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The amount of scholarships a student can apply is staggering and overwhelming. Applying for them is easier, but it’s still time-consuming applying for every single one. What if you could use one application to apply for all the scholarships you wanted?
Scholarship Owl seems to have that answer. They are a scholarship matching website with a twist: they will apply for the scholarships you choose with one application form. But is it too good to be true? Our Scholarship Owl review will take a detailed look at the website and help you make that decision yourself.
What is Scholarship Owl?
Starting in 2015, Scholarship Owl is the brainchild of Kenny Sandorffy. Drawing on his own scholarship experiences, he began thinking about how to streamline the experience for future students. His idea was, like other scholarship search platforms, you fill out one scholarship application, choose scholarships you want to apply for, and the system will fill in the scholarship applications for you.
Bonus read: How to Save Money as a College Student
This process work by taking the information you provided, they match your application with scholarships that best fit you. As you go through the list and apply for the ones you want, Scholarship Owl will fill in the application forms, adding essays and writing samples as you go along. In less time, you can fill out more applications and increase your chances of paying off your tuition.
Since it’s launch, tech and business websites such as Forbes have spread the word about the platform’s unique database. Hundreds of students telling of how they were able to pay their full tuition give the company further legitimacy. The company also encrypts the information given to keep it out of the hands of hackers, so it’s a safe service.
Now, let’s look more in-depth at what we found in our Scholarship Owl review.
We Liked Scholarship Owl Because…
Here is a list of four things we found we liked in our Scholarship Owl review:
1. Application Process
We can’t start this list without first touching on what sets Scholarship Owl apart from others. Their automating process with the academic information you give them saves a lot of time and effort; two things that are in short supply for any college student.
2. Spam and Privacy Protection
One of the things they provide is spam protection. By keeping all the updates and messages in their Membership section, it protects your email inbox from being flooded with emails from scholarship companies and other affiliates.
In poking around the site, we also found the site to be trustworthy. They have SSL software in place to protect the information given to them and they screen for scams before adding new scholarships to their database. You can also opt-out of giving any third parties more information than you want.
3. The “You Deserve It” Scholarship
Like many scholarship platforms, Scholarship Owl provides new members with a chance to win a $1,000 scholarship award for signing up. It looks as though it is only for new members and starts over every month. It’s not exactly something that sets Scholarship Owl apart from other platforms, but the incentive does deserve a mention in our Scholarship Owl review.
4. Help Center
One of the services Scholarship Owl provides is around the clock help for anyone needing advice on applying or financial aid. They also have a blog that covers a wide range of topics on scholarships coming up to advice on writing a solid essay.
Not So Sure About…
The whole premise of this scholarship platform is to streamline the application process and the service seemed to free. As we got to poking around though and looked at other reviews, we found that isn’t exactly the case. Turns out, you can use the search engine and platform to find matching scholarships for free, but if you want the site to automate your applications, you do have to pay a membership.
Bonus read: How to Save Money as a Teenager
There are four membership level tiers, the lowest being a Semi-Annual, Quarterly, or Monthly membership which includes the automatic application for scholarships and reapplication if needed. For those wanting to pay, but a bit strapped for cash, the Semi-Annual (twice a year) is the cheaper solution. That rounds out to be about $10/month every six months.
The VIP is the elite tier at a hefty price of $99 per month. This includes features such as the automation, reapplication, financial advice from college experts, and a review of one 500-word essay each month.
What makes this more of an issue is that the information on the membership prices is not anywhere easy to find. To actually find it, you have to already sign up for free. Then you find out that to get full access, you have to pay. Otherwise, it is very hard to find any specific information on this, even in the FAQ or HelpDesk pages. It was disappointing to find this, especially when there are alternative websites that are more upfront with their services.
Online Reviews Say That…
Since its launch, Scholarship Owl has gotten a lot of good press on its streamlining model, reputable service, and security measures. Many of the recent Scholarship Owl reviews have similar good things to say about it.
An article on SurveySays rated Scholarship Owl number one on their list of scholarship databases. While the article did touch on the membership level fees, they gave the website and company 5-stars, citing their reputable practices and their secure platform.
A financial blog, Dividend Mantra, did their own Scholarship Owl review and rated the website and company as well. This article went into more detail on the membership payment plans, finding the same issue as we did on it’s “freemium” model.
While the “freemium” model does detract from the potential it has, Scholarship Owl is a good scholarship matching site. The fact that it encrypts it’s information and screens any new scholarships before uploading them into their database promises they are looking out for their clients that use their website. Though the membership fees may be out of reach for some of the people who use it, it is a good service to keep in your back pocket.
In Conclusion
Scholarship Owl is a new scholarship matching website that promises to streamline the scholarship application process. In our Scholarship Owl review, we found that even though this process holds a lot of promise, you have to pay a membership fee to use it. Despite that, it is a trustworthy company that protects their client’s information to keep it from hackers. This is a website we would recommend.
What are your thoughts on Scholarship Owl? Have you used the website and what do you think about it? Share your thoughts and comments with us!
