Seattle Colleges International Programs presents... Conversations with!
Seattle Colleges International Programs presents... Conversations with!
S3E17: Seattle Colleges Conversations with! Foundation Scholarship Manager Jasmine Meraz
In this our seventeenth (17th) episode, Seattle Colleges host Evan Franulovich interviews Foundation Scholarship Manager Jasmine Meraz about how students can apply for and get the Foundation Scholarship that is offered here at Seattle Colleges.
Learn more about or apply for the scholarship here:
https://foundation.seattlecolleges.edu/scholarships
1:16 - Hello Jasmine!
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Evan Franulovich 0:05
Welcome to Seattle Colleges International Programs and our show 'Conversations with!', where we talk to people that help you understand how you too, can be an international student in the United States and why Seattle Colleges should be your first choice. We'll talk to students and staff and agents and government folks, all kinds of people about what you can expect when you're getting ready to apply or travel here, what you'll experience while you're with us, and how it can all lead to an amazing life. Don't forget to check out the Seattle Colleges International Programs website at intl.seattlecolleges.edu where you can find a treasure trove of information about the school, the programs here and best of all, fill out and submit your application. Again, that's intl.seattlecolleges.edu.
Evan Franulovich 1:07
Hey everybody! Happy New Year from Big Lake, Washington, just outside of Seattle! I'm here on my holiday, but I wanted to take a moment to wish you all a happy new year and let you know that this episode is quite important. The question we probably hear the most is, "Do you guys have scholarships?" or "What kind of money is available to me?" This episode is gonna answer that questions, so pay close attention and remember to apply for the Foundation Scholarship. It opens for applications in the middle part of January, which is coming right up. Happy New Year!
Evan Franulovich 1:47
Hey everybody! Welcome back to Seattle Colleges 'Conversations with!', we're here at Seattle Central today. Very excited because one of the first questions we usually get as recruiters is, "Hey, do you guys have scholarships?" Today, we're excited to welcome Jasmine Meraz about the scholarship, the big one that we offer. I gotta tell you, there's a lot to be learned here, so listen very carefully if you're interested in getting money to help your education. Welcome, thank you for being here!
Jasmine Meraz 2:17
Thank you so much. Glad to be here.
Evan Franulovich 2:19
Yeah. No, it's great. So I want to get right into it. The big scholarship that we offer is the foundation scholarship, and that's where you work.
Jasmine Meraz 2:28
Yeah, that is my forte. That is my specialty.
Evan Franulovich 2:30
That's right, but the Foundation Scholarship is a big thing. So let's just get into, first of all, before we start talking about the foundation scholarship, let's learn a little bit about Jasmine. So did you go to school at Seattle Central?
Jasmine Meraz 2:44
Not Seattle Central. I went to grad school at the University of Washington.
Evan Franulovich 2:47
Oh, you did.
Jasmine Meraz 2:48
So I got my masters there, and then I did my undergrad at Oregon State University.
Evan Franulovich 2:52
Oh, you were a Beaver. So, no community college for you at all?
Jasmine Meraz 2:55
I did community college in high school, but in Oregon.
Evan Franulovich 2:58
Oh, okay.
Jasmine Meraz 2:58
My high school did a pilot program, similar to Seattle Promise here.
Evan Franulovich 3:02
Okay.
Jasmine Meraz 3:03
And I did that for a year, so luckily, saved myself a couple $1,000 just by taking those classes.
Evan Franulovich 3:09
Are you from Corvallis?
Jasmine Meraz 3:10
No. So I grew up in a very small town, I guess, south of Salem, North of Corvallis, called Monmouth, Oregon. Very small school.
Evan Franulovich 3:19
There's a great university there.
Jasmine Meraz 3:20
There is a great university there, yes.
Evan Franulovich 3:22
And which one is it?
Jasmine Meraz 3:22
Western Oregon University.
Evan Franulovich 3:23
Yes, it is. Yeah, that's where my wife got her degree.
Jasmine Meraz 3:27
My best friend went to school there.
Evan Franulovich 3:28
Yeah, it's a great town. Check it out. Yeah, Monmouth's a great little town. So okay, well, you didn't go to a community college, but, well, you did a little bit through high school. So, and then how did you make your way to Seattle Colleges, and Foundation Scholarship?
Jasmine Meraz 3:43
Yeah, so I was working in Tumwater in the ESD, so K12 education. I was a Behavioral Health Navigator there.
Evan Franulovich 3:51
Oh, cool.
Jasmine Meraz 3:52
Great work. But I always saw myself in some form of scholarship or support programs. Most of my work as a student undergrad was all within Student Services. So I was involved in camp, which is the college assistant migrants program at Oregon State, which is a federally funded program. I was also in TRIO.
Evan Franulovich 4:12
Me too!
Jasmine Meraz 4:14
You know, full circle movement. And then I had a friend who actually works for EDIC here, and I had asked them about opportunities here, you know, they were here for about for a couple of years, and they said that they like the job, they like the environment. And so I kind of just took a whim and applied. And here I am.
Evan Franulovich 4:30
Here you are. And how long have you been here?
Jasmine Meraz 4:33
Almost two years.
Evan Franulovich 4:34
Me too. We must have started...
Jasmine Meraz 4:35
So a year and 9-10 months now.
Evan Franulovich 4:38
I started just a little ahead of you then, I started in August. You must have been...
