Are you tired of calculating whether buying a matcha latte will send you over budget? College financing is stressful, but scholarships, grants, and awards can help ease the burden. These funds are available to undergraduate and graduate students at all stages and, unlike loans, do not have to be paid back. The value varies, and multiple small awards can equal one large one. While some scholarships are automatic, others require an application and/or essay.
Why Should You Apply for Scholarships?
Perhaps you think that you don’t have the qualifications to win any scholarships, or that someone more qualified than you is applying, so why bother applying for scholarships?
In reality, many scholarships are less competitive than you’d expect. Students are often busy, undervalue them, or don’t know where to find them. Some scholarships are also very specific, limiting applicants. Applying for scholarships, grants, and awards is worth the effort for the potential reward. Even if you don’t win, writing the essays is excellent practice for pitching yourself, such as in job interviews or other applications.
Where to Find Scholarships for College
Review your college’s financial aid webpage for available scholarships, grants, and awards, which may also link to external databases. For example, in Canada, you can search for scholarships on ScholarshipsCanada, StudentAwards, and ScholarTree. In America, you can find scholarships on Scholarship America, BigFuture, FastWeb, CareerOneStop, and Scholarships.com.
Check your academic department’s website for awards, as you may be eligible for awards that require an essay or project completed in their classes.
Some companies and organizations offer scholarships; check whether the ones you are interested in or where you or an acquaintance works do. Also, religious or cultural groups sometimes offer financial aid to students in their community.
When in doubt, you can ask your friends, teachers, and school counselors to learn about where students have previously applied.
How to Apply for Scholarships for College
Always read the eligibility criteria to avoid wasting time on an application for which you don’t qualify. Scholarships may require high grades, athletic involvement, specific enrollment, financial need, or membership in marginalized communities. If a reference letter is required, give the writer sufficient time (i.e, at least two to three weeks).
Depending on the scholarship, you may be asked to write an essay or personal statement, or answer a series of questions. Company-sponsored scholarships tend to be more specific to the company’s purpose; for example, an energy delivery company might ask you to write an essay about the future of renewable energy.
Colleges tend to have more open-ended prompts, such as “Demonstrate your financial need/academic achievement/community involvement/student leadership/athletic involvement.”
In these cases, you must prove you deserve the scholarship by detailing your life circumstances and/or achievements. If space allows, discuss how the scholarship has impacted your studies, extracurriculars, or community engagement.
For example, in my application for an award that prioritizes community involvement, I described how I champion the educational journeys of high school students, especially those from marginalized communities who encounter barriers to accessing higher education. I emphasized that my degree in English literature has taught me the value of education and empowered me to help the students I work with. I also mentioned how receiving this award would allow me to focus on my studies and extracurricular engagements without financial stress.
There is no wrong way to approach a scholarship essay, as the prompt and word count will affect how you approach your scholarship essay. If you have a higher word count, you may have room to include elements of storytelling and creative nonfiction like you would in a Common App essay. If you have a lower word count, your essay will need to be more concise.
If you have written a personal statement or completed a supplementary application, you may be able to reuse some content in your scholarship essays. You can write about the interests and activities that you have previously written about, expand on concepts that you cut from your essays, and refer to your previous material for writing inspiration. However, you should always tailor your essays to the scholarship you are applying to.
How to Write a Strong Scholarship Essay: Tips for Applying to Scholarships, Grants, and Awards
Here are five practical tips to make scholarship applications more manageable and successful:
- Save past applications and essays
- Track your achievements and activities
- Stay organized with deadlines
- Get feedback on your essays
- Celebrate your wins
- Keep a folder of all your previous applications and essay materials. Colleges usually reuse the same application and essay questions, so it’s useful to have a structure or template that you can refer to when you write your applications for the following years.
- Make a list of your achievements and activities throughout your college journey. When you have a list of everything that you’ve accomplished, you will have an easier time finding ways to showcase yourself to others.
- Keep track of deadlines for the different scholarships, grants, and awards that you plan to apply to. Scholarships are available year-round, so make note of the deadlines in your calendar or planner. This will also help you prioritize which applications and essays to work on, especially if you are busy with your academic, extracurricular, or personal commitments.
- Ask someone to review your essay, whether that’s a friend, someone from your college’s writing centre, or one of Write the World’s College Essay Advisors. An extra pair of eyes will ensure that you put your best foot forward and that your essay shines.
- Celebrate whenever you win a scholarship, grant, or award! Congratulate yourself for putting in the work, and reward yourself with a little treat—how about that matcha latte you were thinking about?
About Vivian Zhi
Vivian Zhi is an undergraduate student at the University of Toronto majoring in English and Book & Media Studies. Vivian writes stories about local histories and student life, and their work has been featured in The Ex-Puritan, The Varsity, and Destination Ontario. Vivian looks forward to helping young writers find themselves through their writing.
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