Where to start for the scholarship hunt this summer for an upcoming senior?
Ask your high school counselors
You will likely have more success if you start with a different strategy and focus time now on identifying colleges that offer significant merit aid to students with stats like your student’s stats, or financial aid for families in circumstances like yours. You can check out financial aid with net price calculators on each college’s website.
Most outside scholarships are one time, and often for smallish sums. Most college scholarships are renewable for four years and can be for larger amounts.
You’ll also need to figure out how much you WILL pay towards the cost of college each year. A $20K annual scholarship may not accomplish enough if the college costs $62K/year and you can only pay $22K.
^ +1 to @arabrab in post #2.
I would also suggest working on your college applications and getting them in an expeditious manner. Many schools have early dates to be considered for their merit scholarships. Usually school scholarships are the most generous.
Here is a link to merit scholarships offered by different colleges and universities: https://www.■■■■■■■■■■/scholarships/. Check out the actual college websites referenced for updated information.
@arabrab outlines the general strategy that our family used. Daughter applied to 8 schools, 7 with high merit potential for her stats, one need based that we weren’t likely to be able to afford full pay but she wanted to try anyway. She was admitted to six of eight, all with great merit offers and the last one being full tuition at a private school. We found the merit information on each school’s websites. She also got a few one time local scholarships totaling 5000, but it was a lot of extra effort to get that money. In the end we will be spending about 11,000 per year less than we budgeted, so will likely also be able to help some with graduate school if she chooses that route. The school websites have this information.
thanks to everyone for replying, do you usually need to be perfect 2400 SAT 4.0 GPA to qualify for these school based scholarships?
^^^
absolutely not. If you look at the links for assured scholarships, you’ll see what stats are needed.
@mom2collegekids I was seeking to thank whoever pointed me toward that link http://automaticfulltuition.yolasite.com/ but I couldn’t track where it came from. It’s how I found out about the Bama and Temple full tuition scholarships that will create extra options for us. Thanks so much.