12 Feb Scholarships Can Make The Difference in Paying for College

This is the time of year when parents and high school seniors are receiving their financial aid award letters from various colleges. After reviewing your financial situation, each college sends out a letter which details the financial aid they have determined you are eligible to receive from federal, state, school and private sources. There is usually some difference between the cost for each college and the financial aid packages available that you will have to pay for yourselves.

In some cases this amount might be substantial, but in others it could be relatively small compared to the full cost of attendance. For some students, though, it might impact their decision about which college to attend. While there is the option of taking out federal or private student loans to cover any remaining costs, another option is to go back out and see if there are any scholarships still available that might just make the difference.

One great scholarship opportunity that was just announced is from Discover Student Loans. The company will be giving away scholarships to forty students in the amount of $1000 each for the 2014-2015 academic year. Students and their parents can use these scholarships to help pay for the cost of college attendance, including tuition, housing and books, at accredited, non-profit, four-year colleges and universities in the United States.

The scholarships are available to high school seniors planning to attend college this fall, as well as students currently enrolled in college or graduate school. The application deadline is April 15, 2014. An independent judging organization will conduct a random drawing from all of the eligible entries. No transaction or loan application is necessary to enter or win one of these scholarships.

The Scholarship Search Continues

But don’t stop there. Keep looking for other late-deadline scholarships that can put you over the top at your college of choice. If you don’t know where to start, Discover Student Loans also has a new online scholarship search capability which provides access to over three million scholarship and grant opportunities worth more than $18 billion. You can receive personalized search results based on key categories such as your career goals, interests, and field of study.

If you truly have your heart set on attending a particular college, don’t give up until you have exhausted all possible forms of college financial aid. Scholarships are a wonderful way of making up the shortfall between the cost of attending a certain college and the amount of financial aid available, but they don’t usually come looking for you. You have to do some work and go out and find them on your own. If you need more information on the financial aid award letter or finding scholarships to close the gap, set up an appointment now for a free financial aid strategy session with College Financial Aid Advisors (CFAA).