Jasmine Meraz 4:42
I was February of 2023.
Evan Franulovich 4:44
Okay, yeah, sure. Well, cool. Let's get into foundation. So, you know, the big question is, what is the foundation scholarship? Let's start there.
Jasmine Meraz 4:54
Yes. So the Foundation Scholarship, or scholarships, however, you want to say it, is an encompassing application that we match students to scholarships based on your program if you have specific needs, so say, like you're in fire science at North, for example, we have a scholarship that's specific to that. If you're in graphic design, there's specific scholarships that may be just for graphic design students. And of course, there's a verification program that we check in with the programs to ensure that you're actually enrolled in the program. Because obviously, whoever is donating those dollars to the student scholarship, they want to ensure that it's going to students in those programs.
Evan Franulovich 5:33
Gotcha.
Jasmine Meraz 5:34
But we also have general scholarships that don't necessarily have to be in one or the other, whether a student's just trying to get their transfer degree, whether they're just taking classes here and there. We try to make it as simple as possible, but essentially, it's one application that opens the door for 300 plus scholarships that we have available.
Evan Franulovich 5:52
Wow, that's a lot. Well, when I looked at your website, I saw like, seven different.
Jasmine Meraz 5:56
Yeah, and those are some of the highlighted scholarships that we had that were very, very niche into specific programs, but we have a plethora of different scholarships that are available for students.
Evan Franulovich 6:07
So you really make it easier for our students to be able to tap into a lot of different scholars.
Jasmine Meraz 6:12
Because it's easier for us for you to have one application, and then we match it to as many scholarships as you qualify for, instead of you having to opt into one application, another application, another application, and that's a lot of work to do, especially if you're re entering the same information over and over. So here is just one application, three statements, and we are the ones that are matching you to a scholarship that best describes you in your situation.
Evan Franulovich 6:40
Interesting. So let's get into the application then, because in order for you to match them up, obviously you need to know a lot about them, I'm guessing. So can you talk about the application process? So you know you're going to want to apply for this, and it's open for...?
Jasmine Meraz 6:56
All students. So incoming students, prospective students, current students, all students are able to play, even if you're not sure if you're gonna get in or not, even if you are awarded, you can always deny the scholarship. Say you end up going somewhere else.
Evan Franulovich 7:09
Oh, good to know.
Jasmine Meraz 7:09
Lets say if you decide to go to a different community college or a different institution. It's no bad on you, nothing goes off, but the scholarships do stay within the colleges, so you're not able to take that scholarship somewhere else. So that is something that we need to also make sure we know that even though you receive a scholarship from us, that doesn't necessarily mean that it's transferable to another institution.
Evan Franulovich 7:28
So this foundation scholarship is specific to Seattle Colleges.
Jasmine Meraz 7:31
To Seattle Colleges, yeah.
Evan Franulovich 7:32
Like it doesn't also belong to Edmonds or Bellevue or anything like that.
Jasmine Meraz 7:36
Just us. We have scholarships that are for district wide, so a student can be what say central this quarter, and then the other two quarters, they may be transferring to North, because that's the program that they're in. If the scholarship scholarship is eligible, they're able to transfer that over. But we also have scholarships that you have to be a student at that campus to receive it.
Evan Franulovich 7:55
Gotcha.
Jasmine Meraz 7:55
And can only receive it at that campus.
Evan Franulovich 7:58
Are there awards available for students who go to say, the wood technology program, the maritime...
Jasmine Meraz 8:06
Yep, we have a lot. We actually don't get as many students we would like in the wood tech and maritime, and those are definitely some of the programs that we have the most funding for. It's just the timeline doesn't always work for the students because of their enrollment. Um, sometimes they don't start enrolling into the program until maybe spring quarter, and by then we had already closed the application. And so we're working on that now with maritime and wood tech to try to see if we're able to move things around so that way we can disperse scholarships for their students. But on top of that, the only other things that are required is a 2.0 GPA. And even if you don't have a 2.0 GPA, that's not to discredit that, not to apply. We look at your whole application, not just the GPA. That's just for current students to ensure that they meet their guidelines to be able to be in good standing with the college. So it's mainly for that. And then, of course, their personal statements that we always have available on our website that states what the questions are, and then helpful tips of how to write it.
Evan Franulovich 9:01
Yes.
Jasmine Meraz 9:02
Us at the foundation, we're not able to help you with the scholarship statements. We can guide you as to what reviewers may be looking at, but we always highly encourage students to go to the writing center, do peer review, go to a different tutoring center if you're not able to go on campus to get some form of support with the statements, since that's usually what gets graded to the highest amount in our application. Oh, and then, of course, transcripts, if you have them, whether that's a high school or other colleges or universities that you have attended. Resumes optional. Some students really like having their resumes on there. Some don't. Again, it's optional, so the student doesn't, nothing happens to them if they don't have it. Okay.
Evan Franulovich 9:38
So that's a lot of information in a very fast food so I want to reiterate for the listeners out there, you can be a prospective student. I want to really highlight that. So apply before you even come or before you even get accepted. That's really important. If the GPAs so in some countries, like my markets are Latin America, Africa and the Middle East, and, you know, some students don't necessarily have a GPA. So what do those students do?
