Pursue Your Path- Fall Edition 2024

There are many post-high school educational options that students may choose to pursue, and the process of paying for those options can be complex. This newsletter is designed to help families of current 12th grade students learn about the resources available to help students pay for the various post-high school educational options, including financial aid and scholarships.

Please note: in this newsletter we will provide links to various web-based resources. We are providing these links for the convenience of families, however Mountainside High School and the Beaverton School District do not review, screen, or otherwise manage the information on these websites. Families should make their own choice about using the resources provided below.

“Financial Aid” is the term used to describe money that is awarded to students to help pay for post-high school educational options. Financial Aid can include “gift aid” and “self-help aid”:

• This is money that does not have to be paid back.
• The money for gift aid is usually given to students as scholarships or grants.
• The money for gift aid can come from various sources, including the Federal or State government, colleges, scholarship foundations and organizations.

• This is money that a student needs to earn, or that the student/family will need to pay back later.
• The money for self-help aid is usually given to students as loans or work study.
• The money for self-help aid is generally awarded by the Federal government.

The financial aid application process usually begins by completing either the FAFSA or ORSAA form during 12th grade. These forms help determine if students will receive grants or loans from the Federal government or grants from the State government; also, they are often used by colleges to determine if students will receive certain scholarships.

FAFSA stands for: Free Application for Federal Student Aid

ORSAA stands for: Oregon Student Aid Application

Consider watching the videos below to learn more about each of these forms.

Students will only need to complete one (1) of these forms, whichever one is right for them, and it is recommended that the form be completed as soon as possible after October 1st in 12th grade. However, for the Class of 2025, the FAFSA and ORSAA forms are being updated and therefore are delayed; our understanding is that these forms will be available on or around December 1, 2024.

Both of these forms request information about a family’s financial situation and allow continuing education programs (2-year and 4-year colleges, universities, and career/technical schools) to offer financial aid to students who are applying to their programs.

To learn more about these forms and which one might be right for you, consider visiting the websites for Federal Student Aid and Oregon’s Office of Student Access and Completion (OSAC) linked below.

For students who will complete the FAFSA form, one step that they can complete right now, while waiting for the new FAFSA form to be available, is to create their Student Aid account. The Federal Government has created some helpful videos about this process, including a specific video about how to create your username and password for the FAFSA form. Consider watching the video below to learn more.

Most students apply for and receive financial aid (including scholarships) from the continuing education program, college, or university to which they apply. In fact, the largest amount of scholarship money that students receive is usually granted directly from the continuing education program they attend.

Colleges and universities typically provide information about the scholarships available at their school in one of the following locations on their website:

• The Admissions page
• The Financial Aid page
• The Scholarship page

It is important to know that some continuing education programs will automatically consider students for all of the scholarships they have available; others will not. Reviewing the admissions and financial aid pages of the programs you are applying to will help make sure that you are aware of all of the opportunities available to you.

Some colleges also have specific financial aid programs that are designed to support students experiencing significant financial need. These programs may have G.P.A. requirements, and often include both a financial scholarship, as well as academic support and mentoring opportunities.

Colleges will typically provide information about these programs on their Financial Aid or Scholarship webpages. To learn more, consider reviewing information about the opportunities available at Oregon State University (OSU), Portland State University (PSU) and University of Oregon (UO) which are linked below.

There are several grants available in the State of Oregon including the Oregon Promise Grant, Oregon Opportunity Grant, Oregon Tribal Student Grant, and the Chafee Education and Training Grant.

To learn more about these grants and other grants available to students in the State of Oregon, see the videos below and consider visiting the information pages on the website for Oregon’s Office of Student Access and Completion (OSAC) linked below the videos.

Please note: the Oregon Legislature made some changes to the Oregon Promise Grant in March 2022, (after the video above was made). The required G.P.A. for this grant was reduced from 2.5 to 2.0.

Applying for foundation and community scholarships can be one of the most complex parts of Financial Aid. These scholarship opportunities may have multiple application steps and can have large numbers of students applying for just a few scholarships.

One resource available to Oregon high school students is the OSAC Scholarship Application available from the Oregon Higher Education Coordinating Commission. OSAC has a database of over 600 scholarships and students can apply for up to 40 scholarships through the OSAC Scholarship Application. To learn more about the OSAC Scholarship Application, consider visiting the OSAC scholarship website linked below.

Another resource is the "Oregon Goes to College" website which is created by Oregon's Gear Up program. On their website, there is a collated list of scholarships that are available through national, state, community and local organizations.

There is no common application for these scholarships and the qualifications and application processes for these scholarships can vary widely. Students and families are encouraged to carefully research the scholarship opportunities available through the foundations/organizations on this list.

Some key tips for evaluating scholarship opportunities are:

• Make sure the organization's website is secure before providing any personal information to the scholarship organization.
• Make sure that you are comfortable providing your information to the foundation or organization that is awarding the money.
• You should never have to pay to apply for a scholarship.
• Use an email address other than your school email address.
• Be aware that there is the potential for spam email from scholarship organizations.
• Confirm what the application requirements and eligibility criteria are to see if it is a good match for you and your goals.

Consider reviewing the Oregon Goes to College website (linked below) to learn more about these potential scholarship opportunities.

Another scholarship opportunity that students may want to consider is the Western Undergraduate Exchange (WUE) scholarship. This scholarship is designed to reduce the cost of attending out-of-state colleges and universities.

WUE scholarships are available at over 160 colleges and universities (including some 2-year colleges) in 16 Western States (including Oregon). The eligibility requirements for the WUE scholarship will be different at each college, and often there is a G.P.A. requirement for earning the scholarship. To learn more, consider visiting the WUE webpages linked below.

Thank you for reading our newsletter! The Winter Edition of this newsletter will be available in early January and will highlight additional specific scholarship resources.

College and Career Readiness Counselor, Mountainside High School

Secondary Lead Counselor, Beaverton School District