A scholarship is a financial help that is given to students for additional study. Scholarships are given on different criteria that generally tell the values and purposes of the donor.
Mostly scholarships may be classified as:
- Merit-based: These scholarships are given to students for their academic, artistic, athletic or other abilities and for extracurricular activities and community service. The most common merit-based scholarships are given by private organizations or student gets it directly from college for their academic achievement.
- Need-based: For this scholarship, applicants will have to fill out a FAFSA to qualify and based on the student and family's financial record they get scholarship. Private need-based scholarships will often require the results of a FAFSA and also see student financial need and cost of future study.
- Student-specific: Gender, race, religion, family and medical history are specific factor that applicants must qualify first. Minority scholarships are the most common awards in this category, and not all are based in the United States.
- Career-specific: Career specific scholarships are given by a college or university to students for further study in a specific field. Education or nursing career is in great demand and mostly this scholarship is given to them. So many schools will give future nurses full scholarships to enter the field, if the student wants to work for needed people.
The applicant sometimes tie up with scholarships and have to work for specified period or work in rural areas to pay back the support that they received from the scholarship. This is usually with the education and nursing scholarships. The programs offered by the uniformed services of the United States (Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, Coast Guard, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration commissioned corps, and Public Health Service Commissioned Corps) sometimes resemble such scholarships.
Local scholarships
It is necessary for people to know how to find scholarships in their home town. By asking local persons and organizations you can easily find the information and they are less competitive also.
For local scholarships high school students check with their guidance counselors to search scholarship opportunities,
- Community foundations: Many counties and cities and regions have a local foundation committed to give money in the form of grants and scholarships to people and organizations in the area.
- Non-profits and charitable trusts: The Charitable grant making trusts can help those who really need help such as unexpected family calamity and if a person needs money for special education.
- Foundations: In the United States some foundations offer scholarships for industrial activities.
- Music teachers: To help low income children some music teachers offer free lessons and some local non-profits provide free music classes to youths.
- Trade union|Labor/trade unions: Main union time and again provides scholarships for needy members and their children.
- Chamber of commerce: Many chambers of commerce offer small grant to students who are planning on careers in business and public service. Even if they do not offer any themselves, one can usually get a listing of members, and many of them may offer small scholarships to local students.
- School: Famous old schools also provide scholarship funds.
- University: The famous universities also provide scholarships to most talented students for studies but the student must belong to some special category or be among a nation's best.
- PSAT/NMSQT: Usually in their junior year of high school in United States, the student gets the opportunity to take the PSAT/NMSQT test. National Merit Scholarship programs are initially determined by the scores received on the PSAT/NMSQT test. Some private scholarship programs require applicants to take the PSAT. The test can be used as preparation for the SAT.
- Disabilities: The disable students can apply for awards while it may be common or with specific disability.
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