Scholarships and TESC

[HorseManiac]

I'm looking for some opinions on my situation regarding scholarships. As some of you may know I'm a home school high school senior this year so naturally I am looking into several scholarships that I might a have good shot at receiving. Now, many of them require you to enroll in the fall in a school. I'm not planning at this point to enroll in TESC right after I graduate because I would like to continue testing before I pay the enrollment fee. So I called the Financial Aid office at TESC to see if maybe they would hold the money in an account for me until I enrolled. They said no and that they didn't think I would get many scholarships if I wasn't going to enroll in college in the fall. My mom was thinking that if I were to send a letter along with my scholarship applications explaining that I would be working on college work, just not through one specific school that they might accept that.

Does anyone have any opinions on that? Suggestions? Should I just forget looking into scholarships because I don't want to enroll right away? I thought about waiting to apply for the scholarships until I was ready to enroll, but many of the ones I am looking at require you to be a high school senior when you apply although a few do not. If any has anyone suggestions, I'd be happy to hear them.

[Pjbarney]

Scholarships all have their own individual, (and sometimes unusual) requirements. I doubt you can get around them. I think you will either have to look for those that fit you, or, if the scholarships are that good (full tuition, for example,) you might reconsider enrolling next Fall. It looks like you have a good start to testing, and you can continue testing while enrolled.

[cooperalex2004]

As Pjbarney said, scholarships are all different. You can always apply and see what happens if you get it. I received a scholarship out of high school for $500, they just wrote me a check and I used it for community college courses. I never gave them any documentation but I did use the money for courses and not exams. Normally I'd say talk to your counselor but the homeschooling thing kind of complicates that by not providing the same support. I guess read the requirements carefully and if you decide to go for it hope that they give you the money instead of the school. If they insist on paying the school and give you enough money it might be worth enrolling early.

[HorseManiac]

Thank you Pjbarney and Cooperalex2004 for your feedback. Both of what you said about going ahead and enrolling if I were get a large enough amount of money has crossed my mind and I've been seriously considering it. What I've been thinking about doing is applying for these 2 scholarships that are due in January that don't really have any rules about when you enroll in college. At least they aren't stated. The one will be awarded in February and it's the largest one. The rest are considerably smaller. So if I didn't get the large one then I don't think I'd enroll in the fall. I could go from there I guess and decide if I wanted to apply for some of the other ones due in Feb, March and July. Does that sound like a good plan? I'm thinking if I apply and it asks what school I'm enrolled in that I'll just be honest and say that I plan to enroll in TESC, but that the enrollment date hasn't been decided yet. If they don't give it to me, then I'm not out anything, but if they do then at least they'd know up front. There are a few July scholarships that are expense scholarships. You turn in receipts and then they give you the money so I'm going to see if my CLEP/DSST exams would count as expenses and then apply for those.

Thanks for your help and if anybody has any other opinions on this I'd be glad to hear them.

[frankiebleyes]

Good luck with your scholarship hunt. My grandson had a 4.0 and didn't receive any scholarships he applied for as the competition is extremely high these days. I know nothing about home school based scholarships and just wanted to encourage you to keep applying for the scholarships that you desire. TESC does not seem to give many scholarships from my experience with them and my son's experience also.

[HorseManiac]

Good luck with your scholarship hunt. My grandson had a 4.0 and didn't receive any scholarships he applied for as the competition is extremely high these days. I know nothing about home school based scholarships and just wanted to encourage you to keep applying for the scholarships that you desire. TESC does not seem to give many scholarships from my experience with them and my son's experience also.

Thank you so much for your encouragement!! It is really appreciated. I am sorry to hear that your grandson wasn't able to get any scholarships. I'm not really sure how competitive the scholarships I'm applying for are, but I don't see any hurt in trying. Yes, I did notice that most of TESC's scholarships require you to have already taken like 12 credits with them. That's too bad! Thank you again for your kind words!

[HorseManiac]

**BUMP**

Okay, I have some more questions that I'd like to get some feedback on......

