Thanks everyone for your thoughtful replies. I feel like I can take some of the ideas you’ve given me, and go to the scholarship coordinator at our district and see what she thinks.
I like @Ucbalumnus’ idea of phrasing the scholarship in such a way that it will go to a student whose college allows it to go towards work-study or loans or other incidentals.
Also, @DavidPuddy’s suggestion of giving a scholarship for trade school is compelling, since my husband and I own a plumbing, electric, HVAC business and have a very hard time finding people trained in the those trades. I’m embarrassed to say that I don’t know much about trade schools, so I’ll look into that.
Awarding a student a laptop, flight coupons, or other more concrete gifts is also something to consider, but I’m thinking the value of those would probably also need to be declared to the school and would be subtracted from the financial aid awards. I’ll see what the scholarship coordinator says about it.
@Jzducol, and several others, suggested helping the first gen kids while they are still in high school, and this may be the route we go. My son is first gen, and the only reason he got into a school that met full need is because of the massive amount of research I did before he started high school. If I had not done that, I would never have known that if he worked hard in high school, the sky was the limit. Our large, public, rural high school offers pretty much zero college counseling. There is a financial aid night, but by the time parents attend that, it is too late to consider the rigorous qualifications needed for full need schools. One of my son’s friends, a bright and talented kid, didn’t even know until college app time, that he should have taken a foreign language. So maybe I will look into offering something to 8th grade graduates for private high school/college counseling. It’s possible that many first gen students don’t even make it to the scholarship application process, and we could focus our efforts there.
Of course, there is always offering help with books, laptop, etc… for community college students, and my heart is there too. My daughter, who has struggled with mental health issues, couldn’t go straight to a four-year college because she tested out of high school early, and community college has been a stellar fit for her.
I also want to say that I didn’t intend to demean the colleges that apply outside scholarship to grants. I’m so grateful to my son’s school for all the financial help they’ve given us, including increasing our grants when our daughter wanted to attend community college in another city. And I’m glad some of you reiterated to me that the money colleges save on one student, will go to help another.
So thank you all for giving me so much to think about!