How To Have Fewer Student Loans!

Ramit from I will Teach You to be Rich, shares an email he recently sent to a friend detailing tips and hints for getting scholarships. The advice is great and for those of you getting your children prepped for school or the high school junior/senior wondering how to pay for an education. For those of you already paying back education loans this will likely inspire a, “doh. Why didn’t I think of that?” moment. Have no fear because your advice is coming shortly.

Ramit writes:

Don’t bother with Fastweb.com. It’s online so there are 2358234 billion people using it, and nobody wins anything from it. Also, don’t ever pay to enter a scholarship.

What I found were a few keys to getting scholarships: Nobody applies, so you have a good chance if you just apply; write a really good essay and have lots of people proofread it (I’m happy to help if you want); know that you can control how good your recommendations are by giving them material and making it easier for them; and interviewing well (more on that once you get the interviews, which I’m sure you will).

Ramit’s best advice is to apply for all the relevant scholarships because even the small dollar ones add up. He recommends many useful resources as well as a game plan for getting started. Getting started Ramit argues is the most important aspect and I agree. In school I applied to 5 or 6 scholarships and walked away with two. If I could go back I would have multiplied that number by 10 to greatly decrease the amount of money I borrowed.

Do you have any scholarship advice? If you could go back to your high school junior self, what would you tell yourself?