Of course, winning a scholarship takes time and effort. You may have applied to many a student and college scholarship programs and have won quite a few too. If you have not won a scholarship yet, you may win one in the near future if you do your homework well and apply keeping in the mind the eligibility and selection criteria. But, what do you need to do after you have won a scholarship? Is that all? Exactly, not. In fact it is the beginning. The free money that you get is surely going to help you bear the college expenses. Given below are some tips and suggestions on what scholarship winners need to do next.
Writing the Thank You Letters
So, you have received a letter with the opening words: "Congratulations". It is quite obvious that you have the scholarship that you had applied for. It is now time to write thank-you letters to scholarship sponsoring organizations, scholarship selection committee, the program director and other people involved in the whole scholarship selection and awarding procedure. Do not fret, as you do not need to draft a speech for a movie awards ceremony. You need to write just a couple of words to express your heartfelt thanks to scholarship judges who spend many hours selecting the deserving candidates out of thousands or more applicants.
Writing thank-you letters after winning a scholarship also brings you the opportunity of keeping in touch with many scholarship organizations that might help you later as well. In the thank-you letter, do remember to mention your contact info and plan to keep in touch further as well. You may also plan to write another letter to continue being in touch.
Preparing Scholarship Recipient Speeches
Many times when you win scholarships, sponsoring organizations may ask you to make a scholarship speech. After you have won scholarship money for college, students may be required to speak at the winner's banquet or reception. Do not feel apprehensive about speaking before the public, as the audience already loves you for winning the free money for college. It is a good idea to prepare a short story including who you are and what goals you want to achieve in future. And be ready to enjoy the moment, as the audience is there just to celebrate your win.
The audience would usually comprise of scholarship organization members, program director, community leaders, sponsors etc. So, use scholarship speech as an opportunity to impress the audience and win some brownie points by appreciating other scholarship winners as well. You never know when they get impressed and consider you for an internship later. While delivering the speech, do thank the organization members, scholarship program judges, your family and teachers who recommended you for this college scholarship program.
Requesting Funds
After winning a scholarship, you may be asked to fill out a form so that the scholarship award office may send you the check. If you receive a letter mentioning the same, you need to exactly find out where you need to submit the form for requesting scholarship fund. Many universities can have separate offices for financial aid and awarding scholarships. Check out all the details while requesting funds for college education. You can either log on to the respective website or make a call to the scholarship office to gather inform regarding the fund request form and its submission.
After the submission of the scholarship fund request form, the scholarship award office can either send the free money directly to your address or at the school you attend. The school committee will later deposit the fund into your account. In case you find delay or do not receive the scholarship money even after submitting the fund request form, do not sit thinking that they are not going to send it. Just make a call and get in touch to find out the details or the current status. At times, the scholarship award office may not be able to get sufficient information required to send you the scholarship money.
Keeping in Touch
Winning a scholarship means you have also won the support of a whole network comprising of scholarship organization members, scholarship judges, community leaders etc. You need to keep in touch with all these influential people. This network can also bring you lots of job opportunities, internships and mentoring facilities among others. The scholarship organizations would really love to hear about your updates and progress while you attend college. You can also write them a nice email on a quarterly basis to keep them updated. You have no idea how this professional and influential network can bring you more and more opportunities for the advancement of your career.
