Help Keep Your College Bound Student Out of Debt

As you may know, student loan debt is consuming many students across the nation. With the surge in higher education, many students are paying a premium to attend colleges and universities and accumulating a lot of debt as a result. 

Luckily, there are options. If you have a student headed to post-secondary school, there might be help for them in the form of financial aid, scholarships and grants, particularly if your student excels in math or STEM. Financial aid can reduce the financial burden your college bound student takes on, which can really help with the stress of attending college.

We want to help your student! We’ve done some research to help make applying for financial assistance easier and compiled ideas of where to start in your search.

Fill Out the FAFSA

Regardless of whether your student is looking for financial aid, completing the FAFSA is something every student should do. It’s a free application that’s accepted by most post-secondary education institutions. Parental income is one of the factors used to determine financial aid eligibility, which may make you second guess having your student apply. However, it’s good to fill out the FAFSA regardless. Most merit-based scholarships will require a FAFSA.

Start Researching Early and Apply for Multiple Scholarships

Scholarships applications take time to complete. It’s best not to wait until the 19^thhour to fill them out. Your student will need proper time to write essays, garner transcripts and request letters of recommendations. Having your student record deadlines somewhere that are easily accessible will ensure that they don’t miss good opportunities. Students can start applying for many scholarships in their junior year of high school and some can even be applied for as early as sophomore year.

Know Where to Look

It’s tempting to start by Googling ‘financial assistance’ to try and find suitable opportunities, however, there’s a lot of content out there, and, that could lead to spending even more time searching than applying. Students are far more likely to receive scholarships and financial aid from sources closer to home. Communities are generally looking to invest in students, some by  helping aid them in their studies.

• Churches, Synagogues and Temples – many religious communities like to give back to youth and offer scholarships to their college bound members.
• Non-profit/Volunteer Organizations – your student may have already spent timing volunteering. Some of the organizations that coordinate volunteer opportunities offer college scholarships. Asking is the first place to start.
• Corporations – Mid to large business love to give back to their communities. If your student is good at math or science or planning on majoring in a STEM related field, they should look info scholarships from businesses in those fields.  As you can see from this link, corporations of all sorts offer scholarships to students with potential.
• Private Organizations – The Elks Club, Rotary Club and the AAUW are some of the most notable types of these organizations, and many are willing to give financial aid to local students.
• Colleges and Universities – Schools want enrollment from students who they have been accepted, which means they will often offer incentives like financial aid and scholarships. Your student can search for money available through grants, scholarships and financial assistance when they send their application in for admission. Sending them in together reduces a second step and makes it easy for school administration to track. Students generally have the most success receiving financial assistance with in-state schools

Rather than doing all the searching online, have your student visit their school counselor. Most schools have access to lists of financial aid opportunities and counselors are there to help assist students in finding the best fits when it comes to applying for scholarships and grants.

Play to Your Strengths

Does your student excel in math and science? Math scholarships and STEM scholarshipsare being awarded at a high rate right now, especially in comparison to other types of scholarships. It your student does well in math and science, they should be applying for math and STEM scholarships.

Is you’re a student an athlete and scholastically in good shape? There’s a scholarship for that. Do they participate and place in science fairs? There’s a scholarship for that too. Do they love theater? Maybe a drama scholarship (including scholarships for technical theater, for those STEM-minded drama members) is for them.

Your student likely has strong interests and passion for something. Let strength in those interests lead them to scholarships. That passion will shine through in applications and donating parties will find them an attractive candidate for what they’re rewarding.

Be Organized

Staying organized is clutch when it comes to applying for scholarships, especially if you’re student plans on applying for lots of them. Creating folders, both physically and digitally will help with this. Here are a few things to start with in those folders:

1. School transcripts
2. Letters of recommendation from teachers.
3. Letters of recommendation from community members.
4. Essays. These will likely be different for every application, but the body might be able to remain the same, so your student could create one or a couple for templates.
5. Resume. A resume may seem strange for high school students to have, but schools look for students with drive. Tracking past jobs, community service awards and activities all shows ambition, which can be something that sets the student apart when applying for scholarships and grants.

Please let us know if you have any STEM or scholarship recommendations for students. Good luck!