Education doesn’t come cheap, and now that times are especially tough, you might find it hard to get the funds you need to put yourself through college. You’re lucky if your parents have already saved enough for your years in college, but if you find that you have to work or find financial aid through other means, then you might want to try getting a scholarship.
How to Write a Winning Scholarship Essay
You have to keep in mind, though, that there are many students vying for scholarships nowadays, and you have to convince admissions officers that you’re good enough to be granted a scholarship. The competition becomes more intense if you’re a home-schooled student.
As someone who studied at home for many years, you’re probably wondering how you’re going to do this. Well, you get the chance to tell admissions officers all about yourself, your personal life, and your life as a home-schooled student when you write your scholarship essay.
1) Sample scholarship essays that focus on home-school experiences can help you come up with a theme
If you have no idea how you’re going to write scholarship essays, then you can get essay help by taking a look at various sample scholarship essays online. It’s easy to find these samples, you only have to do a search on the Internet and there will surely be many results that you can check out. Look for samples that have unique school experiences as the theme and see how the topic was discussed and elaborated. There are many benefits that you can get from looking at different sample scholarship essays.
For one, doing so will help you see how other scholarship applicants wrote their own essays. You might also get ideas about topics and angles while looking at these sample essays. Make sure, though, that you do not copy these sample essays. You can use them to get ideas, but don’t copy the style or the information contained therein. It’s important that you make your scholarship essay personal and unique. After all, this is your chance to convince admissions officers that you deserve the scholarship you’re applying for.
2) Examples of scholarship essays can help you how to highlight unforgettable home-school experiences
You can start writing your scholarship essay by making an outline or a rough draft. Of course, you first need to know what you’re going to write about. Pick a topic that you want to focus on. Would you like to give your readers a chance to know how your life was like being a home-schooled student? If so, you need to highlight this experience properly in your essay.
Focusing on a topic and having your essay revolve around it will make it easier for you to string together your ideas and make your essay appear as a coherent whole rather than a hodgepodge of ideas that were hastily put together.
When starting your scholarship essay, you should make sure that your starting paragraph will grab the readers’ attention and entice them to read your essay through to the end. Of course, if the organization or school you’re applying to specifies a particular topic and requires your essay to be of a specific format, make sure that you follow these guidelines.
3) What to write in the body of your scholarship essay
Your scholarship essay will give admissions officers a glimpse into your life. It will give them an idea of how you are as a person, as well as what you do when you’re not in school. You can use your essay to enumerate the achievements you’ve had, or the obstacles thrown your way when you were home-schooled and how you were able to overcome these obstacles.
Make sure, though, that you stick to the angle you’ve chosen. When writing about being a home-schooled student, perhaps you can write about your unusual experiences and how you interact with other members of the community even if you’re mostly at home. You can also write about your volunteer work or extra-curricular activities to give admissions officers a view of how productive you are as an individual.
4) A sample scholarship essay can be a source of other basic essay help tips
Reading sample essays can help you edit your essay better. Once you’ve already finished writing your essay, make sure that you read it again and thoroughly edit it. A simple typographical error on your essay can be a mark of carelessness, and grammatical errors will surely be noticed by readers.
Remember that you have to impress admissions officers, but you should also make sure that you don’t sound like a know-it-all. It’s also advisable for you to read sample essays and critique them so you’ll know what to not include in your own essay. Don’t be afraid to revise your essay and to add or remove paragraphs as you go along if you think doing so will make your essay better.
About the Author: Carol James is an EssayLab psychology department writer and senior editor. She has MA degree in social sciences and is an excellent specialist in this field. Carol worked with numerous materials on the subject and is eager to share her knowledge with our readers.
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