Jasmine Meraz 10:05
They can still submit the transcript that they have from their home country. We just look at it to see if they have any other educational background, whether they have bachelor degrees or have an associates or just a high school diploma elsewhere. We'll look at everything else In the case of the student is not able to provide it. The only people that see it is the admin team, and no one else sees it. So no one else would know where your transcript is coming from, other than myself and my director.
Evan Franulovich 10:35
Right, okay.
Jasmine Meraz 10:36
So that's just like a leniency thing of we would like students to have it if they have it available, but it's not like detriment if they aren't able to have it.
Evan Franulovich 10:44
Okay. Wow, so many things to talk about. So one of the things is there's no fee to apply for...
Jasmine Meraz 10:53
It's free to apply and submit.
Evan Franulovich 10:55
Free to apply and submit.
Jasmine Meraz 10:57
Never apply to a scholarship that requires you to pay. You should never be paying for an application for scholarships. The concept of a scholarship is that they're giving you money, not the other way around.
Evan Franulovich 11:09
Right, right, right, right. That's a good point, actually. Okay, so it's free to apply. It does cost you a little time. You mentioned very, you know, very quickly. So I want to break it down a little bit, lots of different elements to the application. So the first thing is, they're just general information, right? Name, address.
Jasmine Meraz 11:28
Your name, address, your ethnicity, race, and all of those you can write in. You can leave them how you want, if you don't wish to disclose them, if it doesn't have a optional that means it's a required question. And so even if you're not able to say, put like a home address, say, if you're not living in Seattle or in King County currently, you could just put like N/A or something in place. So that way it marks the question as complete.
Evan Franulovich 11:52
Gotcha.
Jasmine Meraz 11:52
Because if it's not marked complete, it will not let you submit it. And that's always the hard part.
Evan Franulovich 11:57
Sure, sure. Okay, and then let's talk briefly about the statement, or these are essays that they have to write. There's three different.
Jasmine Meraz 12:06
Three.
Evan Franulovich 12:07
Three, okay.
Jasmine Meraz 12:07
So there's a personal, a purpose, and financial.
Evan Franulovich 12:11
Say that again, slowly.
Jasmine Meraz 12:11
Purpose, personal, financial.
Evan Franulovich 12:15
There you go. So can you talk about each one of those?
Jasmine Meraz 12:17
Yep, so each, they're all kind of similar in question. To be honest, the way I like to think about it is you want your, all your statements to kind of align together. And so each statement should kind of tell different parts of the story of who you are as a student, without repetitive information. And so in your personal story, you may want to say something along, like maybe an educator or something that inspired you to get to want to apply in the first place, so that could be an experience that you've had. Say you had a really good mentor, and that mentor happened to go to this college or whatever it may be, and maybe they're the ones who kind of guided you to go to whether this college or that college, whatever be. Your purpose is kind of, where does your personal story align into what you want to do academically as a career? So you know, if you want to be, say, like a mental health therapist, like, where are your goals with that? Like, what inspires you to want to do those things? How do you feel, either the college or you, with your story is going to be able to achieve those things, and your financial statement is just that more. So, you know, if you're an international student, especially the costs of coming to, you know, the United States and studying is already very expensive. And so those are the things we want to know. Is that, what is the this additional expense to you, getting in a college education...
Evan Franulovich 13:39
Sure.
Jasmine Meraz 13:40
...doing for you. So because you're an international student, you may not be able to work, right? Which is a case for a lot of international students, and so receiving a scholarship would help with the cost, right? That you are associated with, not just academically, but outside fees that you don't think about, like books and transportation maybe, that students often don't think about when they're coming to college, they just assume cost of attendance is just everything, but it's not.
Evan Franulovich 14:05
It's not.
Jasmine Meraz 14:05
Everything that goes with it, going to college. And so all three of those things are less than 300 words, so pretty short. We always suggest to reread it to yourself before you submit it. Definitely check your grammar, because that is the one thing that reviewers do like to check for. And then some translation services aren't the best. And so if you write it in whatever your native language is, it may not translate to the system. And so currently, our system only allows for English to be the written language, not to say that I'm a Spanish speaker, so I can read Spanish, but the reviewers who may be reviewing your application may not right, and so then they can't score you on your statements, because they can't read it.
Evan Franulovich 14:51
They can't read it, yeah. So yeah, use, I mean, Grammarly is a great tool to check your grammar, and if you are already in country, there are a number of other resources for them. They can go get tutoring.
Jasmine Meraz 15:05
There's tutoring that's offered locally through the county. The public library is a great service. King County has a great public library system that has tutoring, mentoring, just other sources that you may need to no additional cost to you, of course. So if you have that available, definitely go.
Evan Franulovich 15:21
We have a writing center here.
Jasmine Meraz 15:22
We have a writing center here.
Evan Franulovich 15:23
At each of the campuses. What would be, so it just occurs to me, you know, it's like, what's the downside? Like, why would someone not bother applying for Foundation Scholarship?
Jasmine Meraz 15:35
Often, the most that we get is either because they haven't completed their FASFA or their WASFA. Which, again, we our application, we don't consider the FAFSA or WASFA as an indicator to receive our scholarship, because we have a lot of international students, and DACA and undocumented students, and so we don't want that to create an inhibitor for them not applying.
Evan Franulovich 15:55
Right.
Jasmine Meraz 15:56
If they've been out of school for a long time, especially, you know at a community college, junior college, often students are discouraged because say they've been in the workforce for a lot of years, so we definitely don't want that to be a reason for but we see often is the case and then the time to apply.
