How to Apply for College Scholarships: 7 Steps for Teens

By: Hailey Traum

The most important thing you can do is help your teen find someone to guide them through this. Having a person in their corner can improve the odds of landing the right funding, and it takes a lot of the stress out of a process that often feels overwhelming. That person might be a school counselor, a community group, a friend or family member who is already in college, or a mentor at LSA. If you are not sure where to begin, this post gives you the high-level overview. LSA also has many resources to help students plan for their next steps, including our scholarship resource page and scholarship planning spreadsheets that help your teen stay organized.

You apply for college scholarships by working in order. First you find out what your teen’s colleges will cost, list what makes your teen unique, search for awards that fit, and then track every application in one place until it is submitted. Most families do the opposite. They apply to whatever they stumble across and lose track of deadlines by midwinter. If your teen is still deciding whether college is the right fit, or you want to know how to prepare your teen for college success, those articles are worth a read first. The seven steps below keep the process manageable, and your teen does the work while you act as the sounding board.

Step 1: Find Out What College Will Actually Cost

Start by looking up the full cost of attendance for each school on your teen’s list. That means tuition, fees, books, and housing for all four years, not just the tuition number on the front page of a website. If your teen has not narrowed down a college list yet check out our artical on picking a college major and school! Put the numbers side by side in a simple table, one row per school, so the real differences show up. Add a column for whether that school offers its own scholarships. The gap between what a school costs and what your family can pay is the number your teen is working to close, and knowing it makes every later step feel less like guessing.

Step 2: Learn the Three Ways to Pay: Grants, Scholarships, and Loans

Grants and scholarships are money your teen does not repay, and loans are money your teen does. Keeping those three straight helps you decide where to spend your effort first. Most families aim to cover as much as possible with grants and scholarships before looking at loans.

• Grants are financial aid that usually does not need to be repaid and is generally based on financial need. Federal grants are applied for through the FAFSA!!!
• Scholarships are gift aid awarded for things like achievements, activities, background, or intended major. They can go toward tuition, fees, books, or room and board.
• Loans are borrowed money that must be paid back with interest. They come as federal loans (backed by the government) or private loans (issued by banks or credit unions).

Step 3: Fill Out the FAFSA

The FAFSA, or Free Application for Federal Student Aid, is the form that determines eligibility for federal grants and other federal aid. It is free, and it is worth completing even if you are unsure your family will qualify, because many colleges also use it when deciding on their own aid. The official form lives at studentaid.gov. This is a parent-and-teen task, since it asks for family financial information. Sit down together, gather what it asks for ahead of time, and let your teen type while you supply the details. Do it early in the senior year process rather than waiting, so the results are ready when college offers arrive.

Step 4: Write Down What Makes Your Teen Unique

Before searching for a single scholarship, have your teen list their activities, achievements, and personal background in one document. Scholarships are rarely won by the student with the longest list. They go to the student whose story fits what the sponsor cares about, so your teen needs to know their own story first. Two tables can be created to help keep it simple. The first table covers unique characteristics of your student like school and extracurricular details, church or service, life circumstances and background, career and college plans, hobbies and talents, and community involvement. The second table is a running record of activities and achievements, with dates, the organization, the title or role, and any awards or accomplishments. These two lists become the raw material for applications and essays, and they also turn into a strong one-page resume. Doing this ahead of time will make it quicker to apply to scholarships down the line and limit errors when trying to remember certain details!

Step 5: Find Scholarships That Match, in the Right Places

Search for scholarships where your teen’s unique characteristics match what the sponsor is looking for. Read each scholarship’s requirements before you commit time to it. A good match is one your teen could honestly describe themselves as a fit for in a sentence or two. Skip the ones that need a stretch. Start with these sources:

• Each college’s own scholarship page. Many schools offer awards that only their applicants can get, and your Step 1 table already has a column for this!
• The PSAT/NMSQT. This test, run by the College Board and the National Merit Scholarship Corporation, is the entry point for National Merit scholarships which can cover up to the full tuition!
• Federal aid through the FAFSA, which you handled in Step 3.
• LSA’s scholarships page on leadaz.org, which has many different scholarship opportunities for students of all types to apply to!

Step 6: Track Every Scholarship in One Place

Keep one tracker for all scholarships so deadlines, requirements, and login details never live in a dozen browser tabs. A spreadsheet works fine. Treat the time your teen puts into this as an investment. A scholarship application costs hours, not dollars, and a good tracker keeps those hours from being wasted on missed deadlines. Give each scholarship its own row with columns for:

1. The scholarship name and who offers it.
2. The start date and due date. Logging the start date means that you can start figuring out what scholarships you want to apply to before they are open so you can get ahead of the game!
3. The amount, and whether it renews each year, a lot of time when renewing you will need you to fill out a reapplication so make sure this is something you are willing to do.
4. The requirements, recommendations, and required materials.
5. A link to the google doc for the essay(s).
6. A status (not started, in progress, submitted) and a notes column. Use the notes column for the unglamorous details that cause the most trouble: usernames and passwords, special instructions, and essay topics.

Step 7: Prep the Essays, Then Apply

Most scholarship essays are asking the same few questions, so prepare your answers once and adapt them. Typical prompts ask about a challenge your teen overcame, what makes them unique, their goals and why, and the values that drive them. Underneath, the sponsor is checking whether your teen is resilient, thoughtful, and clear about where they are headed. Have your teen brainstorm short answers to each of these themes first, then talk them through with you or a mentor before writing. Your role is to ask questions that help them find what they actually want to say, not to write or reshape the essay for them. Then work through the tracker from the earliest due date forward, submit one at a time, and update the status column as each one goes out.

Where a Mentor Can Help

Applying for scholarships is a long process, and many teens do best with someone outside the family who asks good questions, helps them put their story into words, and keeps them on schedule when other things get busy. LSA’s 1:1 Success Coaching pairs your teen with a mentor who works alongside them year-round, which can include getting through essays and applications without anyone taking over the work.