Oh man, college. The land of student loans. But wait! It doesn't have to be, don't believe me? Take it from someone who didn't think they would be able to go to college, but is now going completely paid for.

Sounds like a dream, doesn't it? This can be you too! Now it sounds too good to be true, but it really can happen as long as you put in the hours of work and stamping. (I went through SO many manila envelopes)

First things first, where do you stand on your finances? Are your parents or family helping you go to college? Do they have a savings plan for you to go to college? Don't worry if they don't; this is what the blog post is for, to help you find some of that free money for college.
 Now, I am assuming you have talked to your parents and have found out their stance on financing college. (No student loan debt, Robert!) Okay, so maybe you have been left wondering what on earth you will do now that you learned your parents didn't actually start a savings plan for you. If you are a senior in high school, there is a 99.5 percent chance that you have heard of the typical scholarship website, Fastweb.com. Perhaps you have even heard of Cappex, and Unigo. If you search for scholarships on Google, these sites will undoubtedly pop up, promising thousands and thousands of dollars in student aid. 
Just sign up and these websites will give you a huge list of scholarships that amount to hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of student aid, but there's a catch. Oh, I got you there, but wait, it will get better, I promise. So the catch is that most of the scholarships they offer are NATIONAL (some are even international) or even by the luck of the draw so the odds of a student getting all those hundreds of thousands of dollars that are reported by those websites is pretty slim... unless you invented the cure for cancer, in which case, go you!

Anyways, for the rest of us, (And I thought I was a pretty competitive student with a 4.4 GPA and a 29 on my ACT plus over 200 hours of community service hours, but boy was I in for a reality check.), we should choose how we spend our time wisely on scholarships. Some scholarships can take hours upon hours of work and essays to submit. So here's a list I wrote down that will hopefully help you out with this whole process:

1) Have you submitted your FAFSA? This is the number one thing! You MUST do this as soon as the application comes out, which changed this year from January 1st to October 1st, because it uses your parents financial information (their yearly income and money from different assets) to ascertain how much money you can get through different federal grants! Yes, GRANTS, meaning free money that you do not have to pay back. You must do this as soon as the application comes out because it is a first come, first served basis. 
Now, the FAFSA itself will not give you money directly. FAFSA is just an application that will review your financial status and estimate how much your family can contribute towards your college education; they will send you a file determining how much you can expect to receive in federal aid per your financial stance. Then as soon as possible, once you hear back from your colleges, you must send them the FAFSA! UPLOAD IT, again as soon as possible, because it is the University that actually decides how much money to give you! The FAFSA is a suggestion and guideline the university will use to decide how much to give you, so you must upload your file as soon as you receive it.

2) Start searching! Does it matter if you are NOT a senior yet? Biggest misconception is the fact that you should start searching for scholarships during your senior year of high school. No! That is not true! You can start searching for scholarships at almost any age, but especially during high school. You would not believe the amount of scholarships out there that allow freshman to apply as well as seniors! So if there happens to be a freshman, sophomore, or junior reading this right now, yes, I am talking to you too! Go out and search for scholarships. But how, you ask, didn't I just say that those websites (fastweb, cappex, unigo) were difficult and time consuming? Now, now, I did say there was a catch, but it does not mean you shouldn't create an account with each of them. It simply means you must fill out your profile as much as you can!
Each of these websites has the option to fill out personal information like test scores, (ACT, SAT), GPA, your parents' occupations, your likes, the clubs you are involved in, what you plan to study in college, your religious views, and etc. FILL these out to the best of your ability because it will only help you find scholarships that are more geared and designed for you specifically, which will only increase your chances of getting that scholarship!

TIP: Start searching locally in your own town for scholarships. Many times there are businesses or individuals who offer scholarships for local students. Talk to your guidance counselor about scholarships available in your area.

1. Local first. City/County/District Scholarships 

2) State Scholarships (You can use Fastweb, Cappex, Unigo) to find these.


3) National/International Scholarships. Not only are these usually the most time consuming scholarships, which usually consist of many essays and personal information that you must submit, you are going against a wide and diverse range of students. (Cappex has a really cool tool that shows the expected number of people that will compete against you for each scholarship, ranging from not many people to very competitive. These scholarships can be found on websites such as Fastweb or through a quick Google search.)

4) Luck of the Draw Scholarships, always apply to these because they usually only require a few spaces of information, like your name, test scores, email address, and physical address. This is not a reliable scholarship source but since it takes less than ten minutes to apply, you should always try to fill these out.

Feels like so much information, so overwhelming! Trust me though, you will thank yourself later for doing all of these steps (that will increase your odds of getting the scholarships!)
Yes, I started searching for scholarships my senior year of high school and I am now able to go to college. So don't think it's too late for you to be able to go to college for free. 

I hope this article helped you. Comments, questions, suggestions for a new blog post? Please leave them below. Next post I am planning will deal with more information on scholarships and some more tips and tricks. As always, be Valiantly You in your search for scholarships and in life.

What's the first thing that pops into your head when you meet someone new?

• Oh, I love her shoes.
• He is cute.
• I wonder if she is nice. I should go say hi.

But wait... what about their name?
The most popular question that you will undoubtedly ask someone the first time you meet them. Often, it comes up more than once a day if you are out in public. Take a moment. Think about how many times in your life you have had to introduce yourself or simply state your name for a worker of a store. Comes out quite frequently doesn't it?
My name is Isis. No, no, I promise you are safe. I am not some atrocious and evil group of people. In fact, if you saw me, I am pretty sure you wouldn't think about that at all. Until you asked me my name. Your eyes might widen, you might crack a joke or two about how you might be in danger or that you are glad we aren't in an airport right now, or look at me and pat my shoulder and try to sympathize and console me by saying the origins of my name. (Egyptian goddess, if you were wondering.)
Yet, I am not ashamed of my name. Go ahead and crack the joke or two, belittling, not only me, but the tons of women and girls that have my name. I will take it; I will take the jokes and the sympathetic stares, but don't forget that it is my name and I won't change it for you or the comfort of normal conversation. 
But also remember my name is not in capital letters, a crucial distinction between myself and the malicious group that attacks innocent people. I sign my name with dignity because I was named after a goddess. A mythical goddess who is known to be strong, brave, indomitable. 
My name is Isis and I am pleased to meet you, but don't base my identity off of a twisted definition the world has come to know. Rethink the next time that you might utter a nervous laugh and crack a joke on behalf of everyone named Isis, think of the little girl who is trying to become independent and courageous but is constantly bombarded by the media's cursing of her own name. But if you do decide to joke, it's okay. We can all take it. After all, we were named after the most powerful goddess for a reason.