Ok so tons of UniversityDude readers have been asking lately how to get some extra college cash (or financial aid). We’ll go through the best ways.
FAFSA – A College Grant
If you haven’t applied for the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) then you are missing out. Do it now!
Getting grants for college has the smallest barrier to entry to get financial aid. So go to fafsa.ed.gov and fill out a form. They made it easier than ever by posting the full application online!
You’ll just need to sit down with your driver’s license, income information if you have a job and your parents income info. This college grant is based on financial need and can result in you getting a Pell Grant and several other grants.
Private Scholarships
There are tons of private scholarships available! They usually award between $500 – 1000 per person and accept many people per scholarship. Huge corporations like Best Buy, Disney and tons of others award these all the time.
Don’t fall for any of the scam programs out there though. CollegeBoard and Fastweb are well known sites that allows you to search through tons of real scholarships. CollegeBoard does not require a signup process but Fastweb does. So go search!
If you’re not sure if a site is legit or not, you can usually tell if they try to upsell you (never pay for a scholarship) or if they try to pitch you on attending online colleges. Deny both of those requests and just apply directly for the scholarship you want.
We suggest you go directly to CollegeBoard’s search page and start looking!
Athletic Scholarships
If you are in High School and play a sport, you should look into schools that can award you athletic scholarships. You’d be shocked at how many schools award these for sports you wouldn’t believe. Each school allocates a certain amount of scholarships for all sports so even if you’re a star fencing athlete, you might as well start searching for athletic scholarships 
Minority Scholarships
Minority Scholarships are just like any other private scholarship but they limit applicants to a certain ethnic group. So this limits the number of total applicants and raises your chances significantly of landing a minority scholarship. Even if you are 5% of a particular ethnicity, you can usually apply!
Again, you can search for these on the CollegeBoard link under private scholarships.
Student Jobs
If you absolutely cannot qualify for a grant or scholarship (which is unlikely) then look for cool on-campus jobs. These are often times easy, with flexible schedules and short time frames because they understand the needs of students.
I worked 10 hours a week through college and it gave me the pocket change I needed to go out on weekends, eat out and take hot girls on dates!
So set aside the next few hours and start making a list of financial aid sources to apply for. To recap -
1. Apply for the FAFSA now!
2. If you need more money, do a scholarship search and apply! You’d be surprised at how few people apply for some of these, dramatically increasing your chances to land one. Look for minority and local scholarships for the best chances!
3. If you still need more money, look for on-campus student jobs.
Good luck!
