Tech Scholarships for College/University? 577
Mirkon asks: "I'm a potential high school graduate, and have been accepted to a four-year school for furthering my rather biased educational interests. The problem is that while I'm cheap, the school (predictably) isn't. It's still getting itself off the ground, and thus only offers the legal minimum of scholarships - for racial minorities and those with intense financial need, neither of which I qualify for. Tedious searching for third-party scholarships has revealed that there are very, very few that cater to the interests of a technologically-inclined student, and even fewer that don't give a paltry one-time prize of $500 or less. While there's certainly no shortage of 'write an essay about us/you and we might give you a scholarship' offerings, I find it hard to swallow that there aren't more and more valuable scholarships to encourage growth in the tech sector. Are there?"
Coop with tech companies (Score:5, Interesting)
OT but can someone fill me in... (Score:3, Interesting)
Growth in the tech sector (Score:5, Interesting)
I started studying Computer Systems Engineering. After seeing what my code-monkey friends have been going through for the last two or three years, I decided not to go with that. I'm going to go back and finish college in something else. I'm not sure what, just yet, but I'll use my computer knowledge as an asset to help further myself in another career, not as a career in itself. You're either going to do computer service for a living, which can make money, but not a lot and is mindnumbingly boring, or you're going to be feast-or-famine as long as technology remains the commodity that it has shown to be. Learn how to do something else, that knowing computers benefits you in, and keep your skills to help you.
Re:OT but can someone fill me in... (Score:2, Interesting)
Although it may not be as bad as "consumer debt", student loans will deffinitly hurt you afterwards, especially if you've borrowed a lot. You really want as much free money as possible.
Like I said in another post, apply for all those paltry little scholarships; no one ever does, and you can "MAKE $$$ FAST" as the default winner. Someone also suggested using local resources, such as clubs & professional organisations your parents may belong to: church groups, VFWs, Elks Lodges, unions, all those entities often provide money to help put the squirts (read: you) through school.
Re:Coop with tech companies (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, it took me twice as long only taking two night classes a semster. However, during this time I had other things happening (marriage, a house, etc...) I highly motivated individual that really wanted to sacrifice their social life could take 3+ classes and then take summer classes as well... and shorten things up...
So, at the end of it, I ended up with 8 years of work experience and no student loans.
I know that this won't work for everybody. Obviously, your not just going to walk into a ASIC job or something where you need some up front education...
Re:OT but can someone fill me in... (Score:4, Interesting)
I'll say. I had lots of tech knowledge from misc hacking while in high-school but didn't have anything I could put on a resume' so I joined the USAF for three years (minimum to get GI benefits) and wrote/phrased my resume' in such a way that, without actually lying, anyone reading it would assume that my knowledge had been gained in the service.
It worked out great! I'm taking night-classes for my MBA right now...
Re:OT but can someone fill me in... (Score:3, Interesting)
Stop sponging off the tax payer (which is what Blair is moving towards) and pay for it yourself. Here in Canada so many people have degrees (much higher rate than the UK) that even with a Masters (especially arts) you could end up working in a restaurant. This doesn't stop people signing up for more student loans - you'll pay it off eventually no matter how poor your background was. To be honest, I didn't even notice my student from the UK. The monthly payments were miniscule compared with things like rent, beer, car, etc. Two nights out on the piss cost me more than my student loan payments did, and I get pissed a lot.
I was so pleased to graduate and get away from all those whiny pretensious NUS types. Especially all the arts students who had 4 lectures a week and then spent the rest of the time socialising in the student bar.
Re:Growth in the tech sector (Score:2, Interesting)
Offshoring is NOT just affecting IT, it's also:
- CPAs
- Lawyers
- Radiologists
I would think there would be a lot of potential in Nanotechnology, but why wouldn't that be shipped off as well?
Re:Play the Race Card...No, Really! (Score:1, Interesting)
http://www.genetree.com/product/native-american-t
It worked for this Irish-American kid I know who got into Stanford once his hardship was discovered.
More info needed ... (Score:2, Interesting)
When I was first applying, among other schools, I applied to UCI, UCLA, and UC Berkeley. They all gave varying degrees of financial aid and scholarship opportunities. In fact, the degrees of aid varied so much that it taught me some schools want you more than others. Are you dead set on going to the school you want to attend? If so, why? Will a degree from the school you've chosen make a truly night-and-day difference in career opportunities for you?
