Scholarship Essay Complete Guide: (How to Start and End your Essay)
How to write a Scholarship essay has been a challenge for many college students since the past years. Most Scholarships require their applicants to attach an essay alongside their scholarship application while applying.
Writing a scholarship essay is an opportunity to make a case study about yourself and also show the scholarship committee why you deserve the award.
This blog post will give you a complete guide on how to write a Scholarship essay easily. You don’t need to be a genius or a some type of guru to know how to write a scholarship essay.
What is a Scholarship Essay?
A scholarship essay is an essay written to give the reader (scholarship committee) an insight of who you are, what you tend to achieve and why you deserve the scholarship.
A scholarship essay is a vital part of a scholarship as it increases the chance of winning the award. A well constructed essay makes your scholarship application stand out.
Why is a Scholarship Essay important?
A scholarship essay is important because it shows the committee why you deserve the scholarship. Your application letter is not enough reason why you need a scholarship. Writing an essay adds more personal information and a well description about yourself.
What should be included in a Scholarship Essay?
In an essay written for the purpose of a scholarship, there are certain sections that need to be included. These sections include;
Introduction
Just like writing a formal or informal letter, an introduction is essential as this is where you state the reasons for writing while introducing yourself. A well written introduction retains the reader’s attention and triggers the reader to continue reading.
Body
A scholarship essay also requires a body section. This is the section where you go into the details of your purpose of writing. Once you can capture the attention of the reader in the introductory section, it is much easier to retain them in your body section.
Conclusion
This is a brief summary of the key points in your essay. In your conclusion, it is advisable you restate how the scholarship will help you reach your goals.
How to write a Winning Scholarship Essay
There are certain approaches you need to take in crafting out a well written scholarship essay. Now that you understand the sections that must be included in your essay (introduction, body, conclusion), the next step is understanding how to utilize these sections.
10 Tips to Implement when Writing a Scholarship Essay
1. Early planning
Most students wait until the last minute before they start writing their scholarship essay. If you do this, you will likely reduce the quality of your essay. Planning early gives you enough time to relax, think and write a good essay. You can create a time management table for at least an hour a day within a week to draft out your scholarship essay. Remember to include all the requirements for the scholarship and deadline in your time management table.
2. Understand the given topic
Every scholarship gives their applicants an essay topic to write on. In most cases, the given essay topic relates to yourself and contribution to the community.
Examples of a scholarship essay topic:
- Tell us about yourself.
- How have you contributed to the community?
- Tell us about a time you failed and what you learned from it.
- What impact has sports had on your life?
- Why do you deserve this scholarship?
- Tell us about a time when you had a belief or idea challenged.
- Why do you want to study/pursue [your chosen course]?
- How will this scholarship help you?
Once you are able to understand the given question, writing an essay on it would be much easier.
3. Brainstorm ideas
You may be wondering, “why brainstorm ideas about myself?” Yes! You need to brainstorm ideas, so you don’t write unworthy points in your essay. Think deep, but make it simple and factual. You don’t want to exaggerate to the readers.
Brainstorming ideas expands your reasoning capacity. When writing your essay, let the readers read something weird but meaningful. Remember, there are hundreds of other applicants seeking for the scholarship award, ensure your essay stands out.
4. Create an Attention-grabbing Introduction
Your introduction must be attention-grabbing because that is the strongest part of your essay. A weak introduction kills the urge to continue reading, and this reduces the chances of getting selected. When you write a weak introduction, the scholarship committee reading your essay can predict how your essay ends, and this reduces their chances to continue reading.
Remember, there are hundreds of essays awaiting to be read, without an attention-grabbing introduction, your essay might not be given enough concentration.
Overall, you’ll want to give your reader a quick preview of what they can expect from your essay. Your introduction is more like a written version of a movie trailer. Give them a reason to keep reading.
5. Keep a Good Comprehension
After you have successfully gotten the attention of the reader, you need to keep a good comprehension in order to maintain the reader’s interest in reading your essay.
Don’t create an introduction that you can’t keep up with in the body of your essay. It is advisable to write an essay that is not just interesting, but easy to comprehend.
