<p>Ahhh!!! I’ve just finished filling in my profile for the College Board scholarship search and it came back with a load of irrelevant results (ie one for blind students when I said I didn’t have a disability, one vaild in NM and I listed my location as NY, etc.) Is there a trick to this or is it just as worthless as it seems??? I think I’m giving up on online scholarships and switching to local scholarship searches. Better odds anyway.</p>
<p>yeah the collegeboard one sucks. try fastweb</p>
<p>Just as word of caution, Fastweb gives useless results too.</p>
<p>Just go to your guidance counselor. My school has drawers full of local scholarships that are easier to win than any national ones.</p>
<p>The way I see it, the only way scholarships work is one of two ways: you do not qualify for fin aid and therefore will be footing the bill in total without loans at a private or if you apply them to state schools since many do not offer any of their own. Otherwise, many private schools will not allow you to subtract them from the family contribution of the bill.</p>
<p>janesmom1, that’s not true. Some scholarships write the check directly to you thus actually benefitting your financial aid, instead of taking away from it.</p>
<p>Plus finaid often consists of loans and most schools will let you apply outside scholarships to the loan portion of your aid before grants etc.</p>
<p>Thanks for that bit of info swimcat. I have been comparing most of the colleges my D applied to and want to be ready just in case she is awarded some money from an outside source. One of the colleges said it will cut the amount in half if she is awarded money from them. Half from EFC and the other half will go to what if any they give her. :-(</p>
<p>D’s school first applied outside scholarships to Perkins loan, followed by work study followed by subsidized Stafford. We were told she would have to have more than $13,000 in outside scholarships that year to affect her grant from the school. And even if the scholarship writes the check to you, you are expected to let the school know that you received it. One of D’s scholarship was won before she had selected a school so check was made out and sent to her. However, we had to notify the scholarship committee when she did select a school and then foward the money on to the school. I don’t believe scholarships affect EFC’s unless they are very large or the student’s family is not receiving any financial aid.</p>