Summer Scholarships for Summer Time Students
Many times students who choose or need to take a summer school course or enroll in a summer education experience do not consider looking for summer scholarships for summer time learning, thinking that scholarships are only for things taking place during the course of the traditional school year. However, there are ways to fund summer school expenses without paying everything out-of-pocket. Sometimes the financial aid allocated for the traditional school year can be applied to summer courses, especially if students are going to be replacing credits with those earned during the summer. Also, if scholarships are applied for early enough, many of the recipients are notified of their award and funds are sent to the educational institution before summer, but students will need to pay close attention to ensure these funds have arrived and are available for use before August.
Until now Pell grants have been available for summer educational experiences, but they were recently defunded. This has seriously limited funds available for summer students. The majority of summer scholarships now available for summer programs are for study abroad. If this is of interest for you, spending the summer travelling and learning in a foreign country is something that can be partially or fully funded via a summer scholarship.
There are also a number of summer scholarships available to high school students wishing to be better prepared for their upcoming college experience. Participating in a summer institute or internship is often a very focused, intense experience which can provide valuable insight and skills for a student. Specific financial aid or scholarships for taking summer college courses is best found at your institution of study. Many colleges have specific summer prices or aid for taking extra classes for remediation or for accelerating degree completion.
One opportunity for a high school student is the QuestBridge Scholarship. A number of prestigious universities have joined forces with QuestBridge to provide low-income, high school students entering their senior year with a chance to sample college life. Students are given a full-ride summer scholarship to one of the following schools in order to take classes, live in dorms, play sports, and get to know students from a vast array of backgrounds. Emory, Harvard, Notre Dame, Penn, Stanford and Yale are all participants in this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Students must have excellent GPA’s and test scores despite facing economic challenges. Many students go on to be considered for college scholarships to the university attended for this summer program.
The Sloan Career Cornerstone provides a state-by-state of many similar pre-college camps and summer programs that offer experiences in core and specific areas of study to give students an edge upon entrance into college. Many of these programs take place at universities around the country and give students a feel for the campus, as well as provide a real-life introduction as to the daily pace of college life. Local companies and the universities themselves often offer summer school scholarships or financial aid for these opportunities.
The following scholarships for the summer help to provide real-world life experience to students in the form of a summer internship. The Henderson-Reznick and Shinners families donated funds to be used to provide an unpaid internship to a student whom would not otherwise be able to afford such an opportunity. Preference for the five $5,000 scholarships is provided to students seeking an internship within the non-profit, humanitarian, government or scientific research (non-profit) sectors. The University of Wisconsin Madison, affiliated with the families, sponsors the internships. Applicants must be previously chosen for an internship, providing evidence of this, and then apply for the scholarship no later than March 31.
A brief sampling of the types of summer opportunities other than a “regular job” is hopefully enough for you to get the ball rolling in the direction you choose for your summer. Whether you are planning to work at home, travel abroad, get work experience with an internship or take college classes to get caught up or ahead for the next school year, you need to plan ahead. In addition to making decisions about the path you will choose, you need to investigate funding options. This again cannot be left to last minute or you will certainly be paying out-of-pocket for any expenses you incur. Keep in mind that there may be fare fewer applicants applying to the scholarships for summer school then in the regular school semesters which may help your odds in landing one of the summertime scholarship programs available. There may be a number of unclaimed scholarships to be easily discovered.