Talk about when you did/did not recieve a scholarship?
As a college freshman, I have been applying for scholarships online in hopes that it will help reduce the amount that my parent and I have to cover, but I am honestly not sure how effective applying is. Applying to scholarships is easy, but what about winning them? Everyone always says to apply for scholarships to help pay for college, but what are your experiences in doing so? Does anyone have any inspiring stories about when they actually received one? Or, do you have any stories about when you applied for so many but, despite your efforts, it never got you anywhere? #scholarships #college #help #financial-aid
2 answers
Ken’s Answer
The most important thing to do when you are considering college and applying for scholarships is career focus. Getting to know yourself better to develop a career focus and then meeting and talking to people who are doing what you think that you might want to do to see what they do, how they got there, and find out what advice they might have is very important.
After acquiring an appropriate focus, you can contact various people in professional associations related to your career area, the reference librarian at your local library, your academic adviser, your major department head, your religious organization (if you have one), just to name a few.
Getting to know yourself and how your personality traits relate to people involved in various career opportunities is very important in your decision making process. During my many years in Human Resources and College Recruiting, I ran across too many students who had skipped this very important step and ended up in a job situation which for which they were not well suited. Selecting a career area is like buying a pair of shoes. First you have to be properly fitted for the correct size, and then you need to try on and walk in the various shoe options to determine which is fits the best and is most comfortable for you to wear. Following are some important steps which I developed during my career which have been helpful to many .
Ken recommends the following next steps:
Raquel’s Answer
I was very fortunate to be a part of the Be a Leader Foundation in Arizona and they honestly helped me go to college and pay for it. They provided me with college-going mentors who helped me with my essays and made sure the essays followed the prompt, were well-written, and provided some insight on adversity that I faced along with what I learned from it. If you don't have any mentors, I would suggest reaching out to your English teacher, school advisor, or career center advisor and see if they can proof-read your essay. Your essay should typically be in story-form where you can talk about any challenges that most of your peers don't typically face and what you learned from it, any impact you've made in your community, or any impact you hope to make in your community in the future. Those are typically the main prompts you'll come across. I learned that a lot of places used the same prompt but had different wording so it was easier to re-use some of the same essays. However, if you re-use the same essay, make sure multiple people have read it to ensure it's a strong essay.
I can say for certain that there were many times were I felt discouraged and lazy and didn't want to put the time in to write so many essays. But I was a first-generation student with immigrant parents and I felt like I had the responsibility to put myself through college because of their sacrifices. I wanted my parents to know that the life they left behind was worth it and I promised myself that I would uphold that belief every day. Whenever you feel discouraged, remind yourself for the reason why you want to go to college in the first place. If you can't find a reason, simply think of writing essays as a job. If you take 40 hours applying for scholarships and you get one worth $5,000, that's $125/hour! Sometimes, perspective is all it takes to keep that motivation running.
Good luck on your journey!
Raquel recommends the following next steps:
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