Scholarships and homeschooled students

[Sharon in SC]

My firstborn is a very bright 9th grader and, at this stage of the game, find myself wondering - do homeschoolers have an equal chance at college scholarships as their private/public schooled counterparts? TIA for sharing any insight, experience, knowledge you may have on this.....

[Raders Fan]

My oldest probably applied for at least 30 scholarships last year, including speaking and essay contests. Some of the scholarships said, in essence, "Homeschoolers need not apply."

 

Some will inherently put a homeschooler at a disadvantage. I think Toyota and Coca-Cola really want to see major student body government/leadership positions and/or serious sports involvement. Some seem to want lots of AP or honors classes. I think it's kind of hard to really say that your homeschool son or daughter is student body president, much as I'd like to be able to do that myself. Toyota and Coca-Cola scholarship competition start off as online fill-in-the-bubble forms, and if you can't make that cut with the computer, no matter how stellar your student's other achievements, you can't get the money. That being said, my son did make it to the semi-finalist for Toyota, but no further. Best Buy, Wal-Mart, Lowe's, and Carl's Jr. competitions begin the same way, and my son won two of these on the local level, for a total of $2,500.

 

If people determining who to award a scholarship to include current/former ps teachers, I honestly think homeschoolers are at a disadvantage. The same goes for essay and speaking contests. My husband and I have seen our sons compete in the American Legion contest for a few years now. While we recognize that we might be biased and think our darlings have performed better than another contestant, I do feel that others observing the competition are not so biased. First example: son speaks well, but so does another student, so husband can't say whether son will get first or second, but it should be one of those places. To the shock of many, ds takes third. Was it was because he was a homeschooler, or because he took a conservative stance, or both?

 

Second example: son does not speak as well as the other student, that is clear. But this is a contest all about the Constitution, and the other student didn't mention the Constitution even once! He just rambled on and on about what a great country this is. He even made up words. But he was introduced as a ps student, and mine was introduced as a homeschooler, and the contest was judged by school teachers. Were they biased? Were they swayed by a student who spoke louder and was more confident, to the exclusion of the other factors they were supposed to judge, and which should (according to the scoring sheet) have been given more weight in the judging?

 

Do homeschoolers need to mask conservative tendencies, if there are any, in order to do well? I don't know. Actually, I guess much would depend on who the judges are.

 

I truly believe that as homeschooling becomes more accepted, it will be easier for our students to receive scholarships, that the field they are playing on will become level.

 

As far as college scholarship money is concerned, that's going to depend on the schools that your student is interested in. But more and more are actively recruiting homeschoolers.

 

Good luck.

[Sharon in SC]

I do understand how the others are going to be interest specific but was particularly interested in hearing how *college scholarship money* is concerned......

 

Thanks for taking the time to share!

[Sandy in Indy]

I think a lot depends on the school. That certainly was one of the questions I asked when dd was applying. DD received a great scholarship from the school she now attends...this was awarded based on her SAT scores and transcript. (about 1/3 tuition) I know several homeschoolers who have attended U of Indy and received great academic scholarships. Some of those scholarships stated some sort of class ranking but they ignore that for homeschoolers. U of Indy is very homeschool friendly!

[Ms. Riding Hood]

I appreciated this answer, as one who is seriously researching scholarships right now. I have found a couple of "biggies" who specifically state that the student must attend an "acredited public or private school". Why the heck would they care (these are corporate scholarships)? The thing I have found very critical, and where ds lacks, is in service. And that is a place where homeschoolers could really shine!

 

Thanks for your input.

[Gwen in VA]

Our experience --

 

There is a LOT of money out there.

 

1) There are local scholarships that hs'ed kids are not eligible for -- the ones that state explicitly that the student has attended one of the public or private schools in town. These scholarships are usually small -- $500 - $1000.

 

2) Sometimes being a hs'er will be a drawback. Ds was invited to the Johnson Scholarship competition at Washington & Lee last week. None of the folks on his faculty panel OR his student panel were particularly aware of hs'ing, so all were amazed that he was able to participate in so many extracurriculars! Given the feedback he got, he does not feel optimistic about the results.

 

3) My kids were both invited to apply to the Presidential Scholar program run by the Dept of Education. The application was long and involved and my kids did not feel optimistic that the DOE would choose a homeschooler as an award-winner (they could only find one hs'er who has ever won -- out of 147 per year) so they didn't even apply.

 

4) On the other hand, plenty of people find hs'ers fascinating. Dd received over $400,000 worth of scholarship offers (over 4 years of college) including two full-tuition scholarships. Ds currently has received over $250,000 worth of scholarship offers (again, over 4 years of college) including two full-tuition scholarships -- so hs'ers certainly can get loads of money! (And we're still waiting on several colleges' final offers to him.....)

[Anne/Ankara]

So what is the process for finding out about scholarships? I understand that a particular college might offer a scholarship, based on the student's application, but how would you know about any other possible scholarships? Any hints or experience here?

[Ms. Riding Hood]

Wellll....what a can of worms this is! I've been swimming in the sea and feel way in over my head.

 

There are search engines online dedicated to this purpose. Fastaid and fastweb are two that come to mind but there are TONS. Also, there are books...many huge, NYC phonebook-type books, that list scholarships. Ask me how I know! Two that I read and found particularly useful were Ben Kaplan's How to Go to College for Almost Free and Gen and Kelly Tanabe's Free Money for College. They have good tips and point you to other sources. Many of the rest are strictly directories with long listings. One good tip I found, which seems so simple but had not occurred to me: search your local high school's website. Guidance offices often post local scholarship info that you might not be aware of. I've spent a lot of time sifting through a lot of stuff, some worthwhile, some out of reach, and some total timewasters. Be forewarned!

