Say good-bye to all those essays, transcripts and letters of recommendation letters, because starting this year, applying for more than $600,000 in UAF scholarships requires only a single piece of paper.

Under new procedures, students applying for privately funded scholarships will only need to fill-out a single, double-sided application. Scholarship officials will instead determine eligibility from the official academic records database.

University officials began investigating doing-away with the excess papers about a year ago after listening to a presentation by the University of Idaho on its scholarship model, said Naomi Hume, a scholarship coordinator.

"We've sort of taken it and mutated it for our own purposes," Hume said.

Many scholarship committees didn't need all of the extra paperwork, Hume said. Under the new system, she said, committees that do will contact applicants directly.

"It makes the connection between the committee and the students," she said.

As their name implies, privately funded scholarships receive their funding from private individuals or organizations. Donors select criteria for student eligibility, including major, class, ethnicity and residency.

Scholarships range in value, from $500 to $10,000. Many students receive at least $10,000 from a combination of scholarships, Hume said. UAF offers about 60 needs-based scholarships, she said, and some for married students or parents.

Last year, 688 students applied for privately funded scholarships, Hume said, with nearly a quarter disqualified. The financial aid office distributes roughly 400 awards each semester, she said. Nearly a fourth received scholarships in past years, she said.

But those numbers could be higher, Hume said. About $200,000 to $300,000 in private funds remained at the end of last year's scholarship process, she said, and although UAF uses some of that money for inflation buffering, more money could be distributed.

"The effort is always to use as much as possible," Hume said, "but many students don't apply."

Advertising hasn't always worked well, Hume said. A scholarship whose deadline came last week had only one applicant despite fliers throughout campus, she said.

Hume said she hoped the pool of applicants would increase this year. "If I don't get at least double," she said, "I think we need to try something again."

On the Net: UAF Financial Aid: www.uaf.edu/finaid/types/scholarships.html

Comment on this story...