Funding Your Future is a General Intelligence article series focused on connecting high-achieving high-school seniors with large, fall deadline scholarships. This week, the series will be focusing on the Carl’s Junior Scholarship. Make sure to keep reading until the end to hear from Giao Nguyen, a 2020 recipient, and to learn some of her personal tips for future applicants!

THE AWARD: The award for the Carl’s Jr. scholarship is one $10,000 scholarship split into $2,500 per year of college enrollment. 

THE ELIGIBILITY: The eligibility requirements for the Carl’s Jr. Scholarship are as follows:

  • Be a high-school senior 21 years old or younger
  • Reside in Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Louisiana, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, Oklahoma, Oregon, Texas, Utah, Washington or Wyoming.
  • Plan to enroll in college the following year

THE APPLICATION: The application must be downloaded online from Carl’s Jr. and submitted my mail. It is best to apply early to this scholarship, as only the first 1,000 applicants will be submitted. If you are chosen as a finalist, they will email you and tell you that you are eligible for an interview. From there, up to ten people will be chosen. You will be emailed if you receive the scholarship. 

STUDENT PERSPECTIVE: Giao Nguyen will be attending UCLA in the fall as a Regents scholar. In high school, she participated in various science competitions at the state and local level and volunteered at local resource centers and nonprofit organizations. She also hosted annual donation drives for the underserved which included Christmas toys for low-income children and hygiene kits for the homeless. In school, she led multiple clubs and was involved in academic decathlon and peer tutoring. She was fortunate enough to be recognized as a Coca Cola Scholar, Carl’s Jr. Scholar, Questbridge National College Match Finalist, Gates Scholarship Finalist, and Don and Roy scholar. She also received several local scholarships and would love to assist anyone with the college and scholarship process!

Giao’s number one piece of advice is to elaborate “more on your extracurriculars on another sheet of paper” due to the small amount of space on the physical application itself. She also states that “if you make it into the interview round you’re pretty solid, so just try to be yourself and express your interests!” The interview should only be about 30 minutes, and the primary application was pretty simple!

Like always, I wish you the best of luck in your scholarship search and your scholarship applications! Make sure to keep up to date on Funding Your Future articles for more scholarship information!