Evan Franulovich 16:12
It does take time to apply.
Jasmine Meraz 16:13
The application may take you as fast as an hour or a week or two weeks to do, depending on how quickly. The parts that are going to take you the longest are the statements. And so even on the first day when it opens, which hits January 15 of 2025.
Evan Franulovich 16:31
Be ready.
Jasmine Meraz 16:32
Everything else you can get done, even if those things take you a week to two weeks, three weeks to do, our statements are also always available on our website. And so even if things change, sometimes the only thing that'll change are like the helpful tips for writing it. But the questions relatively always stay the same year by year.
Evan Franulovich 16:50
Gotcha. So website, can you give the listeners your website? So they know where to go.
Jasmine Meraz 16:56
www.seattlecollegesfoundation.com, and then on the right hand side, it'll have a menu option, go down to scholarship information, and that's where you'll find everything you can possibly find regarding our application and our system and questions. We even have FAQs for students. And even then, if you have additional questions, we do have our emails available as well.
Evan Franulovich 17:19
Right, right, right. And we can help you as well. If you are an international student and you're applying to Seattle Colleges, you can reach out to your regional representative and they can point you in the right direction, or they can get that information for you. So that's good to know. One of the other things that I get asked quite a bit often is about the references. They have to have two. Yeah?
Jasmine Meraz 17:41
So currently, this year, we have changed it where it was only one required and one optional.
Evan Franulovich 17:46
Okay.
Jasmine Meraz 17:47
And so even if students aren't able to have references, while it's highly encouraged, often, there are students who don't have someone that they can either because they're still in high school, or they've been out of school, or they really are a commuter student, where they really just go to class and that's all they're able to do. And so we also don't want students to feel discouraged by that, so there is leeway around that. Often we tell students that if they aren't able to have a reference, or they don't think anyone's will be able to be a reference in that amount of time, we always suggest maybe just putting either your own name and email, just so the system marks it as complete. Of course, we would love students to have references if they're able to, but we also understand that every student situation is a bit differen.
Evan Franulovich 18:29
Sure.
Jasmine Meraz 18:29
And so if they have questions regarding those references, they can always email me for more specifics along that.
Evan Franulovich 18:36
But I personally would encourage you to be creative thinking about this. You can do teachers, you can do youth group leaders, you can do religious leaders. There's a lot of people you probably know in your community.
Jasmine Meraz 18:49
The only people we currently tell that you cannot have is family members.
Evan Franulovich 18:55
Yes, right.
Jasmine Meraz 18:56
Or if you have say, family friends of some kind, as soon as they mentioned that you have a like familial relationship.
Evan Franulovich 19:04
Right.
Jasmine Meraz 19:04
You may it may not be qualified as weapons, because now they have some form of family tie to you.
Evan Franulovich 19:10
Right, right.
Jasmine Meraz 19:11
But anybody else, mentor, coach, teacher, counselor, coach, nurse, caseworker, plethora of options.
Evan Franulovich 19:19
Yeah, if you're a young person out there, or even young I mean, do some volunteer work. Let people get to know you, get out there in the community, and then it's a nice way for people to vouch for the your qualities, both character and work ethic, that kind of stuff. That's really good to know. So the application opens in January, and from what I understand, it's a couple months. It's the window is only open for a couple months.
Jasmine Meraz 19:47
Yes. So the application opens January 15, and then it closes March 18, 11:59, Pacific Standard Time.
Evan Franulovich 19:55
Good to know.
Jasmine Meraz 19:55
So as long as you get it in, I would even say before 11:59 because if there's too many people on the site, it will crash. And we monitor it throughout the night of the application. But we also don't want to stay up until midnight in the morning.
Evan Franulovich 20:11
Of course.
Jasmine Meraz 20:11
...monitoring it. So we would suggest at least, like, maybe try to finish it by 10pm the latest that night, if you really can't get to it, just because sometimes questions may not load the way you want them to, maybe something you're trying to upload isn't uploading right, and so you just want to give yourself enough time to do it.
Evan Franulovich 20:29
Sure. Yeah, be mindful of the time zones, guys. If you're over in Africa or Middle East, that's a long, that's a big change. But I recommend getting it done early, I mean, it opens in January, don't wait till middle of March to do your application, for sure. Okay, and then once it closes, you guys are reviewing. How long does it take for them to get a response back?
Jasmine Meraz 20:53
Yeah. So usually it takes us another month and a half to get to a completion part. And so after the application closes on the 18th we do a review check for application. So it could be that students did complete it, but the submit button wasn't working, and most of the students will email us, so we have to go in and check the system, and that usually takes us about two days or so to do, and then from there, students will get put into assignments from the reviewer side so that we can actually be reviewed and scored. That usually takes us about two weeks to a month to do, depending on how quickly reviewers are able to complete. They also have their own timeline that they have.
Evan Franulovich 21:35
Sure.
Jasmine Meraz 21:36
And then from there, the matching takes another two weeks to three weeks. And so like I said, we match you to scholarships that best describes your application, especially for international students or undocumented students. We want to ensure that you're going to qualify for the scholarships that you're able to qualify for, just because of the status issue, we don't want it to be an issue for you, tax purposes. So we're very, very diligent about putting you into the correct scholarship group, that way there's no issues down the line when you have to complete any other paperwork. And so usually we will say around middle of May is when we'll notify so the goal is always before the end of spring quarter, especially for students who have anticipations of starting summer of that year, which is often is the case for a lot of international students. And so from there, students get another two weeks to complete once they if they decide to accept a scholarship, they have two weeks to complete what's called the post acceptance questionnaire.
