Posts Tagged ‘FAFSA’

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5 Amazing College Scholarships that End in January

Thursday, December 23rd, 2010

It’s winter break – how are you using your time? My College Guide hopes that you take advantage of a little time off and look for free money for college! We’ve got a short and sweet list of January ending college scholarships so you can pick and choose a few that apply to you.

Applying for college scholarships just makes sense.

hitthatswitch

If you are really motivated, we would also suggest you browse our list of college scholarship websites so you can find more ways to pay for college. Now – what are you waiting for, again? There’s no time like the present to dig in and get started! From unusual college scholarships to the major-specific, we list it.

Anne Frank Outstanding Scholarship Award – Have that college acceptance in hand? This giant $10,000 college scholarship goes to the most community-minded among you. Answer the essay about social injustice and combine it with letters of recommendation and whatever supporting materials you have. Don’t let this one pass you by!

4th Annual Create-A-Greeting Card $10,000 Scholarship Contest – Put your artwork, photos, and general creativity to use as you try to snag this big $10,000 scholarship prize! For business or corporate celebrations, this college scholarship not only gives away a big prize, but you get a chance to see your work put into print.

Dell Scholars Program – Not an A+ student? Not a problem! The Dell Scholars Program awards $20,000 scholarships to students who demonstrate academic potential and have a financial need. With this scholarship, it isn’t just about the numbers. They want to know about your personal struggles and how you have overcome them.

Jim McKay Memorial Scholarship – Love TV? Are you considering entering the television industry? If you plan on completing a four year bachelor’s  degree, majoring in Communications, and concentrating on any part of the television industry – you’ve just met your college scholarship match! A $10,000 college scholarship will be awarded to the gifted future video programmer.

Sam Walton Community Scholarship — If community service is your middle name, you may want to look into applying for this $3,000 scholarship available from retail giant Wal-mart! You will need a minimum 2.5 GPA and show that you have financial need. Remember the FAFSA, the Free Application for Federal Aid? It’ll come in handy with this one!

Who We Are: Information you can trust. For 20 years My College Guide has produced an annual magazine chock full of free college info for high-achieving high school sophomores. Check out our participating colleges. If you’re a student, enter for a chance to win an Apple iPad or iPhone or cash!

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Five Minute FAFSA from Fastweb

Friday, November 26th, 2010

The My College Guide Guru has seen it all — and responded! Our ever-wise and all-knowing Guru tells us that, based on your recent emails, it’s the season for Financial Aid questions! This older video from Fastweb is not only relevant and informative (it will answer many of your FAFSA questions) – it’s also fun!

Find out about the FAFSA, the free application for federal student aid, like what it is, why you should fill it out, and how to get started. You can’t receive aid if you don’t even bother to try! Don’t worry – it’s easier than ever before. You would like free money for college, wouldn’t you? Watch The Five-Minute FAFSA on YouTube or below.

Thanks to Twitter follower MichaelCCR for bringing this hilarious yet information-packed video to our attention!

Who We Are: Information you can trust. For 20 years My College Guide has produced an annual magazine chock full of free college info for high-achieving high school sophomores. Check out our participating colleges. If you’re a student, enter for a chance to win an Apple iPad or iPhone or cash!

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Find Free Money For College or Scholarship Resources You May Not Know About

Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010

You are most likely familiar with college scholarship search sites – but there’s many other resources available that you may not have realized. My College Guide has a list of sources to turn to when you need to find free money for college. As with many parts of the college process, it’s a good idea to get started before the very last minute (trust us, Senior year in high school can be hectic enough as it is!).

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JKönig / jennifer könig

High School Guidance Counselor – Your high school guidance counselor may be one of several important resources that you may have overlooked! The fact is, many (if not most) high school guidance counselors have  listings of state and local scholarships. These tend to be less competitive and can help you on your way to finding free money to pay for college! Meet with your counselor to see if s/he has one so you can get started searching!

Scholarship Search Sites – The world wide web is home to thousands upon thousands of scholarships and there is no easier way to find them than by logging in to a scholarship search site! Know how to tell a scholarship scam from the real deal and you will soon realize that there are scholarships for any student, from the skateboarder to the ballet dancer. Plug in your ethnicity, your intended major, your hobbies, interests, and talents, and see what scholarship listings you can find and apply, apply, apply.

Google, Yahoo, Bing – Put these search engines to work! Combine your hobbies or intended major into a search engine and see what sort of scholarships you can find. For example, type in phrases like “Hispanic college scholarship” or “unusual scholarships” or “photography scholarship 2010” and you might be surprised at what pops up. It can at least direct you to the scholarship database that contains the prize (since there are a lot of them out there!).

