Reusable Materials 8: Adapting Essays to Multiple Applications

Thursdays we discuss how reusable materials help you WOW committees and save time

Barbara sought multiple scholarships. The scholarships search engines described many of the possible scholarships as essays. Writing essays bothered her. She felt like every application asked for a different essay, so she kept writing each essay from scratch. We taught her how to adapt essays she had already written to qualify for the scholarships.

Use Essays You Already Wrote

Last week we shared essay topics currently requested by scholarship committees.

You will notice, as you review the topics, that you probably already wrote essays about some of those topics. The titles may not match exactly, but you can adapt them to do so. You may also change a few phrases or sentences in existing essays to adapt them to what the scholarship committees want.

For example, you may modify any essay you wrote about:

• “What you wanted to do when you grew up” for essays on “Future Career Aspirations”and “Where do you want to be in 10 years?”.
• Family members or historical figures for “Describe a person you admire” or “Who has been the biggest influence on your life? Why?” or “Name someone you feel changed the world.”
• A current event or societal issue for “Pick a controversial problem on college campuses and outline a solution” or “What do you consider to be the single most significant issue in society”

Adapt Phrases and Sentences

You may also expand your themes and home run statements into essays. For example, adding more details about each of your home run statements can create a 350 word essay for the following essay topics:

What traits will enhance your education and future employment?

Describe how you have demonstrated leadership both in and out of school.

Why are you a good candidate to receive this award/scholarship?

What have you done in the last six months to make the world a better place?

You can also ask English teachers to change the topics of class writing assignments to scholarship topics.

Saturday we share a caution about scholarships that appear too easy are usually scams

Sources of Money 8: Club Scholarships or Collegiate Funding

Tuesdays we review a source of financial aid available to help you pay for college

Mark wanted to get his MBA. He worked for a bank who agreed to pay 80% as educational reimbursements. In addition, he earned another $60,000 in scholarships using graduate school search engines.

Advantages of Collegiate Funding

Club Scholarship (www.clubscholarship.com), also known as Collegiate Funding, provides additional tools to help you get money for college. Like many scholarship search engines, they offer:

Find schools by state (click a state on the map to see a list of colleges for that state sorted by “Four Year Universities” and “Community, Junior and Technical Colleges”. The list includes government, private, nonprofit, and for-profit schools

“Student” navigation provides information about choosing the school and paying for it

“Parent” offers information on how parents may save money and still give education

“Universities” describes the advantages and disadvantages of public vs. private schools

Lists specialty schools, online colleges, study abroad programs, & college vs. universities

Financial aid sources for undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools

Lists of state grants, scholarships, and student loan programs

“Grants” includes information about federal and other grants with links to several

A lot of the links go to the federal student aid web site sponsored by the government

Offers a survey to help you identify scholarship sources

Links you to All Ivy Writing Service Inc. for help with admissions essays

Tips and resources for international students including a link to the TOEFL test

Cautions About Collegiate Funding

We found very few cautions with Club Scholarships:

• States “Beware of online scholarship sites. While some offer legitimate information, others exist only to compile information that they then sell to private loan companies. To be safe when searching for funding, it is better to let CF do this research for you and to use our pre-screened sources.”
• Collegiate Funding focuses more on information and links to other web sites than sources of scholarships, grants, and loans.
• You will not find too many actual scholarships listed on the site

Thursday we discuss how your reusable master application helps for school admissions

Tips to Get Money for College 4: Let Others Help You Get Money

Saturdays we share tips of cautions to facilitate getting scholarships or avoid problems

Cheryl, Zack, Brenda, and Will all took our scholarship workshop. Each of them invited others to help them complete the five steps to get money for college. Cheryl met with members of her local church congregation. Zack worked closely with the high school guidance counselor that maintained the school’s scholarship web site. Brenda asked her older sister who had received several scholarships to help. Will formed a group of friends who all worked together. Each of them earned more than $100,000 in scholarships. They attributed their success to working with others.