6. Use Real life Examples and Show Emotions
This is another important aspect of your scholarship essay. You need to include some of your personal real life experiences and examples. The scholarship committee would really love to know your personality and background. Using real life example is a good way to demonstrate such. Avoid writing fictions just to please or entertain the readers, there are movies they could watch for that.
Also, show emotions in your essay. This is basically creating a connection between the reader. Showing emotion can help the reader see you as a person, rather than a faceless author. Don’t be scared of letting your emotions out. Nobody is perfect, and the scholarship committee are not expecting you to be one. Open to times when you felt scared or nervous. This doesn’t demonstrate your weakness, but your maturity and self-awareness.
7. Keep a Positive Tone
Your perspective and writing tone is one very vital part of your scholarship essay. Nobody wants to read a depressing story. Try to keep a positive tone even when you are writing about a sad experience. Rather than writing on the negative part, channel your energy to how you were able to overcome such situation.
8. Make Research and Read Essays of other people
While writing your scholarship essay, make research of your given topic and read the essays of other people in your category. Don’t just believe you can do it all. There’s no harm in making research and seeking sources for your essay. This will even give you a proper insight and method of approach when writing yours.
9. Avoid Boring Conclusion
Now that you must have started with an attention-grabbing introduction and a good comprehensive structure, you need to leave your reader with an interesting question for them to think about. By doing this, you are giving the scholarship committee an assignment that they don’t need to answer but feel the urge to.
10. Proofread
Ultimately, you need to proofread your scholarship essay. By proofreading, you are going to filter out grammatical errors in your essay writing. It is better you give a teacher, or a close friend to help you out in proofreading. By eradicating the grammatical errors, your essay becomes more comprehensive.
How to Start a Scholarship Essay
Create an intriguing Introduction
Since your introduction is basically the first part of your essay, you have to make it intriguing. The scholarship committee are reading hundreds/thousands of essays from applicants. If you flop in your introduction, you might lose the scholarship. This is why you have to get their attention with the first two sentences.
Make sure your introduction captures the attention of the readers. But how do you do that?
Example of an Introduction for your Scholarship essay:
I have known in my heart since when I was a little boy what I wanted to become in the future. It was not a stereotypical child’s dream such as a doctor or a lawyer; my vision was instead something that has shaped my actions and decisions throughout my life.
This is an example of an attention-grabbing introduction. The first sentence talks about passion. How the writer has been passionate about his/her chosen career since childhood. The second sentence explains why the writer is not like every regular person in the society. This brings about suspense to the reader. The reader is then placed in a position where he/she would be triggered to know about the writer’s life and dreams.
How to End your Scholarship Essay
After you have finished writing down the body of your Scholarship essay, you need a perfect format to end it. This is where you restate reasons why the scholarship would help you.
Firstly, recall your introduction, and build on past points but don’t repeat them. Then you discuss your plans for the future and compliment the reader for their time.
Example of a Conclusion for your Scholarship essay:
This scholarship will assist me in achieving my goals through supporting my educational expenses in (mention university). By supporting my education, these funds will enable me to spread my newfound insight and knowledge to further educate the people around me as I plan to (mention your goal) in my community. I thank you so much for your consideration.
Checklist to Answer when Writing your Scholarship Essay
- Have you grabbed the reader’s attention in your introduction?
- Why do you deserve the scholarship?
- Have you written a significant challenge you encountered?
- Did you explain how you overcame that challenge?
- Have you stated your educational and career goals?
- Why did you choose the field of study and institution?
- Have you answered how the scholarship will help you achieve your educational goals?
- What are your future plans after completing the program?
- How will the scholarship help you achieve your future goals?
- Have you summarized your key points in the conclusion section?
- Did you include a compliment?
Conclusion
Writing a Scholarship essay is not a difficult task when you have the proper knowledge to implement. However, practice makes perfect. So as a scholar seeking for Scholarship opportunities, you need to practice how to write a comprehensive Scholarship essay. Take some listed topics in this blog post for guide and practice.
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