I mean, if you want to attend MIT or Harvard, then you may, in fact, initially have more opportunities as a result of graduating from those schools. But my own experience has taught me that the cream rises to the top, regardless of the school you attend. Yes, as an MIT grad you might be given extra consideration for certain jobs in the future. But your co-workers will very quickly find out who you are, no matter where you've gotten your degree. I've worked with some brilliant people that came from some very modest schools, that have done extremely well for themselves. I've worked with some smart people, too, that have come from some amazing schools, that have done just so-so. A school's name might get you consideration, but it never guarantees success.
My advice? Just get your freakin' degree, and don't be so picky about where you go. If another school offers you better opportunities, go there. Remember, both Roy Fielding, the architect of HTTP and founder of the Apache HTTP Server Project, and Paul Mockapetris, author of the first implementation of Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) and creator of the Domain Name System (DNS), graduated from UCI (Go Anteaters!). It's how good you are that matters. The rest will come to you after you demonstrate that you can do stuff.
As far as specific scholarships go, well, hit up companies, bud. Sun, IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, Novell, all those dudes, they're the ones with the need, the bucks, and the motivation, and I'll bet they all have some kind of academic assistance programs, including internships and scholarship opportunities. But they'll be merit-based, you can count on that, and the competition will be stiff, so start competing on TopCoder [topcoder.com], join the ACM [acm.org], and start competing with them [delos.com], too, because you're going to need some serious chops.
Good Luck!
Re:No one gets scholarships for scholarship anymor (Score:3, Interesting)
My experience (from 15 years ago) (Score:3, Interesting)
In the end of it, I suppose it wasn't a too bad a deal, because I ran out of money about the time I was losing interested in the field that I was looking at (pharmacy, thanks for asking). So, I worked my share of crap jobs (fast food) and had my really hard times ($10 for a week, for my girlfriend and me for food, thank you friends and getting a job at fast food place and bringing home waste food). let me tell you, I won't forget that time ever
In the end, I moved in with the girlfriend's folks, got given a solid car (well, cheap payments) drove pizza and saved a lot of money. By this time I was old enough to be legally independant of my parents (freakin' 25!!!!! come on! I hadn't gotten a red cent from them in 4 years!) and was able to get the _good student loans, and had found my nitch (comp sci, emphasis in networking and security), I worked my ass off to get through in minimum time (summer work, and summer school).
In short, I made it, but I swore that I was going to make scholarships that were not based on income (with some limit, of course), were not based on race, were not based on sex, and were not based on sports.
Can you tell I'm _still_ mad?
Best not to depend on the school's financial aid. (Score:3, Interesting)
As people have already mentioned, the following "financial aids" exist:
1. Student Loans
2. "University-provided aid" scholarships, usually need-based
3. Outside scholarships that you have to find yourself
There are two things I haven't seen anybody warn about here yet, so I'll throw in my two cents.
First of all, the colleges I looked at (15 years ago) all claimed that the aid they might give me would be decreased by the same amount as any outside scholarships I might find. Hense, if I came up with a $10K scholarship, the school would decrease their aid package by $10K. I think that was stupid and discouraged anybody to find outside help.
I hope this has changed recently. Of course, if your desired school is NOT offering you any aid, at least you don't stand to get screwed by this behavior.
Second, schools are NOTORIOUS for giving you a "reasonable" financial aid package for your Freshman year and then cutting it to almost nothing your Sophmore year. This bait-and-switch tactic is great for hooking some students and then BLEEDING them and their families dry. Many of my high school friends had to leave their college of choice after the first year because of this. Talk about a dehumanizing experience!
But again, if your school is not offering you any aid up front, the independence you are forced to seek in the beginning (by applying to lots of smaller scholarships/grants) will be a blessing in disguise as you find yourself NOT blindsided by the nasty Sophmore-aid-cut-syndrome.
I agree with the other people who posted saying that there are lots of scholarships out there. You just have to learn how to research and find them. Enlist your high school guidence counselor's help and don't take "no" for an answer. Also don't assume that if you can't find it on a Google search that it doesn't exist. Find a nonprofit org like some already mentioned to find lists of scholarships out there. If you put in a serious continual 3 hours/week into a serious and comprehensive search, you can fund your college education, and that's a hell of a bargain.
Good Luck
Other good things to know about College... (Score:3, Interesting)
In other words, investigate and take as many CLEP tests as you possibly can. It's cheaper than tuition and you won't have to sit through a semester of English 101 (or even 201 in most cases).
