Story by, Raisa Mursalin
There is an average of over four hundred and fifty student athletes at Palomar College. Here are ten tips that Athletes need to know about getting an athletic scholarship.
1. Be aware of the scholarships available. Keep in touch with your school’s financial aid office and regularly check their website for updated lists of scholarships, grants and other opportunities for financial help. The Jan Wessel and the Judy Mazzarella scholarships both offer a $500 award and the Ward “Rusty” Myers scholarship offers a $1000 award for a student athlete intending to transfer.
2. Keep up your grades. While Palomar College’s scholarship programs require at least a minimum GPA of 2.5, all the athletic scholarships offered by Palomar require a cumulative GPA of at least 3.0.
3. Complete the Athletics and Competitive Sports course. Palomar College student athletes are also required to pass the ACS-50, “Introduction to Intercollegiate Athletics” course.
4. Don’t limit yourself. Aside from athletic scholarships, there are many scholarships available for students of specific majors like the Culinary and Hospitality program and the Bill Opie and Selma Zarakov-Opie Scholarship.
5. Check out the National Collegiate Athletic Association website. Scott Cathcart, director of athletics at Palomar College suggested that students check out the website as it lists scholarships and provides rules, regulations and requirements for NCAA and National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) eligibility standards.
6. Be aware of dates. While the deadline for filing in house scholarships has passed, the financial aid office has a list of outside scholarships for which the application is still open like the fourth annual Apex Hosting Minecraft Scholarship.
7. Scott Cathcart reminds student athletes to attend the annual eligibility orientation.
8. Talk to your coaches, and counselors as they may be aware of scholarships that you don’t know about and they can even help with filling some of them out. Scott Cathcart recommends meeting with an academic athletic counselor once a semester and following their directions.
9. Develop a Plan. Research the schools you want to attend, create a student educational plan with your counselor and Scott Cathcart recommends reading Section V of Palomar College Student Athlete Handbook regarding four-year college transfers.
10. Talk to student athletes at your school and the school you want to attend as they have inside information that can be useful.
