To understand how to write a scholarship essay, you have to put yourself in the shoes of the college board that decides whose writing should win. Why should students even spend time on essays for scholarships? That is a good question. It is the chance to start getting solid financial support from your higher educational institution. Colleges and universities around the world award their top students who show the most impressive academic achievements with extra money. A scholarship essay should reflect your life and achievements clearly.
In case you have no idea how to prove that you are worthy of that reward, ask professional online writers and editors for help!
What is a Scholarship?
Let us dedicate a bit of time to explaining scholarship. Online an admission essay, a scholarship paper aims not to get you the place in college, but maintain it and prove that you deserve more. A student may count on one of the following types of scholarships:
- Merit-based
- Need-based
The donor of the department responsible for the payouts decides on the criteria for candidate selection. What is the point of writing this paper? If you win, you receive enough money to cover another college year, cost of study materials, campus, board, and other possible expenses. It depends on the educational institution.
Both incoming students and current graduates have an opportunity to apply. Here are the main factors that guarantee solid financial rewards, and you should include them in your scholarship essay:
- Academic improvements
- Community involvement
- Charity
- Employment experience
- Fields of study
- Financial need
The rest of the post explains how to write a winning scholarship essay. Don’t miss your chance!
General Preparation Tips
Before going into the details, we will provide the basic tips on how to write a scholarship essay.
- Remain original - hundreds of other students hope to get the rewards like you, and your scholarship essay will have to stand out from the pool of scholarship essays to be selected. Many of the essays remain unread. A unique topics and eye-catching hook sentence in the beginning are the most effective ways to make the committee read your piece from cover to cover. Example: - think about factors that make you want to be a lawyer. You may either recall personal life experience like being rubbed by a thief one day or include some examples from the pop culture like the episode with the murder of Batman’s parents. Those are both good ways!
- Study the prompt - in some cases, you will be given a specific question to answer. In these cases, you should give a detailed explanation of the reply with some vivid examples instead of describing your life experience. Provide a full response in the final paragraph. Hint: The main hidden question every applicant should answer is “Why do you deserve to win?”
- Topic is the clue - remember that you must find an original, relevant, and interesting topic recently discussed in your community to make the college board curious about your writing. It does not mean a subject should be complicated. A student should avoid confusing ideas when applying for the scholarship. It is recommended to find a simple research question with lots of information available on the web and in the college library, but create an original approach to exploring it.
Mind that you may not have access to the necessary sources. That is why we recommend choosing the subject you are expert in or reading useful literature on the preferred topic ahead.
Bonus Tip
Go beyond the superficial
Ensure writing down some specifics. It is not enough to admit that you understand the important role of education in your life - you should prove why it is so by providing strong examples. One of it may describe your experience as a tourist in Europe. Mention how your knowledge of Spanish or French helped you to survive while being separated from the rest of the team and assist other lost tourists. This example would work for linguists.
The next section shares specific steps on how to write a winning scholarship application essay.
Format Expectations
Unlike other types of essays, you should not worry about whether to format your scholarship essay in MLA, APA, Harvard, or else. Unless the instructor requires a specific citation format, follow the given rules:
- Make the entire text double-spaced.
- Use Times New Roman font size 12.
- Make sure to apply a single-inch top, bottom, and side margins.
Detailed Tips & Tricks to Help You Win
Those were general tips. Now, we should talk more about how to write a winning scholarship essay meaning that you should pay more attention to specific writing tricks to get the reward.
In most cases, you will have to make it no more the 500-1,000 words, and it is critical to provide the response to the main and hidden questions within this limit. To do that, avoid including many details and irrelevant material. Focus on the major aspect of your life necessary to give an answer to the primary scholarship essay question.
The instructors usually do not ask for an outline. Still, students need this action plan not to get lost during the writing process. Use this 5-paragraph paper template. Introduction - start with a strong hook sentence (metaphor, simile, fact, statistics, anecdote, joke, literary quote, quotation of a famous person, etc.) Provide a summary of the reasons why you deserve to win. Make sure to specify you know how you can contribute to the community and institution development, and finish with the powerful thesis statement.
Here are 4 things each candidate should not forget to include:
- Know the scholarship essay limits!
- Prepare an outline
- Do not miss a thing!
- The extent of the leadership experience and related achievements.
- Reasons to gain the leadership experience.
- List the difficulties and challenges faced while obtaining the necessary experience and the ways you used to solve the problem.
- Things that you learned and the way these lessons helped to shape your leadership skills.
Tell how you plan to implement the lessons in the future. Recall the job you plan to get after graduation and provide reasons why the gained experience will be valuable. Example: As I plan to become a physician, the obtained experience in leadership will help me to improve the hospital communication among both personnel and patients to improve the quality of treatment.
Need Another Piece of Advice?
Are you still hesitating how to write a scholarship essay? You may try to explain why you invested so much time in specific activities and ways you contributed to the development of your community alone, or you can use a helping hand to guarantee success. Search no more - our experienced authors are ready to help! Tell us more about yourself and reasons to obtain a scholarship, and we will do our best to come up with the winning scholarship essay for you!