The FAFSA – You may be tired of hearing it and you may think that you don’t even need to bother filling out one more form because your parents’ make too much money, however, you just never know what completing the Free Application for Federal Student Aid will get you. Besides that, many colleges and universities use the numbers from the FAFSA to match you up with their own institution-specific scholarships and filling out the FAFSA is normally a requirement in order to get the aid.

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callumscott2 / Callum Scott

Books and Magazine – A visit to the library may just be in order. There are giant books at your local library that are just chock full of scholarship goodness. You might even come across the occasional magazine with scholarship info inside. While you can probably find most of them on the internet, it’s a nice break from

College Website – Know where you would like to go? While you should apply to more than one college, take a look at your prospective schools website. There is usually a dedicated page of scholarships for  students. If you can’t find it, give your adviser a call and ask if a list of scholarships can be sent your way — though some colleges and universities do include this (or even a link to it) in their information packet.

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Super List of College Scholarship Websites

Thursday, October 21st, 2010
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姒儿喵喵

How will you pay for college? There are all sorts of financial aid options out there, like merit scholarships and legacy scholarships, but if you’ve been confused as to where to find free money for college, My College Guide is here to help!

As soon as your state’s FAFSA acceptance date opens up for the period when you plan on attending college, you should “get ‘er done” as they say — but long before that date arrives, you can begin the college scholarship hunt!

You can begin with a scholarship search website where you can find many scholarships, from those based on your intended major to your hobbies, and even the downright unusual scholarships, in a relatively short amount of time.

We compiled a little list of college scholarship websites to give you a head start in the right direction. Before you dig in, you might want to familiarize yourself with knowing how to spot a scholarship scam “just in case.”

If we missed a scholarship site that you enjoy using, please feel free to add it to the comments section below. Otherwise, consider subscribing to My College Guide via RSS feed or email to stay on top of everything college!

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College is a Possible Dream for Any Student

Friday, October 1st, 2010

For low income students, college might seem like an unreachable dream. The US Dept of Education hopes to change the way college is thought about to show that higher education really is for everyone. Produced for Spanish-speaking students, there are English subtitles.

If you have ever felt like college is unattainable, My College Guide has years of resources to aid you (we are twenty years old, after all!). Fill out the FAFSA and browse our list of colleges and universities for low income students. These colleges provide no loans packages (so you graduate debt-free), don’t have tuition, or offer full rides to students who fall within their income guidelines. Yes, there are Ivy League schools on  here, and yes – some of these colleges are very selective.

The bottom line, however, is not to give up. College is completely within your reach. You can start right here on My College Guide so will you have the tools to go out there and make your college dream a reality! Watch La universidad: un sueño alcanzable or College: A Possible Dream on YouTube or below.

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FAFSA: Charta Squad Style

Friday, March 12th, 2010

Have you heard of Charta Squad?  Teachers at the independent New York City public school, Williamsburg Charter High School, are all about preparing for college!  Relax, Charta Squad’s first rap video about the SAT, went up on YouTube four months ago — and has drawn over 45,000 views so far!

This time – Charta Squad is spreading the word about the FAFSA, you know, that Free Application for Federal Student Aid?  FAFSA Hooray is the much anticipated follow-up.  Learn the facts, watch out for those FAFSA deadlines, and…don’t forget to relax!

Special thank you to Akilbello for bringing it to My College Guide’s attention.

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The FAFSA Wins a Makeover

Thursday, February 4th, 2010

FAFSA on your list? Get 'er DONE!Procrastinating about completing your Free Application for Federal Student Aid?  Thanks to a bit of pruning by the Department of Education, the 2010 – 2011 FAFSA may not be as complicated as you think!  Yes, you read that right.

The shiny new version of the online 2010 – 2011 FAFSA is reportedly easier to use and navigate!  On web pages alone, the Department of Education boasts a 65% decrease in the number of webpages and omitted over 20 questions!  That’s big news for the millions of students that fill out the FAFSA each year.

A streamlined FAFSA means you can spend less time filling out the FAFSA and more time on other important things like choosing a college and applying for college scholarships.

Changes on the 2010 – 2011 FAFSA include:

Side Tabs. Clearly labeled sections on the left of each screen make it easy for parent (light blue) or student (dark blue) to quickly find and complete specifically labeled sections without a lot of guesswork.