1) As I've been looking over scholarships a lot of them require that you be enrolled which I mentioned before. I'm considering enrolling the fall if I were to get a scholarship. Does anyone know if paying the $75 application fee at TESC will allow you to consider being enrolled? I emailed TESC, but was curious if anyone here knows. I'm thinking not, but wanted to check.

2) Does anyone have any opinions on whether I should contact all the scholarship providers and ask them if having college credit already makes me ineligible? It occurred to me that having credit already might cause me not qualify. Opinions??

Thanks for the help!

[Muricles]

Unfortunately, I don't have any advice on the TESC scholarships. As you've already read, scholarships can have seemingly random requirements and can be extremely competitive.

My advice would be to focus on local scholarships, maybe related to your interests or hobbies. For example, your name is horsemaniac (not your real name...I hope!), maybe you can do a search on scholarships for people interested in riding or cold call/write a local equestrian club. You have a verse from Galatians in your signature, maybe you can try your local house of worship. There are scholarships available for everything from being left-handed to being tall (maybe even being home schooled?)

Create a basic form letter explaining your interest(s) and your goals. Modify as necessary and send it to as many smaller organizations as practical. Some scholarships aren't really advertised. You already have some college credit so that demonstrates your commitment to graduating. These scholarships may not be thousands of dollars, and can take a lot of time and effort, but they can add up.

[Westerner]

**BUMP**

Okay, I have some more questions that I'd like to get some feedback on......

1) As I've been looking over scholarships a lot of them require that you be enrolled which I mentioned before. I'm considering enrolling the fall if I were to get a scholarship. Does anyone know if paying the $75 application fee at TESC will allow you to consider being enrolled? I emailed TESC, but was curious if anyone here knows. I'm thinking not, but wanted to check.

2) Does anyone have any opinions on whether I should contact all the scholarship providers and ask them if having college credit already makes me ineligible? It occurred to me that having credit already might cause me not qualify. Opinions??

Thanks for the help!

1. The $75 is the application fee; to enroll you'll need to pay the ~$3000.
2. I wouldn't think having credit would be a problem. After all, some people trying for scholarships dropped out or already accumulated credits and didn't finish college because of expenses, right? The big thing seems to be whether you're enrolled in a college or not.

This is what I've observed, someone may have more to add

[HorseManiac]

Unfortunately, I don't have any advice on the TESC scholarships. As you've already read, scholarships can have seemingly random requirements and can be extremely competitive.

My advice would be to focus on local scholarships, maybe related to your interests or hobbies. For example, your name is horsemaniac (not your real name...I hope!), maybe you can do a search on scholarships for people interested in riding or cold call/write a local equestrian club. You have a verse from Galatians in your signature, maybe you can try your local house of worship. There are scholarships available for everything from being left-handed to being tall (maybe even being home schooled?)

Create a basic form letter explaining your interest(s) and your goals. Modify as necessary and send it to as many smaller organizations as practical. Some scholarships aren't really advertised. You already have some college credit so that demonstrates your commitment to graduating. These scholarships may not be thousands of dollars, and can take a lot of time and effort, but they can add up.

Muricles,

Thanks for your advice. It makes a lot of sense. I took your advice and looked up some local scholarships. I did find quite a few, but the problem I have with them is that you have to attending a college within my state and none of the Big 3 are in my states. I did find one local one however that I think will work. I even asked about the fact that I won't be "attending" a college and they said to go ahead and apply. That one must be done once you are enrolled though. Haha, it's funny you mention about being tall because I actually found one for tall people, but I missed the height requirement by about 1 1/2"!! I was able to find a few distance learning scholarships so I'm definitely going to go for those.

Thanks again for your suggestions! And yes, I'd be thankful to even receive a couple hundred dollars. I'm sorting through some that I found and trying to decide if they are worth the work depending on competitive they are, how many they give out, etc. I'm thinking that already having college credit won't matter. My mom and I put a transcript together like my high school one that lists all my college credits so if they ask for a transcript then they'll know.