Who You Can Ask to Help

You may ask several people to help you apply for financial aid. You increase your success the more the people you ask who understand how to apply for grants, scholarships, and student loans. We also suggest that while parents may help, they should not be your primary coaches. Within those parameters, you may select any of the following people to help you apply for financial aid:

• High school guidance counselors
• College financial aid counselors
• Teachers or professors
• Family members
• Friends (especially in groups) who also want to get money for college
• Human resource specialists at work who can help you get educational reimbursement
• Nonprofit associations and organizations (especially those for women & minorities)
• Others who received substantial financial aid
• Members of civic clubs, church congregations

What They Can Do to Help

Other people may help you in a variety of ways:

• Keep you encouraged and motivated
• Ask you questions to generate your thoughts, strengths,
• Remind you of activities, experiences, and memberships as you complete search engine profiles
• Brainstorm ideas for themes, categories, and home run statements
• Edit your master application, essays, and letters of recommendation
• Lift you when you get discouraged or feel like quitting

We encourage you invite others to help you apply for grants, scholarships, and student loans. You enhance your success. You feel more motivated. You think better when you bounce ideas and thoughts off others.

Tuesday we review Club Scholarship or Collegiate Funding source of funding

Reusable Materials 7: Essay Topics for Scholarships

Thursdays we discuss how reusable materials help you WOW committees and save time

Michelle frequently chided her mother for saving everything Michelle did as a child. Her mother saved drawings when they came off the refrigerator. She saved a lock of hair from Michelle’s childhood. She even archived every report or paper Michelle wrote in school. However, Michelle had to thank her mother for saving her reports when she used her already written essays to earn $67,000 in scholarships.

Typical Topics for Scholarship Essays

Scholarship committees request you submit an essay with your applications. Prepare 4-6 reusable essays. Committees change topics every 3-5 years. We also recognize that committees shortened the length of essays they typically requested. In the late 1990s committees usually asked for essays of 500 words. Now, they want essays of 350 words or less.

Currently topics include:

• General Topics
  • What traits do you have that will enhance your education and future employment?
  • Tell us about a book or article you read, or class you attended, that inspired you.
• Your Field of Study
  • How will your study of _____ contribute to your immediate or long range career plans?
  • What are the most important issues your field is facing today?
• Current Events and Social Issues
  • What do you consider to be the single most important societal problem? Why?
  • Pick a controversial problem on college campuses and suggest a solution.
• Personal Achievements (Expand home run statements)
  • Describe how you have demonstrated leadership both in & out of school.
  • Why are you a good candidate to receive this award/scholarship?
• Background and Influences
  • Pick an experience from your own life and explain how it has influenced your development.
  • Who in your life has been your biggest influence? Why?
• Future Plans and Goals
  • Why do you want to get a college education?
  • Where do you see yourself 10 years from now?
• Financial Need
  • State any special or personal or family circumstances affecting your need for financial assistance.
  • From a financial standpoint, what impact would this scholarship have?

Saturday we share the tip about how you may use others to help earn scholarships

Sources of Money 7: Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA)

On Tuesdays we review a source of financial aid available to help you pay for college

Aaron could not qualify for federal student aid when he lived with his parents. They earned too much money. When he married, however, his new family qualified with their lower income. He attended a small liberal arts college in the northeast. The school used the same form, the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA), for school scholarships that students completed for Pell Grants and student loans. He paid for his entire master’s program with financial aid.

Prepare Your FAFSA Now

The Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) opens the doors to multiple sources of financial aid:

• Pell, FSEOG, and Teach Grants
• Iraq and Afghanistan Service Grants
• PLUS Loans
• Perkins Loans
• Stafford Loans
• Federal Work-Study programs
• Private scholarships through small colleges

Students must submit a Free Application for Financial Aid (FAFSA) each year that they want money. Instructions for completing the FAFSA can be found on the government web site. You must complete your FAFSA between January (after you complete your Federal Tax Forms) and June. However, several sources of financial aid are awarded based on a first come, first served basis. So, delaying submitting the FAFSA may lose you some financial aid.

You also must submit a separate FAFSA for each student requesting federal aid.

Tips for Completing Your FAFSA

Learn more about completing your FAFSA through the following links. They provide excellent answers to questions and tips. I refer you to them rather than repeat what they say:

• Lynn O’Shaugnessy’s blog The College Solution
• New York State Higher Education Services
• Federal Student Aid
• Rogue Community College
• College Confidential

You may also receive help through your state’s office of higher education. Several states offer workshops in February and March to help students and parents complete their FAFSA. You may find workshops near you by searching the state name and “higher education” or “FAFSA assistance”.

