For Students
The Application Period for the 2023-2024 Academic Year Ended May 31, 2023.
The 2024-2025 Application portal will open January 16, 2024!
All new applicants must reside in the Greater Cincinnati Area* and be pursuing an Undergraduate Degree, Post Bachelorette Degree, or Trade Certification at an accredited, non-proprietary college, university or trade school.
Correspondence between CSF and applicants/awardees will occur by way of email, using the student’s primary email address* entered on the application. It is the applicants’/awardees’ responsibility to regularly check their emails throughout the application process. Failure to check email accounts, including junk/spam folders, is not a valid reason to not follow through with deadlines, needed documents, etc.
*Please do not use your high school email address, it will expire upon or soon after graduation.
Information for creating and submitting the CSF application and required documents:
The following documents are required to complete your application:
- Transcript up to the first semester of the current academic year.
- Student resume reflecting extracurricular activities, employment and community service.
- 2024-2025 FAFSA Submission Summary (formerly known as the Student Aid Report or SAR)
- 2024-2025 Financial Aid Notification from the school you are planning to attend.
- A 500-word essay. Tell us about yourself. What motivates you to do what you plan to do (study and pursue a
career)? What are your positive characteristics? What kind of successes have you had in your life?
What kind of hardships have you overcome to get where you are going?
CSF will only accept documents in the following formats:
- Microsoft Word
- JPEG
If documents are not submitted in these formats, applications will not be considered for scholarship awards. We will not accept HTML, PNG, HEIC, Webarchive, GIF, and TXT.
CSF understands that the FAFSA Submission Summary and/or the Financial Aid Notification may not be available by May 31st. Applicants may submit the on-line application without these documents by the deadline and are responsible for uploading the required documents upon receiving them to complete the application process. Applications will be reviewed upon completion.
When making changes or uploading documents to your application, applicants must electronically sign the application each time or the changes will not be saved.
Please contact CSF by email at info@cincinnatischolarshipfoundation.org or by phone at (513)345-6701 with any questions or concerns regarding applications.
The CSF scholarship award process
Obtaining the required documents can take time (i.e., filing taxes, submitting the FAFSA, waiting for the schools to “package” a student’s financial aid), the awarding of scholarships takes place during mid- to late summer, and sometimes after the academic year begins.
Once CSF has received the completed application with the required documentation, CSF will seek to match applicants with specific scholarships, based on the scholarships’ eligibility criteria (May-July).
Applications are then forwarded to either the CSF Scholarship Selection Committee or to the scholarship-specific selection committees, as determined by the scholarship donors’ requirements. (June—August).
Once a recipient has been selected, CSF will send a notification packet to the awardee that includes the Scholarship Award Letter with the amount awarded, a Student Information Verification form, and an FAQ sheet. The Scholarship Award Letter and the Student Information Verification form must be read, signed, and returned to the CSF office. Upon receipt, CSF will notify the academic institution of the award. A check for the fall semester will be sent to the school shortly thereafter.
If a renewable scholarship is awarded, criteria must continue to be met each year to renew. If criteria such as enrollment status, financial need, a change of major or school are not met, the scholarship will be redistributed.
