GPA, SAT and What Else? What You Need to Prepare for a Scholarship
Whether you’re a freshman in high school just starting your higher education, or a senior looking forward to the upcoming college year, you can prepare yourself for scholarships by creating a great looking application and setting yourself apart from the crowd. Everyone has the opportunity to apply for scholarships and the number of applications a scholarship selection committee views can often be of astronomical proportions. It’s easy to go through a few hundred applications and breeze through yours, forgetting it as the reviewer moves onto the next application. Creating a unique, unforgettable application is attainable by every student, regardless of where you are in your preparations or how much time you have left to prepare.
Grades – Everyone knows grades are one of the most important factors scholarship committees look at when determining whether an applicant is qualified. Many scholarships carry a minimum grade point average. If you’re just starting out in high school, you can start preparing a great application by keeping your grades high. If you’re further along in high school and have received marginal or average grades, there’s no time like the present to give them a boost. Even students with a poor grade point average can boost it up several points with a semester of two worth of higher grades. Scholarship committees like to see improvement over a student’s high school career as well. It shows dedication and maturity. Keep those grades as high as possible!
SAT – The SAT, and other standardized test scores required by some scholarships, represent the other very important number, aside from grades, when viewing applications. Because high schools weight grades differently, and use different ranking systems, the SAT score is the only current method for scholarship review boards to compare applicants against each other. Your SAT score represents your rank among all other applicants. For students who have not received the best grades in high school, the SAT is a great way to show scholarship reviewers you are serious about higher education and have the ability to perform well in school and make use of scholarship monies. For students who already have great grades, a poor performance on the SAT could be devastating to your application. A great SAT score will always be remembered by scholarship selectors. Try taking as many practice tests as available. If your school offers practice tests, make use of them. Buy a book of SAT sample questions and practice, practice, practice! If you can afford an SAT prep course, many guarantee certain scores or improvement and the money you save by winning a scholarship can offset the cost of such courses.
Extracurricular – It’s hard to set yourself apart through grades and SAT scores unless yours are truly outstanding and above the rest of the applicants. But only a few applicants can achieve that. For others, and equally important to scholarship selection committees, extracurricular activities can give students that unforgettable edge they are seeking. Don’t try and do every club and sport just to give yourself a well-rounded application. Scholarship selection committees like to see diverse backgrounds and individuality. If there is a sport you excel at, or a club you are particularly interested in, put your time and energy into that. It looks much better to have won an award or achievement in an activity you are passionate about, then to have an application full of numerous activities, none of which you really loved or showed achievement in.
A Few Final Words – Presenting a great application that sets you apart from the other applicants is tough work. It takes a lot of perseverance and a lot of personal time that you may think could be better used towards other activities. But when the college tuition bill comes and your expenses are several thousand dollars less because of a scholarship, you’ll feel the rewards of all your hard work.