How to Get More Financial Aid for College
The cost of going to college increases nearly every year. Many students apply for government assistance when going to college, then graduate with an enormous debt to pay off. Turn your senior year of high school into the time when you secure as much financial aid as possible. Spend an hour or two each day for the entire school year, and you could get enough grants and scholarships to completely pay for your college education.
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Instructions
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Find scholarship search programs online. Do a search for "scholarship search" to find a variety. These programs are collections of thousands of scholarships and grants in one place. When you fill out their informational questionnaire, the site will match your answers with its information on each scholarship's requirements. The site will then give you a list of all scholarships you are qualified for.
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Fill out the form on at least three scholarship search sites. Some of the larger ones, like Fastweb, Scholarships.com and College Board, can give you dozens or hundreds of financial aid possibilities, but none of them have exactly the same database. Fill out as many forms as possible, to get the largest variety of possibilities.
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Search through the scholarship applications and find the subject of the essay questions asked. Most applications will ask you to write an essay on a certain topic. Many of these topics will be similar or identical. Write a series of essays pertaining to the most common topics in the application forms. You can use the same essay in more than one application, saving you time to apply for more scholarships.
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Fill out application forms for 1 to 2 hours each day. Consider this a part-time job, and dedicate your time to it as if you were working in a store or other place of employment. Fill out the online application forms or print out paper copies and fill them out by hand, depending on the requirements of each particular site.
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Make note of the application process dates for each site. Every scholarship committee accepts applications in a certain period of time. Fill out applications early, but don't submit them until the open dates have arrived. You will be creating a large collection of finished applications early in the year, then sending many of them out later in the season.
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Apply for federal financial aid through your high school counselor or fafsa.com. You don't have to get a loan from the government to get a good financial aid base. Accept any Pell Grant or other grant that is offered to you. These never have to be paid back.
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Tips & Warnings
Don't ignore the smaller scholarship possibilities. Some smaller grants aren't awarded just because no one applied for them. These small amounts can add up to a substantial portion of your college costs.
References
Resources
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