Also, you do not need to pay for someone to complete your FAFSA.

Thursday we discuss how reusable essays can help you save time in your applications

Tips to Get Money for College 3: Trim Your List to Realistic Opportunities

Saturdays we share tips or cautions to facilitate getting scholarships or avoid problems

Dee Dee attended our scholarship workshop and immediately started using the search engines. She felt overwhelmed after completing five search engines. Her combined efforts listed more than 600 scholarships. She couldn’t comprehend where to start. They ran together in her mind. One of our coaches showed her how to take just 15 minutes a day to review and trim her lists. She soon had her list narrowed to 178 real possibilities. She prepared her reusable materials and earned $120,000 in scholarships.

First Generate as Many Possibilities as You Can

We encourage students, whether youth or adult, to generate as many scholarship possibilities as you can. To do so, you click all the things that you have done as you complete the search engine profiles. If you played basketball, click it. If you see a club, join it, then click it. Each item you click adds another possibility to your list.

We encourage you to avoid editing yourself as you progress. Follow your initial reaction and click as many as may apply. Use more than one search engine. Yes, some of the results will overlap, but the lists will also add new scholarship opportunities.

Second Trim Your List to Real Possibilities

Not all of the scholarship opportunities listed will be strong possibilities for you. Some will be tentative at best. Some will not be close. You will need to eliminate the weak ones, to focus on the strong ones. It can be overwhelming unless you break it down into easy to follow steps:

• Set aside 15 minutes a day
• Open the list of one of your search engines
• Click on one of the scholarships
• Review the qualifications listed in the summary (if there is one)
• Follow the link to the actual scholarship page and review the qualifications
• Go back to the list and either
  • Delete or discard it if it will waste your time
  • Save or favorite it if you perceive that you could earn it

Tuesday we will review the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA)

Reusable Materials 6: Home Runs Enhance Master Applications

Thursdays we discuss how reusable materials WOW committees and save time

Nora attended our scholarship workshop. She chose not to meet with our coaches, but to do it on her own instead. She sent us a harsh email about 18 months later stating that she had applied for 178 scholarships and had not received a single penny. We responded asking her to send us her master application so we could review it and possibly find a reason for her rejection. Our review revealed that none of her 36 home runs included a number, dollar, or percent. Her statements ran more similar to paragraphs than 2-line statements. She made the corrections and started receiving money.

Home Runs Demonstrate Depth

You include home run statements in part C of your master application. You write three statements for each of the three categories of your 3-4 themes (4 themes X 3 categories X 3 home runs = 36 home run statements). While categories demonstrate your breadth in each theme, home run statements indicate your depth.

Home run statements are short, concise statements that include $, #, %s to add sparkle. For example:

• “As chair of our school’s sub-for-Santa, I supervised 26 students. We raised $12,000 and provided Christmas for 255 disadvantaged families”
• “At John Burroughs High School, I maintained a 4.0 grade point average in math for 4 years including 2 AP and 2 concurrent college classes.”

How to Prepare Home Run Statements

Use a baseball diamond to visualize your home run statements:

• 1st base: describe where you did what you did either a position or organization
• 2nd base: describe—very briefly—what you did
• 3rd base: outline the results
• Home plate: apply it to them as needed “Is this the kind of excellence you seek to reward?”

Preparing home run statements requires 5 steps:

• Jot down the ideas for each statement “Sub-for-Santa”
• Write them in complete sentences
• Substitute implied numbers for real numbers (“several students” for “26 students”)
• Refine the sentence with better syntax and words
• Ask someone to edit them

Saturday we share the tip about eliminating useless offerings from your lists

Sources of Money 6: SchoolSoup a New Scholarship Search Engine

On Tuesdays we review a source of financial aid available to help you pay for college

I recently received an email from School Soup Scholarships asking why we never mentioned them as a source of financial aid. The simple truth was that I had never heard of them before. Since that time, we have shared School Soup with several students seeking financial aid. They reported good results. So, based on their experience, we share SchoolSoup.com.

Advantages of School Soup

www.SchoolSoup.com offers services similar to other search engines. They state:

“The SchoolSoup.com website is new but our experience in college and scholarship research is not. We began accumulating college and scholarship information in 1988 and developed one of the first computerized scholarship search programs. We currently have a team of research specialists that add new scholarships to our database every day.

