Tips For Writing a Great Scholarship Essay

Updated: 1/7/2009

Now that you have received a scholarship application and you have completed all of the basic information, you may be feeling stumped by the scholarship essay. After all, writing a scholarship essay requires a great deal of time and effort and, if you don’t consider yourself to be a very good writer, the prospect of writing one can be very overwhelming. With these simple tips, however, writing your essay will be much simpler and you will be certain to impress the college scholarship committee that will be reviewing your application.

Tip #1: Take Time to Brainstorm

The first thing you need to do when writing a scholarship essay is brainstorm ideas. When you brainstorm, you write down everything that comes to mind. Remember, at this stage, there are no “right” or “wrong” thoughts or ideas. Rather, you want to let your mind think freely and to write down everything that comes to it while thinking about the subject.

Tip #2: Get Organized

Now that you have purged your mind of all of your ideas, it is time to start organizing them in some sort of logical fashion. If some of your ideas don’t fit in with the overall theme of your paper, you can set those aside and focus on only those that seem to tie together nicely. With this information, you should be able to form a basic outline for your scholarship essay.

Tip #3: Start Doing Research

With your ideas in mind and your outline in hand, you can begin researching information for your essay. If the essay topic is very personal in nature, you may not need to conduct a great deal of research. Nonetheless, if you can find anecdotes or information from literary texts and noted authors to support your thesis, you will have a much more powerful scholarship essay.

Tip #4: Start Writing

If you created a solid outline and filled it in with great research information, the writing component should be relatively simple. After all, the scholarship essay should be basically written for you already! Now, all you have to do is inject some enthusiasm into the writing and to really make it your own. Remember, your goal is to distinguish yourself from other applicants. Get involved with the subject matter and make an effort to really teach your audience. Namely, you want to teach them that you are an interesting person that is worthy of their attention.

Tip #5: Follow Proper Essay Writing Conventions

Now it is time to put everything you learned in your high school English classes to work. Be certain to avoid using slang or unconventional formats. Your essay should contain a clear introduction, body, and conclusion. Avoid saying things such as “Allow me to introduce myself” in the introduction or “In conclusion” in the conclusion. While it should be clear that you are drawing the reader in with an introduction and summarizing and reflecting in the conclusion, your scholarship essay should transition into these three areas smoothly and easily. While writing a scholarship essay is certainly easier for some people than it is for other, by following these five simple tips, you will be able to write a great essay and get yourself recognized when the college scholarship committee reviews all of its applications.

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