Blog

When I was younger (and I am not so sure this has changed since then), we were always instructed to work to improve our weaknesses. If we were weak on spelling, we spent extra time on spelling. If we were weak in math, more time there. Where ever we were weakest seemed to be where our instructors were focused.

Now, I understand that there are some basic skills that need to be obtained and those definitely should not be neglected. However, when it comes to applying for scholarships – you want to make sure you are playing to your strengths not your weaknesses. This obsession with improving one’s weakness has changed quite a bit in the post-academic world. Since the time of my youth many business advisors counsel just the opposite – don’t focus on your weaknesses, but focus on your strengths as that is where your advantages are. That is where you will make a difference!

Knowing Your Strengths

Before you can tout your strengths in your scholarship application,...

You’ve done it again! New school clothes, school supplies, reviewed and readjusted the schedule for the year, sorted out the afterschool activities, figured out the bus schedule, found that old backpack which languished away in closet for the summer and seventeen other things that were required to be ready to go back to school. Students look at going back to school with a sort of bitter sweet perspective. The bitter is that summer vacation is really over and consistent homework will become the norm for the next several months of their lives. The sweet is a mixture of excitement to spend time with friends, school athletics, a fresh new start on their grades, and limitless potential as to the things they will learn and discover. So now that the students are back to school, it’s time to get organized to ensure all things are ready to continue their preparation for their Eliminating College Costs! I’ve broken some of these reminders into groups by where they are in...

There are so many things that we would like to accomplish in our daily lives. Work, TV, family time, watching a game, reading a book, taking a nap, cleaning, learning, the list goes on forever. The old adage, “An apple a day keeps the doctor away,” teaches a simple principle that can be applied to eliminating significant portions of your college costs.

Many of you have heard me speak of just how many scholarships are available each year.  The current estimate is somewhere around 2.6 million scholarships available each year.  The sum total of these in dollars?  About $16 billion!  The beautiful thing about there being that many scholarships is that there are all kinds of scholarships out there!  In this blog, we are going to walk you through a few different types to help illustrate the variety and hopefully show how this variety can help increase the number of scholarships awards that can be yours.

Even though you may have or be a great student, most students will occasionally suffer through a setback in their grades at some point of their scholastic career.  This can be traumatic or just annoying depending upon the disposition of the student at the time this occurs.  And the range of setbacks can vary from performing poorly on a quiz to having not realized they are halfway done with the term and it looks like that hoped for ‘B’ might be closer to a ‘D’!  So what do you do?  Below you will find five grade recovery strategies.

1.   Take Ownership.

“A man can fail many times, but he isn’t a failure until he begins to blame somebody else.” – John Burroughs

The first grade recovery strategy in recovering from a poor grade is to own it.  Don’t waste time blaming your teacher, parents or anyone else in your life for a poor grade.  The grade is yours – accept it. ...