More Than a Test Score

As a pioneer and leader of the egalitarian movement within the higher education community, Yale University has long been recruiting, advising, and supporting students who identify with underrepresented backgrounds. And as universities nationwide follow suit, gone are the days when only the rich and privileged could attain a college degree—in fact, those days never really existed for Yale.

Yale understands that the “if you build it, they will come” attitude does not apply to the idea of equal opportunity— universities today must actively recruit individuals from underrepresented groups and directly connect those students to the education they deserve. In this spirit, Yale hires a new team of Student Recruitment Coordinators every year from various backgrounds to assist with the recruitment of African American, Asian American, Hispanic/Latino, Native American, and low-income students. The Recruitment Coordinators work in conjunction with Yale’s broader recruitment team to attract the best, brightest, and most hardworking students from all types of backgrounds and life experiences.

And it doesn’t end there—students often need financial support to pay for an education, and the university responds generously to those families who need this kind of help. All financial aid at Yale consists of need-based scholarships and each student receives 100% of his or her demonstrated need in financial aid.

In addition to financial aid, Yale also provides fellowship opportunities for undergraduate minority students on campus. Both the Edward A. Bouchet Undergraduate Fellowship Program and the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Program recognize minority students who have demonstrated a commitment to eradicate racial disparities and motivate them to pursue careers in research and academia. These fellowships, competitive and prestigious, allow talented students to work on paid research projects during the academic year, and to pursue full-time research during the summers.

The following are some more ways in which Yale actively creates an inclusive and supportive community for its underrepresented students:

• Clubs and Organizations: Yale offers more than 60 cultural associations on campus such as African Students Association, Asian American Students Alliance, Association of Native Americans at Yale, Brazil Club, Japanese American Students Union, Latin American Student Organization, Pre-Law Minority Outreach, Yale Friends of Israel, and many more.

• Cultural Centers: These centers house student organizations and provide space for meetings, plays, art exhibits, and parties. Founded in 1969, the Afro-American Cultural Center provided a model for the more recently established Asian American Cultural Center, the Cultural Center for Chicano, Puerto Rican, and other Latino students, and the Native American Cultural Center. These cultural centers foster a sense of cultural identity and educate people in the larger community. They also act as optional social centers and community bases for students of a variety of ethnic and cultural backgrounds, supplementing the social environment of the larger, pluralistic Yale College community.

• Peer Liaison Program: Yale peer liaisons are upperclassmen who help connect freshmen to the wealth of support and programming based in the residential colleges. These student leaders also help first-year students to adjust to life at Yale and empower them to become engaged, responsible, and proactive citizens on campus.

• Special academic programs: Yale offers a wide range of academic majors geared toward topics of ethnicity and multicultural affairs including: African American Studies; East Asian Studies; Ethnicity, Race, & Migration; Latin American Studies; Modern Middle East Studies; and more.

• Intercultural Affairs Council (IAC): The IAC challenges bias on the basis of race and ethnicity, gender, religion, sexual orientation, disability, social class, or other distinction. The council collaboratively offers educational and social programming to enhance the overall academic and developmental achievement of all students, while providing avenues for personal growth and increased advocacy, involvement, and support for the Yale community.

Each of these initiatives helps create a campus environment built on open-communication, cultural awareness, and increased advocacy for underrepresented groups. And this benefits everyone at Yale, not just those who identify with the underrepresented crowd. At Yale, a strong sense of community—one that is indiscriminate and provides equal opportunity to all— is at the heart of the university’s progress. And by cultivating this type of community on its campus in Connecticut, Yale seeks to incite a greater global movement, one that results in a more tolerant and just world.

Congratulations to our latest Double Your Money winner, Alyssa King! Alyssa won the Charles Shafae’ Scholarship for $500, and because she found and applied for it on Zinch, we’re matching that five hundred bucks dollar for dollar.

Having a strategy behind applying for scholarships can often be very helpful—here’s what Alyssa did to score hers.

What is your strategy behind applying for scholarships?
I feel that it is important to continuously search various scholarship websites and make a list of those I’m eligible for. I prioritize those that will require the most work (essays, multiple letters of recommendation, etc.) and those with near-approaching deadlines so that I can make sure to request from my University the materials I will need while providing myself with adequate time for retrieval. The others are put on my “like” list and are applied for at my leisure when I have some free time on my computer. The more “narrowed” the requirements are, the smaller the applicant field is, the better chances you have of securing yourself a scholarship!

