Scholarship Reminder! We Really Do Check Your References

Scholarship reminder! We really do check your references. Yes, we really do! I know oftentimes on job, school, and scholarship applications they ask for names and phone numbers to use as a point of reference, and oftentimes you fill this in but disregard the possibility of them ever being called. 

Well, for our scholarship application, we call each of your references and verify before you can even be considered for the scholarship application! This is an extra step to help us verify your project, and hear a little more about you as a student, even if your references don’t know about said project or scholarship. 

But don’t stress, we have yet to receive a bad report from a reference phone call. Most teachers and mentors have only glowing reviews of you! 

However, when you’re putting down this information on your scholarship application, keep in mind that there is a really good chance they’ll be receiving a phone call and will be asked more about you as a student and about your project. Choose your references wisely! 

Our email is also always open to any questions you may have or guidance needed during the process.

You can see more about the scholarship requirements by downloading our checklist here.

For more information on the scholarship, head here.

For our 2023 final submission link, head here.

Scholarship Reminder: Specific Goals!

A requirement on our scholarship application is to write out your goals for your project. The application states: “Your goal(s) should be specific and reasonable, considering both short-term and long-term. If you have multiple goals, type each one on a new bullet point.”

And when we say specific, we really do mean specific. This plays off of our post from last week about telling us your story. If you’re telling us about your specific goals, it’s telling us more about your overall project. Here are a few examples: 

Short-term goal: Plant flowers in our city park. Long-term goal: Attract more bees  

Revamped to more specific: 

Short-term goals:
-Reach out to our town’s local nursery and ask them for locally grown wildflower donations.
-Raise money to purchase additional local wildflowers
-Plan a day to gather the community so that we can work together to plant the wildflowers

Long-term goals:
– Help upkeep the wildflowers by weeding and watering when needed
– Attract more bees, butterflies, and other insects to our area
– Help local gardens and farms benefit from the higher number of bees in the area with the addition of wildflower beds

Can you see how much more information these specific goals give us and how deeper of a picture it paints when they are written in detail instead of in a general sense? 

Our email is also always open to any questions you may have or guidance needed during the process.

You can see more about the scholarship requirements by downloading our checklist here.

For more information on the scholarship, head here.

For our 2023 final submission link, head here.

Scholarship Reminder! Video Requirements

Here’s your weekly scholarship reminder. There is a video that is required for your final submission. This video can be uploaded to YouTube and shared with us, or uploaded to your Google Drive and shared with us. The video requirements are as follows:

2-5 minutes long including examples of your work in action (photos, video clips, etc.)

Include a few words directly from you regarding your project (can be a voice-over)

Include 1-3 brief interviews with people you are working with.

Address the following questions:

  • What would you improve with more time?
  • What new skills or concepts have you acquired?
  • What have you learned about yourself based on the experience?

If you already have a video created for your project for a different purpose, can you still use it for the scholarship application? Yes, if it still meets all of our requirements and answers all three questions within the video. You may also create a new video for this scholarship application specifically and send in a video you’ve already made as a supplement. But all video requirements must be met in order to qualify.

Our email is also always open to any questions you may have or guidance needed during the process.

You can see more about the scholarship requirements by downloading our checklist here.

For more information on the scholarship, head here.

For our 2023 final submission link, head here.

Scholarship Reminder! Add Pictures to Your Submission

Here’s your weekly scholarship reminder: 

Add photos of your work to your scholarship application! Not only is this a requirement in order to qualify for the scholarship, but adding these pictures only helps your application. 

No amount of pictures is too many, I promise. There is a limit on how many you can submit on our actual submission page, but additional photos can always be emailed to us after your final application has been sent in. You can also insert photos on a Word, Google Document, or PDF and submit this as evidence as well to work around the picture limitations on our submission form. 

By giving us a good visual representation of your community project, it helps us verify the legitimacy as well as literally “see the big picture” of what you’ve been working on. 

Our email is also always open to any questions you may have or guidance needed during the process.

For more information on the scholarship, head here.

For our 2023 final submission link, head here.

Scholarship Reminder!

Your scholarship application is due, soon! The deadline for your final submission is May 28, 2023, 11:59 pm MST

This gives you just over 6 weeks to finish up your work, gather photo evidence of what you’ve been working on, and fine-tune your submission paragraphs.

PLEASE keep in mind that the scholarship submission will take a good chunk of your time to go through, write everything out, and upload your files. We strongly suggest submitting everything several days before the due date to ensure everything is uploaded and in before the due date. If you are worried about something not going through or just want to make sure we received your submission, feel free to reach out to us via email.

Our email is also always open to any questions you may have or guidance needed during the process.

For more information on the scholarship, head here.

For our 2023 submission link, head here.

One Student is Changing the Mental Health Game for High School Athletes

Mental health is important. But what if we take it one step further and focus on mental health for athletes? Obviously, every specific group of people ever to exist can benefit from mental health awareness, but a high school student in New Mexico felt passionate about honing in on something that is important to her. So she set out to make that change. She writes, 

“Growing up in athletics, I’ve observed a high amount of stigma and harm surrounding the mental health of youth athletes in my hometown. Specifically, I’ve had extensive experiences with abusive coaching, toxic environments, and lack of access to mental health resources. I’ve also had many friends who experienced these same issues as they participated in youth athletics. Many coaches, sports organizations, and professionals are ill-informed when it comes to caring for the mental health of youth athletes.”

“My solution is to create a local nonprofit dedicated to prioritizing the mental health of adolescent athletes. This is a need I see in our community and after extensively looking, I don’t feel there are any other organizations doing the work locally (or even nationally) to fill this need.”

“I deserve this scholarship because not only have I researched this topic extensively, but I’ve already put in actionable steps to attain success in this project. I’ve written a 4,000 word thesis concerning the mental health of female athletes and read countless pieces of literature in the field. Additionally, I have met with professionals and designed a website for my project already.”

“Furthermore, this project is a very niche but very necessary one. While there are many organizations that support youth mental health in the U.S., there are little to none that support the mental health of youth athletes. This is despite the fact that research shows how important it is to provide this support for youth athletes.”

We’re cheering on this student not only in her sports but in her advocacy for mental health for her peers as well. 

Mentorship In A Louisiana Community That Could Imapct Generations To Come- All Put Together By A Teen

A high school student in Louisiana observed a lot of bullying and a lack of role models in her community. She’s come up with a plan to combat this. She writes, 

“The community I would like to highlight is fairly new to me. I moved here in May of 2022. This community has lots of kids ranging from toddlers to teenagers! Since I’ve moved into this community I’ve noticed a lot of bullying and horrible behavior going on. Not only that but there are also barely any role models in my community, so the younger children and following the older kids who are not showing excellent and responsible behaviors. I believe that making social media posts and planning a group meet-up in my community to meet the different teenagers and young adults would help start this project. Once I have a group we can do weekly meets and do fun projects and activities together with the younger kids. This would show teamwork and problem-solving. My goals for this project are to stop the bullying in my community and help everyone come together as a team. I believe this would just be the start of changing the view for teenagers and helping them understand how much they influence younger kids.”

What sticks out to us in this project is the generational effects this can have on her community. The work she puts into this will not only affect the teenagers in her area but everyone around them as well. Whether this Louisiana teen wins our scholarship or not, her determination, drive, and problem-solving skills will bring her great places in life!