Funding Your Future is a General Intelligence series designed to bring large, fall-deadline scholarships to the attention of capable and outstanding rising high-school seniors. This week, the series will focus on the Comcast Leaders and Achievers Scholarship program. Make sure to stay reading until the end to learn more about the scholarship program from a student perspective! 

THE AWARD: Through the Comcast Leaders and Achievers program, base-level recipients can earn $2500 for their college career. In addition to this, select recipients will be chosen for the program’s Founder Award, which can earn the recipient even more money. 

THE ELIGIBILITY: Applicants to the Comcast Leaders and Achievers scholarship program must fit into the following requirements:

  • Demonstrated commitment to community service, strong character, etc.
  • Be a high-school senior. 
  • Reside in a community that Comcast serves.
  • Plan to enroll in college the following year after graduation.
  • Have a minimum GPA of 3.0.
  • Demonstrate financial need.

THE APPLICATION: This scholarship application is a fairly simple one. Alongside some of the basic information required in every scholarship (test scores, transcripts, biographical information, etc.), the Comcast scholarship also requires a couple of essays regarding technology and your educational journey.

STUDENT PERSPECTIVE: My name is Haley Herbert and I am an incoming first-year at Barnard College of Columbia University this fall hoping to major in neuroscience and computer science on the pre-med track. I attended a public high school in a smaller town in Washington State, where I participated in a multitude of activities such as being the President and Captain of our Knowledge Bowl team, the Vice President of our Associated Student Body Government, the Co-President of our National Honor Society Chapter, and the Founder of our school’s newspaper club, Hilander Today. 

The Comcast Leaders and Achievers Program had one of the simpler application processes that I had come across during my journey. When applying, my tip is to make sure that you have something that you can tie back to the digital world! For me, one of my essays was about how being the founder of Hilander Today required me to learn more about opening up websites and how to e-publicize our paper. I also continued on to talk about how that really sparked my interest more in programming and the such in combination with my AP Computer Science class. For you, you really need to think about what you have been doing over the course of your high-school career and how technology has influenced that. If I were you, I would stray away from the standard “COVID-19 and zoom” topic, as this is something that the selection committee is probably going to be seeing a lot of this year. But, if you can provide a unique perspective to that, feel free to use it! Just make sure that whatever you choose to do is unique and will “wow” the selection committee. 

My second tip is to NOT WRITE OFF THIS SCHOLARSHIP BECAUSE OF WHAT MAY SEEM AS A “SMALL” DOLLAR AMOUNT. Small scholarships, in combination with each other, can mean all of the difference in your student loan process. Interest payments are a real barrier, and the more scholarships that you get mean the less general money and interest money that you will eventually have to pay. Don’t let a small dollar amount scare you off! The application is worth the time! 

As always, I wish you the best of luck in your scholarship search!