Evan Franulovich 22:38
This is really important, so listen carefully.
Jasmine Meraz 22:40
So this includes student bio, so obviously talking about yourself, your name and the quarters that you indicated for enrollment, and then the campus. And so the campus part is important, because if you selected, say Central, for example, and actually you're going to be at North, you should notify us, let us know through email as well, because some of our scholarships are not gonna be able to be transferable to North even though they are a district wide system. And so we don't want students to then, like, down the line be like, oh, but I thought I had this scholarship, and it's, well, the scholarship, you can only have it at this campus, and so the sooner the better. And so that's often what we use the post acceptance for.
Evan Franulovich 23:21
Right. Well, I saw a note about nursing students. What if they change majors? I mean, should they notify you if they change majors?
Jasmine Meraz 23:30
Yes, that as well. So often, what happens in those more programs specific scholarships like nursing is we will email the dean or the program administrator of the program to verify enrollment. And so they will give us, at least for nursing, they give us like a quarter system. So we'll know this the students anticipated quarters to be enrolled and at what campus.
Evan Franulovich 23:52
Gotcha.
Jasmine Meraz 23:53
And so we'll have that information beforehand. And so we wouldn't even either we will or won't give the scholarship to a student based on that verification, and so it makes it a little bit easier. That's why, when I say we really try our best to match it to a scholarship, we are very, very much like line by line, looking at everything when your enrollments are versus the program to make sure that you're going to be able to receive your money.
Evan Franulovich 24:19
Gotcha. Well, with so many scholarships out there, you talked about what, 300 plus or whatever. I mean, what's the maximum amount of money someone might get?
Jasmine Meraz 24:29
The most on averages, we like to say around $4700 to $5,000.
Evan Franulovich 24:34
Okay.
Jasmine Meraz 24:35
Which for a community colleges is a very, very great number.
Evan Franulovich 24:38
Great, it's almost half.
Jasmine Meraz 24:40
Of course, if you get other scholarships on top of that, like we are one foundation, and then South Seattle College Foundation has a separate application. And so it could be that you get scholarships from both of them, because we don't intermingle in those sense. So if you're an international student who is looking to be at South you could apply to both South Foundation. And Seattle Colleges foundation.
Evan Franulovich 25:01
Wow, that's it. I did not know that. And does North and Central have their own?
Jasmine Meraz 25:07
So, it's just South, and it's only for students at South taking courses at South. So unless you're 100% certain that you're going to be at South, apply. But if you're not there, their scholarships do not transfer over to Central. And there's some students who love that campus. It is a great campus, and it might be a great campus for you.
Evan Franulovich 25:26
And this is a compelling reason, maybe, to go to South more scholarship opportunities. Interesting. How many internationals...? I mean, how much competition is there? I mean, we have over 1000 international students. Of those, how many international scholarship applications do you see?
Jasmine Meraz 25:46
Let's see. So this year, we had around over 1200 applicants, and about that...
Evan Franulovich 25:51
Total?
Jasmine Meraz 25:51
Yes, that was total. And maybe I want to say almost a fourth of the applicants were international students. And that could be either the student didn't indicate international or that they did at some point of the application. And so sometimes the numbers look a little rough depending on how the student writes it into the system themselves. Some students don't put anything until we can identify if they are or they're not.
Evan Franulovich 26:16
Gotcha.
Jasmine Meraz 26:17
So we could have anywhere between 300 students that are international students to maybe 800 we really don't know.
Evan Franulovich 26:24
Okay.
Jasmine Meraz 26:25
Or students who have started the application but never completed it, which is a whole other number, which often is the case for a lot of international students, is they'll start the application but they won't actually complete it.
Evan Franulovich 26:36
Well, maybe I should ask then, how many international students received awards.
Jasmine Meraz 26:42
It depends by campus.
Evan Franulovich 26:44
Okay.
Jasmine Meraz 26:46
Top of my head maybe anywhere from like 30% to 50% students per campus.
Evan Franulovich 26:50
Okay.
Jasmine Meraz 26:51
It depends, like I said, it changes every year, and it depends, of course, if you actually end up being enrolling, and so that's another that's a different number that you wouldn't have until the student came on campus.
Evan Franulovich 27:02
But even the rough numbers you're telling me, what that indicates to me is that a lot of you current students, aren't applying. So guys apply, there's, I mean, there's no harm in applying.
Jasmine Meraz 27:15
Yeah.
Evan Franulovich 27:15
The worst case is that you don't get the scholarship. Best case is you could save a lot of money towards your tuition, and then you can use it later, when you go to your four year. Let's talk about that transfer process for a sec. So if they go from here to the four year, does the money follow them?
Jasmine Meraz 27:36
No.
Evan Franulovich 27:36
Oh, it doesn't.
Jasmine Meraz 27:37
It does not. So all of our scholarships are academic basis. And so they only are concurrent during the academic year which they receive it and apply. And so currently, for the students of this year, they're only eligible for Summer 24 Fall 24, Winter 25, Spring 25. Any remaining dollars that remain unused will go back into the pool of that scholarship.
