Free Scholarship Searches - Why Not???

You have to be very careful when conducting scholarship searches.  This can be one of your most rewarding activities during your financial aid process, but you can also quickly be taken by scams. Scholarship search services are common these days. Unfortunately, too many of these for-profit companies charge high rates to provide information that can be found elsewhere for free.

Charging a lot for a service isn’t illegal – what makes some of these companies fraudsters is that they collect money to find scholarships for students but never provide the information, or they misrepresent themselves as a government agency in order to appear legitimate and attract customers, or they guarantee they’ll get the student full funding for college (and then don’t). Still, although it’s obviously legal to charge for services genuinely rendered, you should keep reading if you want to save yourself some money…

Don’t be too alarmed if an online scholarship search asks you for some information up front like your contact information, education background, etc. However, if you’re searching the Internet for scholarships and visit a site that asks for your credit card or another form of payment before it’ll help you find funding, you might want to keep searching. They also should not be asking for your social security number – that might indicate a fraud or scam. Similarly, if you or your parents are contacted by an unfamiliar organization that invites you to an “interview” or “seminar” about preparing and paying for college, do your homework. Ask your high school counselor or a college financial aid administrator whether they’ve heard of the organization and know it’s legitimate. In many cases, such invitations are a way to get you and your parents to come listen to a sales pitch: the company wants you to pay for advice on scholarships and other funding.

Don’t believe anyone who tells you the information they offer can’t be found anywhere else. You can get free advice from a variety of sources. The best places to start are your high school counselor or a college financial aid administrator.

Here is a list of scholarship searches we currently recommend:

Free Scholarship Search - In business since 2001 with good reputation for helping students.

Free Scholarship Search - Current database of $3 billion in scholarships

If you have other scholarship searches to suggest, please let us know.