Scholarship Essays

Scholarship essays are an excellent opportunity to prove to a College or University that you have what it takes to make it in academia. Some Colleges specify formatting requirements; follow their instructions to the letter. If they do not provide style criteria, then APA standard formatting will look professional and like you are ready for College. To begin with, create one or two generic essays on an interesting topic. Many colleges and universities will allow subject flexibility and these generic essays can be used as the basis for multiple applications. A personal essay is an excellent choice as it is very often an accepted essay type.

The other compelling advantage of writing personal essays is that these are adaptable to accommodate a variety of possible award sponsors, take for example the hypothetical opening sentence of an essay awarded by Microsoft, the essay opens like this, Like Mr. Gates, I have worked hard for my achievements… This opening line is adaptable to any company or individual. It is a great generic opening.

Personal essays tell a story or experience in first person. They also provide the writer with another opportunity to show off, not just their writing skills but also their maturity, insights and depth. For many awards, the essays do not have to be complicated or exhibit an extraordinary vocabulary. Have a look at this sample of the 2009 Tennessee Court Reporters Association, winning essay^[1].

 “There was a day when my mom, who is hearing impaired and has to watch television with the closed captioning on, came to me with an article about closed captioning as a career. She mentioned something about learning court reporting, and using those skills to move into captioning.  I initially dismissed the idea, but as I continued to research careers, I decided to humor her and check it out.  To my surprise, the career sounded too good to be true, and everything I was looking for.

Another reason I became so interested in the field is that I was in a car accident two years ago, and severed my brachial artery.  This injury rendered me unable to move my thumb.  This was very frustrating, but after six months of no motion in my thumb, it began to move.  A few weeks after that, I had full use of it again.  Having played guitar for many years, I greatly enjoy using my fingers.  The idea that could find a good, stable career using my fingers appealed to me greatly.

I researched court reporting and closed captioning, which ultimately led me to enrol in the College of Court Reporting in Hobart, Indiana. My experience there has been nothing short of phenomenal, and I can feel that this is the career path that I'm meant to take.”

Given Subjects

Often the sponsor of a scholarship award will require essays to be relevant to the company or individual sponsoring. For example, the privately sponsored organization Celebration of Liberty, sponsor an annual scholarship based on the subject of liberty – it is after all what they are all about.  The number of sponsors and potential topics is endless, realtors, bankers, politicians, businesses and so on. For these scholarships, it is very likely that you will not be able to use generic essays and will have to tailor essays for the sponsor. Rather than apply for a large number of scholarships of this type, it might pay to apply to only one or two of them that offer large monetary rewards. These larger rewards which require more tailored essays are worth the additional effort and time required.

[1] http://www.tncra.com/scholarship-essays.html