Over the past 18 years our college and scholarship data has been licensed to several Fortune 500 companies on an exclusive basis. For the first time ever our scholarship information is available to the general public free of charge.”

The site seems simple to use. Their profile was easy to complete and updated a list of scholarships. Services include:

• Scholarship matching based on your answers to a profile
• The Careers section offers a free Self-Directed Search career test and links information about careers from the government’s Occupational Outlook
• Lists of public and private colleges sorted by state or major
• Information about federal, private and other student loans
• A nice college comparison tool based on your choices for majors, cost, geography, and test scores
• Articles and tips on how to decide what school to attend, scholarship scams, and more
• Links to scholarships sorted by state, city, for women or minorities, year of study, corporate, or activities (bottom of the home page)
• Helpful, not irritating, emails about new offerings

Cautions about School Soup

Many of the cautions about School Soup repeat what we’ve said before

• Avoid all ads, contests, promotions, and surveys
• Click “No thank you” whenever you see it.

Thursday we discuss how home run statements enhance your reusable master application

Tips to Get Money for College 2: Create Experiences That Impress

Saturdays we share tips or cautions to facilitate getting scholarships or avoid problems

Sheldon lived a full life of service, athletics, leadership, and academics. He pursued these pursuits with his parent’s support. They attended our scholarship workshop because his older brother was in high school while Sheldon was in 8th grade. He began recording specifics about his activities. As a result, he had an abundance of material to write home run statements. His information was accurate because he recorded it at the time of the activity.

Get Involved in Activities Early in Life

Involvement and participation remain a key to powerful scholarship applications. Start early getting involved and recording your results. People ask me when to start applying for scholarships. You should start applying in the 10th grade. You should start doing things that will qualify you for scholarships as early as 5 years old.

Scholarship search engines will ask you about your activities. They provide lists of possible athletic pursuits, academic achievements, club and society memberships, ethnic backgrounds, and more. These lists provide suggestions of activities you may pursue. For example:

• Join clubs and societies listed on the search engines
• Participate in team or individual sporting activities
• Seek leadership opportunities in church, school, and community organizations
• Engage in math and writing contests, science projects, and other academic competitions
• Provide short-term service projects and long-term service opportunities
• Join school choirs, dance or drill teams, orchestras, or marching bands
• Pursue little entrepreneurial ventures like lemonade stands, babysitting, or lawn care

Follow your passion for each activity. Look beyond the possible scholarship or financial aid you may receive. Participate because you truly enjoy doing what they offer. You cannot sustain activities that do not excite you.

Record the Details About Your Activities

Your home run statements require details to impress scholarship committees. Start keeping a journal that includes the detailed information. For example,

• Numbers of members you led
• Dollars raised, earned, donated, or given
• Hours, days, or weeks spent on activities 
• Number of teams, contestants, or beneficiaries
• Kits, quilts, or programs produced

Tuesday we we will review the scholarship search engine www.SchoolSoup.com

Reusable Materials 5: Establish Your Themes in Your Master Application

Thursdays we discuss how reusable materials WOW committees and save time

Rachel identified four themes about her life that combined to describe her values, motivations, and accomplishments. She spent a lot of time developing her master application including themes and home run statements. Her themes structured how she described herself in scholarship applications. She failed to include numbers, dollars, and percentages in her home run statements. So, she received very little money from her applications. She changed implied numbers, dollars, and percentages for real ones. She received money from her new applications.

Select Themes That Describe You

Each of you possess certain interests, motivations, and skills that define your personality. Combining some of these interests into one group defines a theme. For example, some people love sports. They get involved in more than one sport. Hence, they may use athletics as a theme. Most people get involved in 3-4 themes.

You should select 3-4 themes that describe you. You may select from the following list or more:

• Academics
• Athletics
• Creative Talent
• Community Action
• Challenges Overcome
• Cultural Arts
• Diversity
• Ethnicity
• Entrepreneurship
• Leadership
• Occupation
• Service
• Survival

Once you select your themes, you demonstrate a depth and breadth to your theme. You add 3 categories to each theme to highlight your breadth. In our example above, our athlete may excel or love football, baseball, and cycling best. A creative person may list her favorite pursuits as dance, vocal music, and instrumental music. We will highlight categories next Wednesday.

