Time-Saving Tips When Applying for Scholarships

Quality scholarship applications take considerable time and effort. Although there’s no shortcut or formula for a winning application, there are steps you can take to make your efforts as rewarding as possible. Strategically and efficiently tackling your scholarship search frees up more time for extra applications, and hopefully extra tuition dollars. These tips can help you save time and headache during the application process and will hopefully yield good results.

Schedule Time in Your Calendar

Think of your scholarship application strategy as a regular practice, rather than a single sprint. Setting aside recurring increments of time over several months will likely serve you better than doing an all-out application-fest over a single weekend. Treat your scholarship application time as you would a part-time job and give it a fixed time slot in your weekly schedule. By turning your application process into a healthy habit, you’re better able to plan for the opportunities you want and manage any snags along the way. Intentionally investing your time will make your efforts less easy to derail and you get the added motivational boost of seeing progress over time.

Create a Master Binder

To save yourself the trouble of scrambling for all of your different required documents at the last minute, dedicate a binder to housing physical copies of regularly requested documents. This should include report cards, transcripts, student ID numbers, awards/certificates, letters of recommendation, and your parents’ tax returns. This way, the appropriate documents are only ever a quick photocopy or scan-and-print away. The master binder is also a great place to keep a list of scholarships you’ve already applied for, as well as a calendar with upcoming application due dates.

Archive Your Essays

Although it’s important to cater your essays to the specific requirements of each individual scholarship opportunity, there will likely be some overlap between the various essays you write, such as similarities in topics or personal anecdotes. Rather than keeping dozens of essay iterations scattered across folders on your computer, print out hard copies of all your applications and archive them in your master binder (separating each application with a tab divider). The next time you find yourself staring at a blank screen waiting for essay inspiration to strike, you can thumb through the pages of past applications and borrow the bits and pieces that apply to the current opportunity. The result? You’ll beat your writer’s block and cut down on overall writing time while ensuring that your essay is fresh and unique.

Make a Cheat Sheet for Online Applications

While you should avoid hitting copy and paste on your application essays, you can speed up the application process by copying and pasting your basic info. Create a document with the basic bits of information that pop up frequently in online scholarship applications. Some examples of content include:

• Personal info: your name, address, phone number, date of birth, and email address
• Academic info: name of current high school, expected graduation date, GPA or other academic scores, list of current courses, and intended majors or areas of study
• Parent/guardian info: names, employment, and income information
• Your mini-résumé: a list of school activities, community activities, volunteer hours, jobs and/or internships, and any significant awards or honors you’ve received

By creating a digital cheat sheet, you’ll spare yourself from having to type out the same answers over and over again. Like all documents with personal or sensitive information, make sure you store your cheat sheet in a safe location (and password-protect it for an added layer of caution).

Be Smart With Recommendation Letters

By submitting letters of recommendation, your teachers and mentors are doing you a huge and potentially life-changing favor. Think about it – their words could be worth hundreds or even thousands of dollars. Therefore, it’s in your best interest to make the process as easy for your letter-writers as possible. As the school year winds down, schedules get extremely busy and your teachers, coaches and employers may not have time to field every single one of your requests, even if you’ve been engaged and participative all year.

Communication is the key – schedule an appointment with your teachers and let them know that you are in the process of applying for scholarships and would appreciate their support with letters of recommendation. Explain whether you need individual letters for each application, or whether a general letter can be repurposed for multiple applications. Be clear about how many scholarships you’re applying to (is it 5? 10? 30?) and ask what you can do to help strategize the process. Provide your teacher with your résumé and be sure to highlight accomplishments you want mentioned in your letters of recommendation. If you wish to use the same letter for multiple scholarship opportunities, get permission from your teacher to edit the letter accordingly.

Be clear about time frames and set a reasonable deadline that works for both of you. If time is an issue, see if your teacher is willing to approve and sign a letter of recommendation that you’ve written yourself. Be accommodating and flexible, and don’t forget to show some courtesy. Send your letter writers a thank you card expressing your gratitude to them for taking time out of their schedules to write you a recommendation, and be sure to share news of any scholarship wins with them.

Time is a crucial component of a winning scholarship application. By combining best practices in time management, organization and communication, you can maximize the both quality and quantity of your scholarship applications and increase the odds of decreasing your college tuition.

At Robins Financial, Better Banking means providing the knowledge you need to succeed. We value education, and understand its importance when it comes to achieving success. We offer Money Smart Programs, including our annual Scholarship as well as Good Grades Program, to reward students for academic excellence and help our members afford education. To learn more about the ways we support our members in their pursuit of education, give us a call, or stop by your local branch.