Evan Franulovich 28:01
Oh, interesting.
Jasmine Meraz 28:02
Yeah, and that's something we don't have control over.
Evan Franulovich 28:04
Sure.
Jasmine Meraz 28:05
That was just something that when when we came in, that was the notification, just because the dollars they want them to be used for Seattle Central or district wide students.
Evan Franulovich 28:15
Right. Okay, so let's say they start in spring. So they wouldn't use money in the fall. They wouldn't use money in the winter. It would they could start using the money in spring.
Jasmine Meraz 28:29
It depends. So our annual cycle application the earliest you would receive it, so if you apply. So in this case, for this current cycle, right? It was January 15 through March 15, notification went out May of 2024, and students were able to use it as early as summer quarter 2024 summer.
Evan Franulovich 28:47
They could use it summer.
Jasmine Meraz 28:49
But if they're, if you're, say, for whatever reason, you weren't able to be enrolled fall quarter, but you received a scholarship for this year. You still have two other quarters of eligibility, and so you would still have winter and spring quarter that you could use it, but anything after that, it is essentially lost dollars for the student.
Evan Franulovich 29:09
So let's say they win. Let's just say they max, get the maximum award of $5,000 if they're only going to have two quarters of eligibility, can they use all $5000.
Jasmine Meraz 29:21
Students have the option to request a one time amendment form. So say, in the application they originally put three quarters, and they're actually going to only be enrolled for two quarters. They could request an amendment form from us, but it's a one time per year, and that's for any change that you want to make to your award.
Evan Franulovich 29:38
I didn't know that.
Jasmine Meraz 29:39
So if a student for whatever reason say, oh, I thought I was going to be enrolled for three quarters, but I only need to be enrolled for two quarters. I need to request an amendment form. We will change the terms of disbursement so that, say, $5,000 instead of between three quarters, it would be two quarters. But the financial aid is the final determinant, they are the ones who determine how much you actually received based on your credit amount, and then, of course, your status. So if you're an international student, you're already paying a higher percentage...
Evan Franulovich 30:07
Sure.
Jasmine Meraz 30:07
...Compared to a resident on resident tuition. And so it's going to vary as well,
Evan Franulovich 30:13
Interesting and just so you guys know, they don't just get a check, right?
Jasmine Meraz 30:18
It goes directly through your account as a student through the bank, bank mobile if there's a refund to be made, and so no check is ever sent from us or the financial aid office of a refund of any amount to you. It goes directly to your student account, and then the financial aid office, they're the ones who manually, which I didn't know, manually, have to go through each student's award and input the correct amount per whatever, which takes a lot of time, which is why some students may see delays in their awards. And often it's because, if you're changing credits, say you're going from 15 credits enrolled to nine, they have to make those adjustments.
Evan Franulovich 30:53
Oh, gotcha.
Jasmine Meraz 30:54
And so it takes a while or you go from nine credits to 12 credits, again, you have to make those adjustments to the awards.
Evan Franulovich 31:01
Of course, if you're an international student, don't forget, you have to be doing at least 12 in order to maintain your visa status. So stick at 12. Let's say they start a quarter, and then, for some reason, let's say grandma gets sick, so they have to leave the country before coming back. What happens to the, so they get a refund? What happens?
Jasmine Meraz 31:21
So if they're going to be back within the same quarter again, you would still request that amendment form.
Evan Franulovich 31:26
Oh, okay.
Jasmine Meraz 31:27
Hey, I had originally said that I was going to be enrolled fall, winter and spring, but I have a family emergency and I'm not going to be enrolled winter quarter. But still planning to be enrolled for spring. They were still requesting amendment form. We would make that no change and let the financial aid office know, hey, this student notify us that they're not going to be enrolled. So we need to move the dollars around to receive what they would have gotten winter quarter for spring.
Evan Franulovich 31:50
Cool. Hmm, really interesting. Now, in what I've been telling students, so I hope this is correct, is that they can apply every year.
Jasmine Meraz 31:59
Yes, so even if you weren't awarded one year, that doesn't mean you won't be awarded the next year. If you're awarded one year, you may be rewarded again. There's just no way of doing it. All depends on how you get scored. And so that's how we base our system is students who score anywhere from a 90 and it's based out of 25 points.
Evan Franulovich 32:19
Okay.
Jasmine Meraz 32:19
And so a student who gets 100%, or a 25 out of 25, may be eligible for the highest amount of scholarships available, but again, it'll be based on maybe you're in a specific program, maybe you're only going to be enrolled for one quarter, and so there's a lot of lot of back and forth computer work for us trying to match you to a scholarship That doesn't say that doesn't say that students who score less won't, because we all still filter the system. So we will go based on like all students who are science in a science program. It doesn't matter what, just say science and it'll just give us a list, and we'll go through everything as much as we can to select a student.
Evan Franulovich 32:58
So is is there a particular major that gets a lot more consideration than others?
Jasmine Meraz 33:06
No.
Evan Franulovich 33:06
No. So there's not more money available for say, computer science majors than for say, drama majors?
Jasmine Meraz 33:13
Yes and no. I think it also depends on what the enrollment looks like for those programs those years. If that scholarship is available that year. It could also just be like if the student is actually enrolled in those programs, because again, we still have to go through verification program.