You then write three home run statements for each category. Giving you a total of 36 home run statements (four themes X 3 categories each X 3 home run statements = 36). We will teach more about home run statements in two weeks.

Themes Answer the Longer Questions

You copy and paste your themes and home run statements into the questions on scholarship applications that provide a larger field space. For example:

• “Describe your leadership experience”
• “List your extracurricular activities”
• “Outline service you have given in the community”
• “List your athletic pursuits”

Saturday we will share the tip about creating experiences that impress committees

Sources of Money 5: Zinch A Fun, Wacky Source of Scholarships & More

On Tuesdays we review a source of financial aid available to help you pay for college
Cynthia attended one of our workshops and worked with a coach for 3 months to find and apply for scholarships. Her coach introduced her to the Zinch “double your money” scholarship idea. Cynthia used Zinch as one of her many sources of scholarships. She received a $700 dollar scholarship that she found on Zinch. Zinch matched it with another $700.

Advantages Zinch Offers You

Zinch (www.Zinch.com), started by three college students from Utah, encourages students to explore and declare “I am more than a test score.” They answer the question What’s Zinch? with

“Almost all colleges find and recruit students through standardized test scores. Zinch allows students to be seen for what they are -- not just numbers, but people.”

While they offer assistance to students in high school, college, and graduate school, they designed the experience for young, intelligent, and creative people. They interplay between their web site, Facebook, and other forms of social media flows seamlessly. Make sure you read the bios of “History & Vision” under “About Zinch”.
They offer a lot to students:

• Scholarship search begins listing “249 Results totaling $2,168,006”. The number and dollars decrease as you answer simple questions (4 minutes) defining yourself.
• They offer a number of interesting sources of financial aid;
• Double Your Money provides $1.00 matching for any scholarship you receive that you found on Zinch. They begin with a sum of $50,000 on January 1st and award the money on a first-come-first-served until the money is gone
• Weekly $1,000 scholarships for the best answer to questions like “If you had to design a Mt.Rushmore representing the 2000’s, whose faces would you select?”
• Articles that provide guidance, hope, and self-esteem to students
• They offer advice for both applying for college using a portfolio concept.

Cautions About Zinch

• You must agree to allow them to send information about schools and 3rd parties to register.
• Many contests

Though we’ve never had anyone complain.
Thursday we will review how to add themes to your reusable master application

Caveat Emptor or Buyer Beware 4: Finances for Proprietary For-Profits

Saturdays we share tips or cautions to facilitate getting scholarships or avoid problems

Barbara had signed a contract to attend a nursing program at a proprietary for-profit college. They helped her apply for federal grants and student loans for financial aid. They offered no scholarships. She came to our office seeking $38,000 in scholarships. We worked with her multiple times, but to no avail. We could not find many scholarships for the school she had contracted.

Government, Nonprofit, and For Profit Schools

Colleges and universities, generally, include three categories:

• Government schools include colleges run by states, communities, and cities. Legislative bodies set the tuitions for government colleges. They usually include the name of the sponsoring government (state university, state college, city college)
• Nonprofit schools were usually founded by religious and charitable organizations. They do not report to government entities, but to an advisory board or private board of education. By law, nobody owns nonprofit organizations.
• For-profit schools are owned by private or publically traded corporations. Generally, tuition for these schools is set by a board of directors or owners. These schools are generally listed as proprietary schools in state directories. Frequently, proprietary schools cost more than government and nonprofit schools.

Reduced Financial Aid for Proprietary Schools

Search engines ask questions to determine what scholarships for which you may qualify. One of the questions will generally ask what school you plan to attend. Based on your answers to the questions the search engines generate a list of scholarships.

Very few scholarship committees award scholarships for people who attend for-profit schools. In addition, many scholarships include qualifying statements such as:

“Plan to enroll in full-time undergraduate study at an accredited U.S. four-year college or university for the entire 2012�13 academic year (excluding proprietary and online schools)”

“The scholarship can be used at any four-year accredited college or university in the United States or Puerto Rico (excluding proprietary and online schools).”

Many times, proprietary schools encourage you to apply for federal grants and student loans to compensate for a lack of scholarships.

Monday we will review the scholarship search engine www.zinch.com