Thursday, December 8, 2011

Set Up A College Scholarship Fund

Setting up a college scholarship fund can be a wonderful way to help the next generation achieve their best. Whether you're setting it up to encourage young adults following a certain career path, as a memorial, or to help people overcome specific disadvantages, the same basic steps need to be followed.


Instructions


1. Get together enough money to endow the fund. When you endow a scholarship that money stays as a permanent asset to the school, and every year the interest from the fund goes to supporting a student. You'll need at least 20,000 to start a fund, most start at closer to 50,000.


2. Talk to the institute of your choice. The directors are very helpful, after all, you're giving them quite a bit of money! Many scholarships go through a school, but you can also set them up through other community organizations.


3. Decide on the criteria for your scholarship. Will this be open to all students? Or perhaps only those of a certain race, gender, religion, sexual orientation or ethnic background. Maybe your scholarship will help those who how trouble affording college(need-based)or those who did very well in school (merit-based).


4. Next you will need to determine how the scholarship is awarded. What sort of information will be collected by applicants? Will there be essays or interviews? And who makes the final decision? Often an advisory board is appointed to make the final call. This allows greater flexibility in awarding to the people you are aiming to get the money too.


5. Get the word out! Depending on the size and nature of your scholarship it might be useful to advertise in publications that reach the same audience you wish to award your scholarship to. There are also various websites that list available scholarships.

Tags: your scholarship