Sharpie is now offering the Autographs for Education Scholarship Sweepstakes for qualifying students. This scholarship is certainly worth the few minutes it takes to apply because it could put up to $25,000 in your pocket toward education costs.

To participate, students must meet the eligibility requirements outlined below:

According to the Sanford website, interested students should complete the following steps in order to participate:

Download and review the official sweepstakes rules.

Complete the online entry form.

Create a virtual autograph.

Submit your autograph online.

To request official rules, direct inquiries to the address below:

Sharpie Autograph Collection Contest Official Rules Request, c/o PSM&M, P.O. Box 63742, Philadelphia, PA 19147.

The deadline for this award is December 31st 2007.

College is not for everyone. These days, it’s easy to succumb to the pressure that develops when friends, family, and teachers make the assumption that college is for you. In fact, many kids find that they simply aren’t interested in the career path that a college education may lead to. Students like this are often more interested in hands-on opportunities that are offered by professions like mechanics or construction. Unfortunately, these students find that even though they are pursuing an upstanding career, it’s more difficult to find scholarships and/or financial assistance to support their decision.

Thanks to companies like StraightForwardMedia.com, however, new scholarship opportunities are being made available for students who have opted to attend vocational/technical school. Four times per year, StraightForwardMedia.com gives away a $500 scholarship to a deserving student pursuing vocational credits.

According to the website, StraightForwardMedia gives these awards because:

During our history of awarding scholarships, we’ve noticed that a majority of scholarships out there specify that the recipient “must be attending a four-year university.” We like four-year universities as much as the next guy, but we’ve never quite understood why students who choose vocational/technical programs over traditional academia aren’t generally considered as worthy of financial assistance.

Well put. If you are interested in the opportunity to apply for the vocational/technical scholarships available through StraightForwardMedia.com, be sure to visit their website for more information.

Deadlines are as follows:

Now’s your big chance: enter the Fastweb e-music Scholarship Giveaway today for your chance to win $5,000 in cash for college!

No essay required. No lengthy application. This contest couldn’t be easier. To participate, simply tell your friends about Fastweb.com by submitting their email addresses via the online application available at the company’s website. Your friends will thank you, and with each entry, you’ll increase your chances of earning more cash toward your college tuition.

To participate, students must:

The deadline to submit entries is December 31, 2007. One $5,000 cash award will be distributed along with free music for your MP3 player. Another benefit: Fastweb.com provides a tool that allows you to upload your contacts from your personal email, which means that telling your friends is incredibly quick and easy.

For more information or to request official rules, direct inquiries to:

“Rules/Winners List Request”
FastWeb, LLC.
444 North Michigan Avenue
Suite 3100, Chicago, IL 60611

AdmissionFacts.com is now offering a $1,000 scholarship for students in need of financial aid. According to the website, the AdmissionFacts Scholarship is part of the company’s ongoing mission to “help students get into and pay for the college of their dreams.” Each year, they contribute a portion of their revenues to a scholarship fund that helps to support aspiring college students. AdmissionFacts.com is an information directory and database designed to help students who are currently in the process of applying for, enrolling in, or attending college.

Student eligibility requirements include the following:

The deadline for this award is November 7, 2007. Interested students should visit the AdmissionFacts.com website for further details. Five $1,000 awards will be distributed this year.

Like money? Need a little? MoneyMatters101.com is now offering a $400 scholarship for qualifying students.

To apply for this award, simply submit an essay that responds to the following question:

With property foreclosures on the rise and home prices either declining or at a stand still in most areas, what are your thoughts on the Real Estate market over the next year?

Be creative and original, but most of all do your research! Make sure that your thoughts and ideas are grounded in facts before submitting them in your official essay, and have a friend or a teacher review your work. The essay should be about 750 words in length.

Additional eligibility requirements include the following:

For more information about this award, please visit the website.

This year’s deadline may already be past, but this is one scholarship that you don’t want to forget about. The Ayn Rand Institute sponsors an annual scholarship for ninth and tenth graders in the form of an essay contest. The topic of choice each year is Rand’s book The Anthem. The essay questions vary by year, but the eligibility requirements are as follows:

For more information about this scholarship, visit the Ayn Rand Institute’s website.

Essays may be submitted online or to the address below:

Anthem Essay Contest, Dept. W
The Ayn Rand Institute
P.O. Box 57044
Irvine, CA 92619-7044

The Don Gentry Award for Student Journalism is offered through The Population Institute. According to the press release posted by the Institute:

The purpose of the Gentry Award is to promote personal responsibility for Americans in their family planning decisions. The award will create an incentive for university students to tackle the issue of personal responsibility for family size—a topic that has not received the attention it deserves—and will also promote awareness of the issue to the general public through publication.

Eligibility requirements:

Awards will be distributed accordingly:

For more information about the Don Gentry award, visit The Population Institute’s website. The deadline for submissions is October 7, 2007.

The Global Media Awards are made available through The Population Institute. According to the website,

“The Population Institute’s Global Media Awards are devoted to drawing attention to global population issues. The awards honor those who have contributed to creating an awareness of population problems through their journalistic endeavors in a meritorious manner.”

Guideline overview:

For more information about the Global Media Awards For Excellence in Population Reporting, visit The Population Institute’s website.
Please submit entries to the address below:

The Population Institute
107 2nd St, NE
Washington, DC 20002
Ph: 202 544 3300, x 106
Fax: 202 544 0068
kdouglas@populationinstitute.org

The Ayn Rand Institute is sponsoring some incredible scholarships in relation to Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead. This is an essay scholarship with several questions to choose from. Each year, multiple winners are selected: 1 first-prize winner ($10,000), 3 second-prize winners ($2,000), 5 third-prize winners ($1,000), 20 finalists ($100), and 20 semifinalists ($50).

This is an annual essay contest for 11th and 12th graders. This year’s essay topics include the following:

1. The conventional view is that in life one can either achieve practical success or be moral, but not both. What view of this relation do you think emerges in The Fountainhead? What is the novel’s conception of success? Of morality? Explain by reference to characters and events of the story.

2. For each of the following quotations from The Fountainhead, explain its meaning in the story and its wider significance.

a. Gail Wynand (to Howard Roark): “There’s a particular kind of people that I despise. Those who seek some sort of a higher purpose or ‘universal goal,’ who don’t know what to live for, who moan that they must ‘find themselves.’” (Part IV, Chapter 5)

b. Peter Keating (to Dominique Francon): “I’d rather you’d express an opinion, God damn it, just once!” (Part III, Chapter 2)

c. Howard Roark (to Ellsworth Toohey): “But I don’t think of you.” (Part II, Chapter 15)

3. In Roark’s courtroom speech, he discusses the conflicts of the creator versus the second-hander and of egoism versus altruism. What is the nature of these conflicts and the relationship between the creator and egoism and between the second-hander and altruism? How do characters and events of The Fountainhead dramatize these conflicts and relationships? Explain.

According to the website, essays will be judged on a variety of factors—style, content, organization, and logic. Applications and essays can be submitted online or at the following address:

The Fountainhead Essay Contest, Dept. W
The Ayn Rand Institute
P.O. Box 57044
Irvine, CA 92619-7044