[Raders Fan]

You can check out books from the library, or buy some, but most seem a little cumbersome. There are several websites dedicated to scholarships; I like fastweb.com best.

 

HTH,

Jennifer

[Gwen in VA]

who has actually found scholarships through fastweb or the like?

 

Everyone I know who has received scholarship aid has found the scholarships locally or through the college or through a specific interest (Civil Air Patrol cadet received $$ through CAP fund, etc.) or through Natl Merit.

[Raders Fan]

Ds won both Wal-Mart and Best Buy (local level, $2,500 combined), which we located through Fastweb. He located others through Ben Kaplan's book, "How to Go to College Almost for Free" (probably about $2,500 combined through these).

[Jan in MO]

Both of my dds have won scholarship money via essay competitions that we found out about through Fastweb.

[Halftime Hope]

Ds will be freshman next year at the local state 4-year university. He is bright, but has language-related LDs that make it more time-consuming and more difficult for him to do his work than for the average student. That is important, because we don't know how long he will be able to keep up his GPA in college, one of the (normal) requirements to make scholarships renewable year afer year. In addition, he is interested in engineering, so it will be a challenging field.

 

That said, he participated in the school's Early Admissions Program, which is part of their Honors College. If a student takes at least 6 hours (essentially dual credit) prior to their freshman year and maintains a B average, they automatically receive a scholarhip worth $X for each of the following four years. They may also continue as an Honors College student, with special classes and perks reserved for the HC students, if they so desire. (There is more work for HC classes as well.) He was awarded another merit scholarship based strictly on numbers--high school GPA, class rank (optional in his case), and SAT scores. Everyone with those stats receives $Y, renewable for four years pending GPA. Finally, we were surprised that he received an outstanding freshman award from the engineering department. It is also renewable, but I don't yet know the stipulations.

 

So, in his case, the institution is a public school, awards were strictly by the numbers, and if there was any competition on the engineering award--I doubt it--the fact that he is a homeschooler did not hurt him.

 

HTH,

 

Valerie

[Tokyomarie]

Our daughters have both received large scholarships given by their college/universities. Our oldest attended a college that gives large scholarships to National Merit Semifinalist/Finalists. She also applied for one private scholarship for homeschoolers which she received. Our second daughter has a large institutional freshman admission scholarship, renewable for 4 years, based strictly on numbers and a smaller institional scholarship based on her music audition.

 

Although I looked at FastWeb during my older daughter's college search time and sent her to look at it, we both concluded that she was so busy during senior year that by the time she prepared her National Merit application, the application for one private scholarship, as well as her college apps that she really didn't have time left over to write a myriad of other essays. Also, as has been stated, many of the private scholarships have heavy community service requirements. For reasons relating to our own living situation during that time, she just didn't have more than a bare minimum of service to list, so we felt it just wasn't helpful to spend the time on those scholarship applications.

[Nan in Mass]

Did the college just offer them to you, or did you have to tell the college you were interested in scholarships? How?

 

This sounds like a totally idiotic question. Sigh.

 

I suspect that a pass/fail transcript along with low SAT scores (slow worker) will automatically put us out of the running for scholarships, but we can always dream.

 

Or maybe they have a special scholarship for plumbers who's high school academic burnout suddenly wears off? Wouldn't that be nice GRIN.

 

-Nan

[Halftime Hope]

Did the college just offer them to you, or did you have to tell the college you were interested in scholarships?

 

In our case, the merit scholarships were just automatically offered. In fact, we haven't yet done our FAFSA, due to complicated life circumstances this year.

 

Or maybe they have a special scholarship for plumbers who's high school academic burnout suddenly wears off? Wouldn't that be nice GRIN.

 

Actually, we were told that there are *many* departmental scholarships available as well, though their award processes do not go through the financial aid office. Perhaps your son would do well to talk to the dean or head of the department, to see if there is something available for older students, ones with life experience, etc.

 

Best wishes,

 

Val

[DollyM]

Liberal Arts Colleges that DD applied to all had a published scholarship that directly related to her GPA and SAT/ACT scores. So you apply for admission, send them your SAT/ACT scores and voila ... here come the letters in the mail. Homeschooling never even seemed to enter into the equation.

 

In addition, whe was invited to "compete" for additional scholarships (I'm talking "institutional money" that comes directly from the SCHOOL itself) in academics and in dance.

 

BTW, if you are driving little suzy to weekly ballet classes - don't give up LOL - Talent in the Arts scholarships were very generous in DANCE. At ALL the schools DD applied to (well: she only applied to LACs that ALSO had a decent dance/ballet program, to start with.)

 

So, in the end, good SATs and some "talent in dance" yielded everything from full-ride down (!) to about 1/2 off tuition, depending on the school.

[Gwen in VA]

Nan --

 

How you apply for the college merit scholarships depends on the college.

 

Sometimes you do nothing -- all applicants are screened (Davidson is like this).

 

Sometimes you just check a box (U Chicago does this)

 

Sometimes you have to apply by a certain date (UPitt does this)

 

Sometimes you have to apply early and submit extra essays (Washington & Lee does this)

 

It's a complicated process. Keep lists and double-check EVERYTHING!