Even if you have to study a textbook to refresh your memory of biology, it's cheaper and easier (not to mention much less time wasting) to take the CLEP test.
Along the same lines, if there isn't a relevent CLEP test for you to take or you just need to pad out your number of units, most schools will let you register for a class, then arrange to take the final on the first day of class and be done with the class without attending all semester.
Taking a "spreadsheet" class this way can seriously help out your GPA if you need it and it's an excellent method for taking care of prereq's when you already know all or most of the material.
In summary, if you are going to sit in class, do it in an interesting or fun class and skip out of the others.
Re:Rich relatives (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Join the Army (Score:4, Interesting)
When you enlist you sign a contract. Pages and pages of terms. What is amazing is how few people read that contract. I had been at the Military Entrance and Processing Center all day- mostly waiting on them. It didn't bother me a bit to have them wait while I read my contract over thoroughly. Sure, there are caveats and they do own you. But on the same hand, you should know what you are getting into.
There were no big surprises in my enlistment. It worked out pretty much as I thought it would. The Navy got me for a little while to do some work that needed to be done (and I did a pretty good job of it) and I got college paid for along with some extra perks- one I mentioned above.
I would ask guys- 'how did you pick the Navy, and this job in the navy?' I was amazed at how many guys who had voluntarily given up years of their life said things like "I don't know- I just took whatever" and so on. Crazy. Then to top it off - they blame the military because they didn't do their homework.
Re:Local Resources (Score:2, Interesting)
Take some advice from a recent CS graduate... Stay away! Run as far and as fast as you can from IT. It's a totally losing proposition. And it's not getting better.
Re:they shouldn't be any encouragement for tech (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm sure you know that IT is not the only technology career, but I have to interject here and clarify the potential confusion.
IT and CS are flooded, yes. But, EE (as in, you know how to make hardware that works) is still desperate for fresh meat. Where I work (making ASICs for NEC), we have had 3-4 open requisitions throughout the IT slump and dot-bomb era. We just can't get qualified individuals, and starting pay in the Boston area (fresh grads) is still over US$75k plus $10k signing bonus and full relocation. It's a bit higher for Santa Clara, and a little lower for Dallas, Chicago, or North Carolina. We also start you off with 29 days of vacation per year (and you have to take it, like I am right now) that quickly gets up to 45 days. No stock options, but bonuses are still being paid in the 8-15% zone.
Unfortunately, most of our applicants are CS majors with experience writing RTL (a fancy name for programming the behavior that hardware is supposed to do). We don't need them. We do, however, need people who understand physics (particulary semiconductor device physics), analog and digital physical design, electromagnetic field theory (for signal integrity), and those who can code their own tools to get the job done (which means you get your choice of language and need pay no attention to GUIs or usability if you have the ability to make programs process data with perfect accuracy, quickly, and with small memory footprints).
If you have even a small interest in the hardware side of things, please consider crossing over. You can code here too, and no one except you needs to understand your code or even how to use your program
Of course, a lot of displaced CS/IT types have been hassling our HR staff with BS. If you're not more familiar with a transistor than you are your own thumb, please don't bother us.
Re:Typo (Score:2, Interesting)
If you think so then learn Hindi or any other widely spoken Indian language. If you think that Bangalore will win the race then learn a Dravidian language like Kannada. English would be also ok in cities but with one of the native languages you'll be far better off.
When at university I attended Hindi classes in the evening. It was fun and there were only 4 other students so the pace was pretty fast. I'd say that Hindi is easy to pick up and within a year (8h/week) you know the basic vocabulary you need even for extended stays. I haven't worked in India yet. But for inquiries for magazines my vocabulary was already sufficient with that little training.
You can't compete with the low salaries in India. But (western) companies that offshore IT units still need someone on site.
IT is a dying industry in the U.S.
It's not. It just in an awkward age. The largest IT market is still the U.S. In Europe IT is experiencing a major crisis and clampdown in budgets. Offshoring is just the a fruit of the basic realisation of all businesses that plan to be more successful: you can do a simlilar thing for less money elsewhere and still sell it for the same price. You would complain if your Nike/Adidas/Puma sneakers would cost double, wouldn't you? But why got those shoes so cheap in the first place?
Re:Typo (Score:2, Interesting)
Nor will you. I don't believe foreigners are allowed to work in India. Welcome to the world of free (?) trade.
go to nc (Score:2, Interesting)
My Experience (Score:2, Interesting)