scholarships

It's tempting to think that our goal is to get our children in to college. No, no! Our goal is that our children can get in AND afford to go to college. Getting admitted is only part of the problem! Here ideas to help you get more scholarship money o...

You can afford college! I want to show you how to earn BIG merit based scholarships! You will even learn how to earn scholarships for kids that are academically or athletically dis-inclined. In this class you'll learn why merit scholarships provide t...

Perfect is swell, but is a perfect PSAT score required for merit scholarships? (Of course, you could always use studying as a way to do better on all of the high school tests! Test Preparation without Getting Smarter)

"I finished watching your DVD Getting The Big Scholarships.... it was awesome!  Thank you for taking the time to help others.  In receiving a merit scholarship wouldn't you have to have a perfect PSAT score?  I 've had a financial aid officer tell me this. "
~Diane in Washington

Did you know the average high school guidance counselor is trying to guide 478 students all at once? How can you possibly be better than a trained professional guidance counselor! Let me explain why you are MORE than qualified to guide your child int...

You've done the hard work and gotten the scholarships. Now what? Let me give you some tips on what to do next. What to do if you have gotten some great offers of scholarships : Compare the "bottom line" of what each of the colleges costs. It's not ho...

Recently Rice  University made a huge announcement about their new financial aid program. Let me explain what a full  tuition  scholarship means to Rice  University and how to qualify. This is what they said in their announcement:...

When planning for college, you will need to have  your child take high school tests. You can find out all about high school tests in my article, High School Subject Tests Simply Explained . When using high school test scores, some college will&n...

Here is the problem. Colleges all have very unique, very different policies from one another. In addition, college admission policies can change over time, sometimes quite suddenly, it seems. That's why half the time the answer to a specific question...

Stacie had some wonderful success with her oldest son, after homeschooling high school. Read this note of encouragement from Stacie and take heart! "I've been meaning to write to you to let you know how things turned out with my oldest son. You have ...

Sharon wrote to me to share the big scholarships that her daughter received. In her letter I noticed three big tips on getting big scholarships! "My daughter was offered a total of $232,000 in scholarships at this time. One college that she deci...

"Today was my very first, ever, live webinar with you and I was 'riveted'. I had to do it from my phone in the car, but listened to 95% of it before I had to log off and manage the kids :) Anyway ... I loved your webinar ... I ate up every minute I c...

Do you know how homeschoolers earn scholarships? By gaining information about the process early in high school, so they know all the pieces and are ready to go when the time comes to apply for college. Here is the quickest possible overview. There ar...

How would you feel if your child sent out 7 college applications and got these results? 7 applications sent ​ 2 colleges offered half-price ​ 1 college offered quarter-price ​ 1 college offered full tuition ​ And, they haven't even heard from all the...

When you are visiting and applying to colleges , try to convince the college that your child is a good investment for their scholarship donations. You do that by making sure their statistics look good in their view, and when future parents do online ...

New FAFSA Available October 1st

Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) is trying to make life easier for you. They will now allow you to begin filling out your FAFSA on October 1st of each year.

You will use the prior year's tax information, so there is no waiting around to collect all the tax info that you need to complete the FAFSA.

You will get a more prompt financial award, so that you can learn about your need-based financial aid while you are applying to college.

Earlier access to the FAFSA will help you know if you can afford college sooner in the year, relieving some stress, and allowing you to adjust your applications based on the financial aid you received.

In the past, I've written a lot about the 3 waves of scholarships.
1. Financial aid based on SAT/ACT plus GPA
2. Need-based financial aid related to the FAFSA
3. Merit, skill, or interview-based scholarships

There was a long pause between the waves of scholarships. There were often many months between admission ("Yippee! You got in!") and scholarship information ("Oh No! How can we possibly afford this?")

There will still be a pause between getting in and getting the final word on financial aid. With this new system, I hope you'll have fewer uncomfortable months, and a more prompt scholarship award!

For more information, read more from the Department of Education.

Federal Student Aid

FAFSA: Free Application for Federal Student Aid

Learn more: Complete the FAFSA for Fun and Profit




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