America Scholarship or the Italian American Club Award is enough. Those events are long enough, without all the details.</p>
<p>Grad student D is headed out this weekend to audition for a small music fellowship (1000 to 5000). The deadline for the application was extended one month, because even in the economy, not enough students applied. There is a lot of money out there, but you cant wait for it to come to you and then get resentful that the people who go after it succeed.</p>
<p>I’ve mentioned this before on the 09 or 13 threads, but I made Son get an application for a small scholarship our elementary school PTA gives. Once I saw the application, I didn’t make him pursue it. It was seriously more complicated and time consuming than any college or honors college application he completed. When I saw who won that scholarship at Senior Awards night, I thought “good for her.”</p>
<p>There were a couple of girls at awards night who received quite a few of the local scholarships…It was pretty obvious that their parents had told them to go out there and get scholarships. But they did the work so more power to them.</p>
<p>It is very difficult to find non-need based outside scholarships. There is one national award that I made Son apply for because it’s a nice amount of money. At the very bottom of the information sheet, it listed the financial need as one of the criteria for the award, but there was abolutely nothing in the application that asked for financial information…do they look up the student’s address on Google Earth or what?</p>
<p>So what? He applied for the scholarships, had what the sponsors wanted to award them, so he got them. I , like a number of other posters here, applaud him and his family for the efforts put forth and shame on any of you who are jealous of the situation. He deserves every cent, unless he fraudently got them. </p>
<p>My B student son also got a number of awards. His school does not mention awards and scholarships, maybe so as not to incite jealous parents, so I don’t know what the goodies were for everyone else, but I can tell you my son was smack in the middle of his class for the awards. He got a great scholarship from his school of choice that was increased upon request, and a very nice outside scholarship. By the way, he was the only applicant who completed the process for this $2500 outside award that has now been closed for lack of applications. He made out as it was only supposed to be for $1K and not renewable, but the sponsors closed the program with him. And he nearly lost the danged scholarship by failing to complete some last minute paperwork on it. </p>
<p>My son applied for about 20 outside awards and was able to only use that one. Only got two more, I believe that were not usable because of restriction. There were many kids worthier than he was in terms of resume, but like the lottery, ya gotta play to win, and play they did not.</p>
<p>If the donors of the scholarship erroneously equated “minority” with “needy”, then maybe it was a good learning experience for them when Mom and Dad showed up for the award cermony in their Bentley. Maybe they will change their criteria in future years. Or maybe they wanted the award to go to a minority, regardless of financial need.</p>
<p>Just as we shouldn’t criticize students who apply for multiple scholarships, we also shouldn’t criticize students who apply to more than a certain number of schools (12 seemed to the the limit of what some deemed “correct”). I know some on this forum were highly critical of students who applied to more than the “correct” number of schools. And some of the critical posters were (private) college counselors, I believe…</p>
<p>“He is a minority (adopted at birth into a non-minority family), and I’m sure one or more of the awards turned to some degree on his minority status.”</p>
<p>His being raised by nonminority parents doesn’t erase his being a minority.</p>