College: Why Should You Pay For It?

“FEBRUARY 15^th!”

“What do you mean February 15^th, it’s already the 5^th!”

“Well if you want the scholarship, you need to fill out the application, write the essay, get three letters of recommendation, and have all of that postmarked by February 15^th.”

“Talk about pressure, deadlines, last minute. How in the world can I accomplish all of that by the 15^th?” I thought to myself. “But it is a scholarship worth three thousand dollars. I guess I’ll just put off everything else because that will help pay for books, and room and board. I need that money!”

This is the typical thought going through the mind of a person who waited too late to apply for a scholarship. But, ironically, there aren’t many students who fall into this dilemma. I have done a lot of traveling and been in many summer educational advancement and college preparation programs.  Combined with those two types of experience along with work experience, I have met a lot of intelligent, high scholastically achieving individuals who weren’t in this dilemma. They actually pay or have paid for their entire education out of their own pockets! I always ask, “Why didn’t you get any scholarships to help pay for college?”

Guess what the most popular answer was? “I didn’t know where to look”, and the second most popular answer was, “I didn’t feel like filling out the application.”

I plan to address both of these issues. The first is understandable, but for my peers that give me the latter answer, I usually give them a look that says, “Well I guess you have gotten what you deserve.”

When you get a chance to indulge in what people your age in other countries and continents can only dream of, and do it for free, you must take advantage of that opportunity and put everything that you have into doing it. Unlike what most people say, life is long, and there will be ample time for you to play basketball, go to concerts, play cards, or whatever other excuse you can think of for not putting your time and effort into scholarship searching.

For any great work, you must create a foundation. The best way to get a scholarship is to have what the scholarship company is looking for. You don’t have to be a 4.0 valedictorian who is the president of every organization at school. You don’t have to be voted “most likely to succeed.” You don’t even have to be the most popular person in school. If you are any of the above, that is great and you also have an excellent light to shine to receive scholarships; but if you aren’t, you also can shine and receive ample funding so you can go to college free. This is what you need to do. Everything that I am about to tell you is achievable, and it is possible to fix any low standings of education at any time in your educational career. I will explain what I mean by that after I give you the list of achievable goals.

When scholarship companies analyze your information, they look at four main sections: grade point average, ACT/SAT scores, letters of recommendation, and essay. The ideal grade point average is a 4.0; you should strive to make a 4.0 every semester that you are in school. Don’t just say to yourself that you want to make a 4.0, actually study hard so that you can earn a 4.0. But if you don’t, that is not a problem. For scholarships, aim your cumulative grade point average to be a 3.5 or higher. If you have that now, be sure to maintain it, because when they see that GPA, that automatically places you in good standings with the progress to success. If you don’t have a 3.5 cumulative, try your hardest to get at least that. It is very hard to be turned down when you have a 3.5. If this is your senior year, and you don’t have the GPA, do NOT let this be the reason that you pass a scholarship by. APPLY anyway you still may get it. Your chances are still high.

Test scores are important. I tell students to take both the ACT and the SAT, because if you score low on one, and high on the other you can just submit the high score, which will give you the weight to still get a scholarship. On the ACT, strive for at least a 25. This is very attainable; you can do it. For the SAT, try to get at least an 1100. Both of these scores are excellent scores for these tests. When you get them and the companies/organizations see this, you will take yourself up one more notch to receiving a scholarship.