Persuasion Post: Apply For Scholarships

It's no secret that the cost of college is getting more expensive. Whether you're attending a small-town college or a prestigious university, every education comes at a price. Unfortunately, many of the students attending college cannot afford the full expenses that come with the pursuit of higher education. According to www.debt.org, America's debt-help organization, "about 60 percent of college students graduate with student loan debt". This website also states that to make matters worse, "income has declined every year between 2007 and 2011 for 80 percent of U.S. families". So how are college students supposed to pay for their education? The answer is simple: apply for scholarships.

According to www.debt.org, "Each year, an estimated $46 billion in grants and scholarship money is awarded by the U.S. Department of Education and the nation’s colleges and universities" and "In addition, about $3.3 billion in gift aid is awarded by private sources". With all that free money floating around, one would think that more students would apply for a slice of that financial pie. However, there are many students who do not actually apply for any scholarships. Reasons for not applying vary from "I don't have enough time," to "I'm not smart enough to get a scholarship," to "One scholarship is not going to be enough to pay for my education," to "What's the point? There are too many people applying for scholarships. I'll never get one". While these excuses may seem valid, none of them are entirely true. 

There are scholarships on Fastweb.com that only require you to register for an account with them in order to win a scholarship. Just make an account, click on the sweepstakes scholarship, and you're done. When it comes to free money, anyone can sacrifice a whole three minutes of their day to apply for a scholarship, no matter how busy they are. 

While it's true that there are scholarships out there with a high GPA as a requirement, there are plenty of scholarships available to people of specific majors, specific genders, specific race or ethnicity, and specific residency. There are also a great deal of scholarships available to people who struggle financially. So you don't have to be academically gifted in order to win free money. You just have to look a little more to find the scholarship that's right for you.

There are a few scholarships that happen to be full-tuition scholarships. In fact, NCCC happens to offer five of them to incoming freshmen students. But the vast majority of scholarships out there do not fully pay for the cost of college. While applicants may be deterred by the relatively small award amounts that some scholarships give out, they should keep in mind that every dollar won is a dollar they don't have to pay out-of-pocket. A scholarship of $100 may not be the full-tuition scholarship you want, but at least you'll be able to rent two or three textbooks for free.

While there are many college students out there looking to apply for scholarships and the chances of getting one may not always be in your favor, there is a 0% chance of winning any scholarship if you don't apply. I like to compare applying for scholarships to fishing. There's a variety of fish in the sea: some are large, some are small, and every fisherman out there wants to catch at least one. But no fisherman ever sat in a boat and waited for the fish to swim right to him. He must bait his line and cast it out in hopes of reeling in his prize. Scholarship applicants are no different. An eligible applicant cannot sit and wait for free money to be given to them. Despite the many applicants out there, there is a greater chance of winning scholarship money by applying than there is by doing nothing at all.

To conclude this very long persuasive blog post, there are billions of dollars of free money waiting to be given out to eligible applicants. Applying is relatively easy and there is a scholarship for nearly every race, ethnicity, gender, major, and residency in the country. When it comes to paying for college, no excuse should come between free money and a cheaper college education. After all, a little effort and a few scholarships now could mean a drastic reduction in student loans later in life.