FAP679: How to write a 500 word scholarship essay, holiday guide
November 30, 2007
FAP679: How to write a 500 word scholarship essay, holiday guide
Listen now:
Scholarship Search
+ How to write an effective 500 word scholarship essay
+ Here’s 529 words in a blog post I wrote recently
+ How fast do you speak? Most people speak about 100 - 150 words per minute
+ Tell a story
+ Structurally, what’s a good 3 - 5 minute story you tell?
+ Establish a context in the beginning - not necessarily an intro, but a context
+ Think about how a movie trailer starts - Dom LaFontaine’s classic “In a world…”
+ End with the scholarship topic phrased or paraphrased
+ “That’s why the housing bubble bursting is the most pressing societal issue today”
+ In the middle, offer details and examples
+ Recent economic blog topic post read aloud
+ The most important thing you can do is to think conversationally to start
Scholarship Update
+ The Society of Photographic Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE)is an international society advancing an interdisciplinary approach to the science and application of light. SPIE has distributed nearly $3 million in awards through its scholarship and grant program. These awards are for both high school and college students.
+ To be eligible to apply, students must be a member of SPIE
+ Be enrolled full-time in an optics, photonics, imaging, or optoelectronics program or related discipline at an accredited school for the full year beginning Fall 2008
+ Be in high school or secondary school, undergraduate or post-secondary school, or graduate school
+ Deadline January 11
+ $320,000 up for grabs
+ About $2,500 per award
+ Details at our free college scholarship search site
Free Stuff Friday
+ Google Maps on your phone has wannabe GPS
+ Give the gift of free software this holiday season
+ The Financial Aid Podcast Holiday Guide of things you can give for free - please regift!
Promo
+ Private student loan consolidation from StudentLoanConsolidator.com
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Reminders
+ Financial Aid Podcast Show Notes at FinancialAidPodcast.com.
+ Discuss this episode at the Financial Aid Forum!
+ FAFSA form tutorials and free help at FAFSAonline.com
+ Stafford federal student loans at StaffordLoan.com
+ Student loan consolidation at StudentLoanConsolidator.com
+ Private student loans available at any time - visit AlternativeStudentLoan.com
+ The Financial Aid Podcast is a publication of the Student Loan Network.
I want to hear from you! Email me at financialaidpodcast {at} gmail {dot} com, visit http://www.FinancialAidPodcast.com, or call 206-350-1208.
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The Financial Aid Podcast Holiday Free Gift Giving Guide
November 30, 2007
Over the Thanksgiving holiday, I put together a little 10 page guide - slideshow, actually - of 5 gifts you can give to others that won’t cost you a dime, and 5 gifts you can give to yourself that are also free but invaluable.
Please enjoy and share with my blessings for a safe, happy, and healthy holiday season!
Download the PDF (10.5 MB, requires Adobe Acrobat Reader)
Facebook Beacon Can’t Be A Part of the Student Loan Network
November 30, 2007
I just had a thought.
The Student Loan Network, and for that matter any student loan company, can’t use Facebook’s Beacon advertising service for its core loan products.
From the Beacon description page:
Simply determine which user actions you would like publish to Facebook and add a few lines of code to your web page. Facebook Beacon actions include purchasing a product, signing up for a service, adding an item to a wish list, and more. When a user performs the action, they will be alerted that your website is sending a story to their profile and have a chance to opt out. No additional user action is needed for the story to be published on Facebook, and users remain in control of their information.
Here’s the issue with Beacon and student loan products: under regulations such as FERPA and the Gramm Leach Bliley Act, attaching Facebook’s Beacon service to a student loan service like our Stafford Federal Student Loan could publicly disclose that someone borrowed or had the intent to borrow a student loan. Disclosing nonpublic financial information is a major no-no, and since the Student Loan Network is committed to your privacy, Beacon can’t live on our transactional sites - or any other financial institution’s site in which a nonpublic financial transaction could take place. Just imagine in your Facebook News Feed:
“Bob just borrowed $20 from a Bank of America ATM at Solomon Pond Mall! Bob paid $2.50 in service fees and has a remaining balance of $251.”
I’ve applied for Beacon for the Financial Aid Podcast to see what it does, and if I’m approved and get into the program, I will publicly disclose exactly what actions you need to take on the Financial Aid Podcast web site to trigger Beacon’s activation. I’m thinking I’d like to attach it to the Add to iTunes button, since listening to the podcast is NOT indicative that you need financial aid or have an intent to borrow, since lots of my social media friends listen to the show who don’t need financial aid of any kind.
What are your thoughts on this?
A Financial Aid Podcast Facebook Fan Page Experiment
November 30, 2007
Facebook now allows organizations and companies to create “Fan Pages” for products, services, and other entities that aren’t actual people. I’ve set up a Fan Page for the Financial Aid Podcast (click here) and if you’re on Facebook, please become a fan of the show.
What I’m trying to assess is how Fan Pages are different than groups, and which is the better avenue for the podcast and the Student Loan Network to potentially use for community development. I’ll post my results after I have something of significance to show for the effort, but I need your help. Please click here and become a Facebook Fan.
And no, we won’t spoil anyone’s Christmas with Beacon, though I’m tempted to install it on the Podcast site just to see what it does.
Student loan consolidation: a balanced perspective
November 29, 2007
I was speaking in the office break room with our director of student loan consolidation, Jon Rudy, about how we’re marketing our federal and private student loan consolidation products. We’re in agreement, as we frequently are, that student loan consolidation has a vital role in the education finance process.
Where I think a lot of student loan companies get hung up is on the idea of saving money for students. Student loan consolidation does not save you money over the long term if you only make the minimum payment, because at the bare minimum payment, you’ll be paying off your loan longer.
Think of it this way. If you rent an apartment, over a period of time, you’ll pay a certain amount for rent. If you rent that apartment longer, it costs you more money. If you rent a smaller apartment for longer, it will still probably cost you more money than a larger apartment for less time.
A loan is nothing more than a money rental. You’re renting money from a lender, and the interest you pay is the rent.
What student loan consolidation does is agree to reduce your rent, trading off with renting the money for a longer period of time, if you make the minimum payment.
Our perspective as a company is that students just out of school need to take a few years to get on their feet in their careers and personal finances. During that time period, a reduced monthly payment is just the thing they need. After a few years, when presumably they’re making good use of their education and degree, we strongly recommend that students step up and make more than the minimum payment, ideally making a payment that’s a little larger than the original, unconsolidated loan payment.
Because there are no early repayment penalties, they can effectively get on their feet financially and then be done with the loan in the same amount of time as if they hadn’t consolidated.
Does student loan consolidation save you money? Not necessarily. Does it reduce your monthly payment? Yes, absolutely. But more than anything else, student loan consolidation helps to buy you some time in the first years after school.
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