Evan Franulovich 33:28
Sounds like a lot of work.
Jasmine Meraz 33:29
It is a lot of work. But luckily, all of the program administrators do a really great job of letting us know, or they'll say, 'Just give you the names and I'll verify for you,' or the other way around, where they will give us the list of the students. So often, that's like the carpentry programs; wood tech will always send us which programs they're in. Graphic design, culinary, fire science, watch tech—those programs will send us often, because we have one or two scholarships designated for students in those programs.
Evan Franulovich 33:57
Okay, gotcha.
Jasmine Meraz 33:57
But we also have scholarships that are very broad, where anybody could get it.
Evan Franulovich 34:02
Right.
Jasmine Meraz 34:02
And so say, if we have two students in a watch technology program at North specifically, and they have, say, two scholarships available for $5,000 as an example. Not saying this is what it is, this is just plain example. And they only have two students in those in that program that applied, well, we are going to get them to them, and then the other general scholarship, that could also be $5,000 we could give it to another student.
Evan Franulovich 34:27
Gotcha. What about other categories, like, say, gender or race or? No?
Jasmine Meraz 34:32
No. Specifically, all we look at is program enrollment. That is something we are very...
Evan Franulovich 34:40
Gotcha.
Jasmine Meraz 34:40
Yeah.
Evan Franulovich 34:41
Very good. So we have a lot of different programs at Seattle Colleges. Most people come here for two plus two. They do two years, then they transfer. But we also have things like short term certificates, we have Intensive English Program, we have vocational technical programs. Is the scholarship good for any of those programs?
Jasmine Meraz 35:01
No.
Evan Franulovich 35:02
No?!
Jasmine Meraz 35:02
So the only programs currently that the scholarships aren't eligible for is students who are in like ELL courses or BTS courses only because their classes aren't graded on a credit scale. And so it's different.
Evan Franulovich 35:19
So are international students that come here, and before they're able to take college, they have to bring their English level up. So they're in SCIE, they're in the Intensive English program.
Jasmine Meraz 35:28
Those closures don't count because they're not enrolled in program or a study, and so in their transcript, it won't show us a letter grade or credits.
Evan Franulovich 35:40
Gotcha.
Jasmine Meraz 35:40
And that's a whole other thing that I didn't even understand when I came to this college. So essentially, if a student is transferring out of those programs, then yes, because when they upload their transcript, it'll still show like ELL567 or BTS, whatever it may be. And then the student will tell us, 'Oh, we have indication that we're going to be now fully enrolled in the program, say, computer science.' Then that's all we need. But they have to be graduating from those programs into Math 215, Writing 44, or whatever it may be.
Evan Franulovich 36:17
Right, interesting. Okay, I didn't know that. So we also have a high school completion plus program, and those students have to be 16 by the first day of classes to start, but you know, our students can apply up to 15 months in advance, so they might be 14 and a half years old when they're applying. Is there an age limit? Anybody can...
Jasmine Meraz 36:40
No, I mean, our oldest student that we had on our application, I believe, was like over 80.
Evan Franulovich 36:46
What?!
Jasmine Meraz 36:46
Yeah.
Evan Franulovich 36:47
That's awesome.
Jasmine Meraz 36:48
And then our youngest student I think we saw in the application was, I think, 14-13, years old.
Evan Franulovich 36:53
Okay.
Jasmine Meraz 36:54
So, I mean, if the school allows you to come to school, I don't see why.
Evan Franulovich 36:58
Sure, sure. Okay, and then we talked about the selection process, there are the different parts: personal statement, financial need, perseverance through challenges, engagement in their community, and academics. There are those five different areas you guys talk about. Does any one of those have more weight than the others?
Jasmine Meraz 37:18
The statements.
Evan Franulovich 37:19
The statements.
Jasmine Meraz 37:19
The statements, is what gets grade did the hardest.
Evan Franulovich 37:22
Okay.
Jasmine Meraz 37:23
Among other things, and that's only because we have so many students that have gaps everywhere else in their application. The statement is the only way we can get the students story.
Evan Franulovich 37:33
Gotcha.
Jasmine Meraz 37:33
We get their understanding of why they're wanting to come to this specific college, why they're wanting to study what they're studying, what family or personal experience brought them to this point.
Evan Franulovich 37:43
Right.
Jasmine Meraz 37:43
That is what mainly we will look at. Because, I mean, like I said, we've had students who were, you know, have a bachelor's degree and a master's degree, and then all of a sudden, made a career change, and they are coming back to school to study something completely different than what they did before.
Evan Franulovich 37:56
Right, yeah.
Jasmine Meraz 37:56
Yeah, we have students who may have received FASFA in prior years from getting a bachelor degree, and then now, obviously they're no longer eligible for financial aid, but the career that they intended to wasn't working now, and so they're now making a shift into that. And so it's not.
Evan Franulovich 38:15
And by the way, you have heard her say FAFSA and WASFA. If you're an international student, it doesn't apply to you. Don't worry about it. Those are for domestic students. Interesting. You talked about being notified, how do they get notified?
Jasmine Meraz 38:35
Yeah, via email. So we send out two emails. One is sent through the system, which is AwardSpring. Often those end up going into the student's email, whether that's a junk file, because your email may not recognize it.
Evan Franulovich 38:50
Right.