Help Text. In previous versions of the FAFSA, the help text took up large sections, creating an online FAFSA as bulky as the paper version!  Now, the help pops up in the sidebar and changes as you move from section to section so you can easily find what you need without a lot of digging.

Assets? The new FAFSA no longer requires students with family incomes around $40,000 to claim assets, in the hopes that, in the future, families will tuck a little away for higher education for their children – without worrying about being potentially penalized for it later.

Data Sharing – Future data-sharing between the IRS and the Department of Education could make answering questions a snap – or at least a lot easier than it has been in the past.  Students filling out the 2009 – 2010 FAFSA for the Spring semester can take advantage of tax information right from the IRS.  It should make filling in the blanks a whole lot easier!

Non-Traditional?  Married? If you are at least 24 or married, the Department of Education has good news for you!  You no longer have to provide parental information – which means it might be easier for you to qualify for financial aid since your parent(s) information will no longer count against you.

What do you think?  Do the changes to the FAFSA make you feel more confident about tackling (and completing) the form?  Why or why not?

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Beyond Federal Financial Aid

Wednesday, October 7th, 2009

Daniel Y Go

When it comes paying for college, you may apply for federal financial aid. The problem may be that when you receive the award letter, it’s simply not enough to cover everything. With a college education comes the expense of covering tuition, books and room and board for a four-year period, which means the costs can really add up. If your federal financial aid is falling short of the amount of money you need to pay for your college education, you may have to turn to applying for student loans from private institutions.

Where and How to Find Student Loans

  • Bank. Your first stop for student loan information should be the bank where you or your parents have an account. Having a relationship with the bank may make it easier for you to qualify for a student loan. It may also help you to get a better interest rate, repayment terms and conditions than you would from a bank where you don’t have an existing relationship. Some lenders may also ask you to open an account with them when applying for a student loan to help with the approval process.
  • Private loans. Another source of college money is obtaining a loan from an individual, such as a family member, rather than applying for a bank student loan. In a private one-on-one situation, you can negotiate the amount, interest rate and payment arrangements with the person loaning you the money. This means you can usually get a better interest rate and more favorable repayment terms than you may get when going through a traditional student loan program. You should treat this loan as you would any other loan, making sure that the agreement is in writing and that you both sign a promissory note that details the terms of the loan.
  • Comparison Shop. Obtaining a student loan is a major financial decision. This means that you should shop and compare your various options before choosing the one that is the most beneficial to you. It’s wise to compare at least three student loan options to compare the differences. You’ll want to compare the interest rates charged, the repayment terms, the term of the loan and any other options available with the loan such as deferment and loan forgiveness. This is important because you’re not sure what the future holds for you in the way of employment and income after you graduate from college.

After you’ve found out what is available for you in financial aid from the U.S. Department of Education’s FAFSA program, you may need to cover the shortfall with other sources. Private student loans may be the way for you to pay for college expenses that are not covered by other means.

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Don’t Overlook the Fastest Route to College Financial Aid

Tuesday, October 6th, 2009

Nathan Colquhoun

If you’re one of the millions of students preparing to apply for college then you’re also probably thinking about how you’re going to pay for your college education. If you’re one of the lucky ones then your parents may be footing the bill. If you’re even luckier then maybe you have a scholarship that will cover all or most of your college expenses. Beyond these options, however, there are a myriad of other funding options available to you. The thing is that you have to be proactive about finding these sources. Using the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) you can hit up a variety of financial aid sources with just one application.

What is FAFSA?

FAFSA is a financial aid program provided by the U.S. Department of Education. In essence, it’s a way for students to obtain federal financial aid in the forms of federal grants, work study programs and federally funded student loans. All you have to do is complete the free FAFSA application. Once you submit your application and it is reviewed, you’ll receive an award offer, which is based on your financial need. With over $80 billion of federal aid being disbursed each year, FAFSA offer a prime opportunity to receive the money you need to pay for college.

Benefits of Federal Student Loans

Private lenders, the bank where you have your checking account or where your parents bank, are private loan opportunities that can also help you obtain the money you need for college. Federal student loans, however, have a number of advantages that make it the better option over applying for private student loans.

Benefits include:
•    Lower interest rates
•    Fixed interest rates instead of variable rates
•    More attractive repayment terms and options
•    Deferment of payments for six months after graduation
•    Payment amounts based on employment income

While federal financial aid programs are not the only options available to fund your college education, it is the first place you should start. It’s free to apply and you’re not obligated to accept what is awarded to you, but it may be the answer to paying for your entire college education or covering the shortfall.

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