What career path do you see yourself taking after school?
After graduating from Nursing School, I would like to work at All Children’s Hospital for a couple of years before applying for USF’s CRNA Master’s Degree Program.

What thing in your life could you say that you are you slightly obsessed with and why?
To be honest, my current obsession is applying for scholarships! I personally believe that the chances of winning a scholarship are significantly better than playing the lottery! I write at least 2-3 essays per week for various scholarship applications in the hopes that I can pay for my own college expenses without requiring student loans!

How are you more than a test score?
I believe that test scores only represent a small percentage of my accomplishments. Although I have gained much of my dedication and work ethic through my academic career, no number can reflect my true worth. While a numerical score can represent a final product, I embody the passion and perseverance “behind-the-scenes” that is involved in the process of achieving these scores. I have always prided myself in my academic accomplishments, but I also excel in other areas such as dance, community service, and tutoring which cannot be represented by a numerical figure. I am the one who is going to make a difference in this world, not my test scores. Many students can have the same GPA, but there is no one out there just like me.

If you have a friend that is super student like Alyssa then invite them to Zinch, cause any scholarship they win earns you the same amount! Check out our scholarship search for more info on how you can rack up those tuition funds.

This article was originally published on The Chegg Blog; read the original feature.

More than once I’ve heard undergrad referred to as the best four years of one’s life. That liberating feeling a student has leaving his parents’ nest is rivaled by very few events. For the first time, you have the freedom to structure your daily activities in a way that revolves around you.

While all of this newly established independence sends waves of excitement down to your fingertips, there are some not-so-great aspects of college students deal with on a daily basis. Here are a few shared gripes I can recall from my years as an undergrad.

Grade Curves
My qualm with curving final grades to meet a predetermined average GPA is this: students who perform better than average run the risk of having their grades lowered to accommodate the curve. One academic school at a university strived to maintain a 3.0 average amongst its students. This meant if the average GPA was 2.8, some students would have their grades raised until the average was a 3.0. Sounds great, right? The flipside, however, was awful.

If the average GPA was 3.2, some students on the +/- cusp saw their grades lowered to meet the 3.0. Instead of adjusting the curve (or not doing it for that semester), students were penalized. Now you can see why this was gripe numero uno.

Fire Alarms at 4am
There comes a time in every undergrads life when they must trek outside at ungodly hours of the morning in the midst of winter all because some freshman had the hilariously authentic idea to pull a fire alarm. Not only is it illegal, but it can get you a world of embarrassment. I’ve personally witnessed an alarm-puller chased and tackled by a well-placed RA. Oh sweet, sweet justice.

Non-existent Lunch Breaks
It’s sad when Andy Sachs’ 15-minute lunch break is considered a luxury but that’s what many students are faced with. Nearly 80% of undergraduates work while enrolled in school, with the average spending about 30 hours per week at part-time or full-time employment. In order to sustain a stable work schedule classes are often blocked together over only a couple of days during the week.

Only being able to leave 10 – 15 minutes between four classes a day leaves very no time to recharge midday, often resulting in key meals being skipped. If your professors enforce strict no-eating in class policies like mine did, you have no choice but to limit yourself to 1 – 2 meals per day, with the possibility of a snack as you’re rushing to your next class. Our eating habits are often the product of our environment, not that we’re simply unhealthy.

Rude Launderers
Look, laundry is a time-consuming chore that we all dread doing but want done immediately. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could all mutually agree that it’s awful and bond over the hate for it? That’s never the case… Instead you have people who comfortably hide behind the veil of anonymity, prematurely removing clothes from the washers, stopping drying cycles, or placing others’ clean clothes on the floor. Just watch it or you may have to thaw your clothes out like this unfortunate person.

Still Being Viewed as a “Kid”
I’m not sure when the transition from child to adult is complete, but many of us take on “adult responsibilities,” make “grown-up decisions,” and have formulated “mature opinions” on life topics. Now, in my mind, that would label the bulk of college students as adults. But, for some reason adults were slow to catch onto this.

