Give It To Me Baby; Scholarship Talk

Really sorry but this post might be kind of random and unorganized but you'll be fine. Trust me :P

1. Don't be a chicken. Apply for those damned scholarships!
Most students think that if they don't have straight A1's they won't have a chance of getting a scholarship. This is B***S***.

Obviously there's basic requirements and from my experience, the very minimum is 5 A's. And those A's can be either A1 or A2.

2. Do research! You want other people to pay for your education, for your living arrangements and for your books and everything else but you can't spend 10 minutes in front of a computer to do some research?! Then you don't deserve to get it. Lazy a**.

3. Go wide! By this I mean your potential money-givers. Don't just look to JPA, MARA, PETRONAS, BANK NEGARA for their scholarships. There's hundreds and I really do mean hundreds of private and government companies and organizations who have money and all they want to do with that money is pay for the education of the future generation of leaders/ engineers/ doctors/ artists(painters, writers etc not singers!)/ whatever other job you can think of that will help the human race.

If you already have a future job in mind, then go to companies that have relations with that job and find out if the company has a grant/fund to finance students. Some may come with a binding contract. People complain about binding-scholarships but you should think of it as job-security. When you finish studying, there's already a job waiting for you. With the world economy looking not so good and with thousands of people losing jobs every day, a binding-scholarship is great!

If you already have a certain school/college/ university that you want then find out if the school/college/university has scholarships to give to prospective students. Most are partial-scholarships, this means they don't pay for everything but they might cut 10% - 90% of the amount of money that you would need to pay, saving you thousands! Full-scholarships are fewer in numbers but that's not to say that it doesn't exist. Again, I say, RESEARCH! ASK!

Side note: I am currently a scholarship-recieving student who is overseas bound. I didn't get straight A1's. Most of my batchmates are the same. They have B's on their result slips too. But here we all are, happy, healthy and having a great time, without straight A1's.

Being moderately active in school helps a lot. Join a club and organize something and make sure there's proof that you put work into those projects.

APPLY FOR ALL/ ANY/ EVERY scholarship!

If you get an interview, come prepared. You'll look stupid and disrespectful if you have no idea about the course you want to take/ the history of the company or organization and etc.

For example, during my JPA interview there was a Malay girl who was in the same interview group as me. She got 10 A1's. Her ko-ko records were great. But there was a huge problem; she didn't know anything about the course she applied for and when the interviewer asked her what country would she like to study in she said "emm..America..", the interviewer said "that's not in the list of countries we offer for your course,didn't you know?". Embarrassing!! And I think you can guess that she didn't get the scholarship. She had no idea what country she wanted to go to, what she would be studying if she took the course she applied for and her not knowing all of this just made her look lazy and self-centered. Don't be her! Find out as much as you can about everything.
She also couldn't speak English. Her English was horrendous! How could she get 10 A1's? The fact that she could score so amazingly if a test was written but couldn't speak a single line of English properly doesn't do her any good.

That's the other thing, English! Brush up on your speaking skills because most interviews are conducted in English. Nobody gives a damn about you if you get straight A1's but can't join in the discussion/ talk/ interview because your English is crap.

Your potential sponsors don't just want you to study books. They want to send you overseas so that you can experience a different culture/ way of life and etc. How are you going to do all that if you can't speak to anyone?
If they wanted you to just study, they would be better off sending you to local universities, it'd save them millions.

This is all that I can think of now.

Good Luck, ya'll.



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