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I'm going to be a senior next year and I'm VERY confused as to where I should start looking for scholarships...Do I get all the little one's that I can and hope they add up? Are the good ones hidden in secret places? Also, financially, is it possible to pay your whole college tuition on student loans? I'm so lost, If anyone has any input please feel free to respond...thanks in advance :-D

By Momof2 (Momof2) on Thursday, July 10, 2003 - 09:34 am: Edit

First, decide on the schools to which you will apply. Follow all the other advice on CC and spread your choices between some reaches and some safeties.

By far the biggest scholarships come from THE SCHOOLS THEMSELVES. That's why it's so important to choose your schools, research them and get their scholarship application requirements as soon as possible. I can tell you that for WUSTL, my son wrote a total of 11 essays and questions, ranging from 250 words to 2 three-page papers. It took him a good 6 months to get them all in order. No other schools he listed were quite as bad, but all the essays were not as interchangeable as he would have liked. Allow PLENTY of time for writing and re-writing. Rather than try to "group" them by topic and cover all the bases in one try, he much preferred to complete all for one school at a time. Thought it was much more "targeted" and focused that way.

Local scholarships are great for filling in the gaps, but our experience leads me to believe the concentration should be on the school-sponsored ones. Good luck to you.