I noticed this frequently happened with professors who often opened the floor up for debate. Each time their opinion was challenged they consistently fell back on the years of exposure they’ve had to the topic. While that’s great, the amount of idea exchange that occurs in the 21st century is significantly greater than it was 10, 20, or 50 years ago, making the numbers game more irrelevant. Let’s hope the “adults” catch wind of that pronto.

What’s your number one gripe about college life? Be sure to tell us in the comments.

Congratulations to our latest Double Your Money Winner Chris Pence! Chris successfully applied for and won the Senatorial Scholarship for $500 and because he found and applied for this scholarship on Zinch, we are staying true to our word and matching it. We asked Chris a few questions to learn more about him and his approach to finding and applying for scholarships—here’s what he had to share.

What is your strategy behind applying for scholarships?

I really have no set strategy for applying to scholarships. I just subscribe to several scholarship sites, such as Zinch, and do all of the scholarships that I can on the site. If I run out, I’ll keep an eye on the site, checking it every so often, looking for new scholarships. My attitude toward scholarships is that the one that I don’t do was the one that I would have gotten, so I do all that I can, throwing it all at the wall and seeing what sticks.

What career path do you see yourself taking after school?

I plan to enter the teaching field, first being a student teacher or classroom helper, then moving to having a classroom of my own. I hope to teach high school history, opening the students’ eyes to just how exciting history can be, by immersing them in history and helping them to experience it, rather than just read it out of a book.

What would you consider to be your greatest accomplishment?

My greatest accomplishment at this point is reaching Salisbury University. It has been a lifelong dream of mine to make it to a university, and it has been an uphill climb the entire way, but it was worth it. I love Salisbury U, for both its location and academics, and I hope that my years here will be some of the most productive and enjoyable that I’ve ever had in academia.

How are you more than a test score?

I’m more than a test score because I’m not a number. Tests are given as formal proof to the teacher that he has done his job, and that the student understands the material that the teacher needs him to. These tests, while important, only test what the student needs to know for class, not allowing him to showcase how much he has learned elsewhere. I never had to take a test on finding a way to get into a great university, how to find and complete scholarships, or how to balance out a day of academia, leisure, and regular life while attending a university. These things I had to learn for myself, and I feel that I’ve learned them quite well. If I was just relying on what I’ve learned from tests, I’d never have been able to leave my mother’s house to get on with my own life. Life is it’s own test, and there is no specific scoring system; the student has to score himself, and if I do say so myself, I get and A plus!

Did you know that Zinch offers nearly $2 billion in financial aid right on our site? If you’d like to win a piece of that, be sure to check out our scholarship search. There’s a wide variety of scholarships available, so get to it!

Congratulations to Brittany Nettles, our latest Weekly “Three Sentence Essay” Scholarship winner!

It’s easy to root for the hero of the story. Whether they’re a fearless adventurer, empowered maiden, or hopeful underdog, we always want the protagonist to overcome the odds.

But we were curious—what character do you identify with that wasn’t the hero of the story? Brittany’s essay was chosen for selecting an often misunderstood figure in a context most students can definitely relate with.

Here’s her winning essay:
I identify with Blanche Dubois in A Streetcar Named Desire. She is a tragic heroine who is out of place temporally. I too feel as though I belong in another time period: the future. I want to be freed from high school; I want to begin pursuing my career; I want to see the world.

Here’s a bit more about our winner:
I am an extremely positive thinker! I am a very goal-oriented person. I have high hopes and dreams; I intend to achieve every single one of them. I have a drive for going after things. I never give up.

Here’s a few of our favorite runners up:

Moussa A. – I identify with Watson from the Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. I relate to him because just like he, I love the background world. It thrills me to solve problems (mysteries) even if I don’t get the credit. The operations, fact finding, and backside work is my passion.

Sandy L. – I identify with Cheswick from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest because I rely on the support of my friends. Cheswick barks but does not bite because he is powerless without McMurphy’s leadership. Humans are weak on their own, but with the help of others they can do so much.

Joshua W. – I find that I can identify with Carlton from the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. Although he’s constantly faced with negativity because of his style or personality, he always remains quirky and confident. I have faced many of these challenges, and like Carlton, I always overcome them.

Miss your shot at this prompt? Don’t trip, we got you covered! We post a new prompt for our Weekly “Three Sentence Essay” Scholarship every Monday, so you have a year’s worth of chances to win that $1,000—apply today!