Catching The Dream

HOW TO FIND AND WIN SCHOLARSHIPS
By Dean Chavers, Ph. D.

Your major will not be just one word or phrase, either. For instance, if your major were nursing, you would use the following keywords, and perhaps others: nursing, registered nurse, nursing education, pediatric nursing, geriatric nursing, oncology nursing, surgical nursing, health care, medical care, health administration, medical administration, public health, and public health nursing.

If your major is business, you would use economics, finance, sales, marketing, business management, business administration, business leadership, hotel and restaurant management, accounting, retailing, and banking.
Once you run Fastweb, it will give you between 120 and 150 sources. Unfortunately, it is a keyword search only.

There is no connection between the keywords, so students have to go through the list manually to determine which scholarships they are really eligible for. A nursing major in New Mexico, may pull up a nursing scholarship for the State of Idaho. You will have to rule that one out, however, since you do not live in Idaho. You may also pull up a nursing scholarship for Iowa State University, and you will have to rule that one out unless you plan to attend Iowa State.

What you will be left with is 30% to 40% of the 120 to 150 you started with. THIS IS YOUR POT OF GOLD! These 30 to 60 scholarships are the ones you are going to target to win the money you need for college. You should add to the ones you find on Fastweb by using the other three ways of finding them.

SCHOLARSHIP DIRECTORIES:
Even though scholarship directories are becoming outmoded by the advent of the Internet, they are still valuable. You will find some scholarships in them that are not on the Internet. Your high school library should have a good set of them; if it does not, you can ask the librarian to buy a set, which should cost under $300. I will send your librarian or anyone else a list of recommended scholarship directories at the drop of a hat.

The alternative is to find a good set at the nearest college library. If you need help paying for this travel, CTD can help with your mileage to this library.

Use the index in the back of the book to find the scholarships you want. Don’t start at the front of the book and leaf through; this will take too long. Look up the same keywords you used on Fastweb to help you find the scholarships in the directories.

There are over 700 scholarship directories published in the U. S. However, you want to use the most comprehensive ones, which have 600 to 1,200 pages each. The following constitute a minimum set of scholarship directories your library should have:

• Daniel J. Cassidy, “Undergraduate Scholarship Book.” Simon and Schuster, Route 9 West, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 07632, (800) 922-0579.
• Gail A. Schlachter, “Directory of Financial Aid for Minorities.” Reference Service Press, 1100 Industrial Road, Suite 9, San Carlos CA 94070, (415) 594-0743.
• Gail A. Schlachter, “Directory of Financial Aid for Women.”
• Gail A. Schlachter, “Directory of Financial Aid for Native Americans.”
• Oreon Keesler, “Financial Aids for Higher Education.” William C. Brown Publishers, 2640 Kerper Blvd., Dubuque IA, 52001, (800) 338-5578.
• S. Norman and Marie Feingold, “Scholarships, Fellowships, & Loans.” Bellman Press, P. O. Box 34937, Bethesda MD 20817, (301) 897-0033.
• We will be glad to furnish your librarian with a fuller listing of scholarship directories at any time, free for the asking. Have your librarian to e-mail me with a request.

YOUR UNIVERSITY: You will be surprised, pleasantly, with learning how many scholarships your university has. If it is an Ivy League, the scholarship dollars per year are in the hundreds of millions. If it is the flagship state university in your state, the figure will be several tens of millions.

If you are an outstanding Native student, you should realize that your intended college, and many others besides, will want to recruit you. You should use this knowledge to leverage at least some scholarship support from the university. The University of New Mexico, for instance, has dozens of Indian and minority scholarships; last year no one applied for some of them!

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