Bravo for beginning your search for scholarships for juniors. As a high school junior, you're obtaining a head start on planning the most out of the college adventure. As a college junior, you're putting yourself up for a comfortable future by decreasing your college loan commitments. In any case, your initiative is likely to be rewarded.
Along with thinking of what you will study and preparing for standardized tests, the scholarship search must be part of your early preparations for college. College is an extremely valuable experience, nevertheless one with a huge financial cost. Thus, the best method to attain maximum value would be to earn as much outside assistance for college as you can. Here are some tips to help you get started:
Start local. Start your search in your school, your community and the larger school district. The greatest resources to know about which local scholarships are designed for you as a junior are your school's guidance office and local chamber of commerce. This could give you a perception of both the scholarships that the school system itself awards and scholarships that local businesses and organizations grant. A local search for scholarships or grants has two principal advantages. First, the pool of candidates is limited given that these scholarships are exclusive to local students. The smaller the pool, the better your chances are that you'll get a scholarship. Second, there's a great chance that you personally know the folks deciding who earns these types of scholarships. If you don't already know them, you will have a good chance to build a relationship with them before you apply.
Check out the state level. Your state government's web site is a great resource to find scholarships for juniors from merely your state. You can generally find these scholarships by using the search engine on your state government's website. The advantage here is that the application pool is limited as compared to national scholarship competitions.
Consult the schools to which you are applying. As a junior in secondary school, you should be contemplating which colleges you'd wish to attend. Part of your analysis must include speaking with the financial assistance departments at those colleges and seeing what kind of scholarships they make available to incoming students. The majority of those scholarships will likely be ideal for high school seniors, but there might be a few for juniors too.
Research the internet. There are a number of resources on the web that will help you obtain more information concerning the availability of college scholarships or grants for juniors in high school. Try to find a good database with a wide list. No website will be comprehensive, so you'll have to check a couple of sites to get as wide of a listing of scholarships as possible.
With regards to scholarships for juniors in high school, 2012 is a competitive year. The good news is that scholarships for high school juniors are more easily obtainable that those for seniors. There are much less available for juniors, however the ratio of nominees to awards is also lower. That means there are more scholarships or grants per applicant and thus a better chance of getting one. The scholarship applications juniors fill out also provide superb practice for applying as seniors. Those borrowers with past experience with the process can have a leg up when it comes time to obtain senior scholarship money. As for scholarships and grants for juniors in high school, 2013 will likely be even more competitive, therefore start early!