Jasmine Meraz 38:50
And so I would suggest clearing out your inbox, because if your inbox is full and you're not able to receive emails, you won't know. And so that's often either junk mail or spam, but it's through AwardSpring—it's just an alert that tells you that you have a notification in Award Spring. And then we also send either a congratulations or a denial notice, one or the other, regardless of what it is for your case, to either your Seattle Colleges email or your personal email. And so I would also suggest making sure that that is correct before you submit it, because we do end up getting a lot of undeliverable emails, since you might put two periods where they aren't supposed to be, or you put ".con" instead of ".com", which happens most often. We don't have the ability to go through every single email when we're sending these notifications out, so just making sure it's the most up to date. And then if you have additional secondary emails, those as well get sent to a massive listserv for those students. And so those are the two notifications. And then when you are awarded, you will also get reminders to complete the award questionnaire that is required up until the date of the deadline. And so we want to ensure that if you're going to get it, we want to know that you got the information. And then, of course, if you're not going to be attending Seattle Colleges, we want to know that as well, so that way we're not bombarding you with repeated emails.
Evan Franulovich 40:15
Right. So if you are in an English class, you would proofread your paper before you turned it in, just like that, double check everything before you turn it in for consideration.
Jasmine Meraz 40:28
And I am also available to check the application with you. And so if a question is confusing to you, you could either screenshot it or send it to us. Or if there's something happening where it's not letting you submit the application. Also let us know, because if it's happening to you, it could be happening to 50 other students, and just no one is saying anything. And so if there's any issues that are coming along in the application when you're doing it, let us know, because then we're able to get it fixed through award spring, sooner than later, especially day of the deadline. We don't want any hiccups. And so if there is an issue we want to know before it it gets worse.
Evan Franulovich 41:04
And if you're overseas and you're listening to this, you'll be like, 'What's AwardSpring?' It's just simply a third-party software.
Jasmine Meraz 41:10
That's the software that you will use to apply.
Evan Franulovich 41:13
Gotcha.
Jasmine Meraz 41:13
From there, all of that information is imported into our system, and so it's just a way for students to have one designated spot to do everything. You don't have to have all of these other additional things. It's just this is a system. We take all the information. You don't have to worry about any of it.
Evan Franulovich 41:30
Cool. You have a background in scholarships, it sounds like. I always get asked about scholarships. We tell them about the Foundation Scholarship. The only other scholarship I kind of know about a little bit is Phi Theta Kappa. There's some money available there, but you've been around. So do you know of other scholarships international students might want to think about applying for outside of the foundation scholarship?
Jasmine Meraz 41:56
I would still go into your specific interest area, because sometimes, like, say, the orange sciences, they may have outside scholarships that don't pertain to us at all, that maybe is only on their listserv. The Financial Aid Office may have their own listserv of other outside scholarships. And so we can't give you a specific "go to this scholarship," because, again, they all range in ages, amounts, requirements, whether it's citizenship or not, and so pretty much any program that you may be interested in, I would still suggest, so like, if you're going to be in the Arts and Sciences, maybe go on and just say, "Hey, are there specific scholarships that I could apply to that allow for international students to apply?"
Evan Franulovich 42:42
Do your research.
Jasmine Meraz 42:42
Yeah.
Evan Franulovich 42:43
Used to be back in the day, I'm older, so when I went to school, there were books that were this thick, you know, with all the scholarships out there. We didn't have the internet back then. But, yeah, just now it's fairly easier.
Jasmine Meraz 42:56
They have one, it might be called, I don't know if they changed the name. It used to be like, Fastweb.com, or something along those lines. I have it somewhere. I can't remember the name of it, but they have, like, it's a whole system online that's for all scholarships that are available. Like, not just maybe even for here, like, say, on the East Coast or wherever else. It's just scholarships that are out there year-round, like our application is only one time per year. But they're applications that are just always continuously taking in applications, or they always have one application every quarter. And so it doesn't hurt to just look up, you know, scholarships for international students or, like, no residency required scholarships, just anything that you can find, because sometimes Google and all of these other systems will pop everything up.
Evan Franulovich 43:46
So maybe I can get that link from you. I'll put the link in the description box, so you can go down and then click on that and go out and look for that money. Everybody is challenged, as far as money goes, so do your research. We'll try to give you a little bit of help there. It talks a lot about campus involvement, volunteering, that kind of thing. What are some of the things you recommend students do to increase their chances? Like, does student leadership seem a little bit better than if they have a job on campus? Or do you guys like to see them having a job on campus? Or does having a job on campus reduce the likelihood that they'll get a scholarship?
Jasmine Meraz 44:32
We like seeing students having a variety of things, because it gives us an idea of where our students are at. We have students who would love to be able to be volunteers and be in leadership, but they have a full-time job commitment, and so that's often the inhibitor for them to be able to be involved. Other students aren't able to have a job outside of campus because of their status. So school engagement is the only thing they can have. And so we'd love to see all forms of engagement, whether that's volunteering at a local church, whether that's volunteering at the library, whether that's being, I don't know, like in Key Club for students who are in high school, whether it's being in leadership or just, you know, sporadic volunteer opportunities that come up in the areas where you're at. We love to see all of it.
Evan Franulovich 45:16
Right. And don't discount what you do in your communities. Guys, a lot of kids think, "Oh, I have no experience." But hey, did you maybe work at a food fair for your club one day? I mean, that's at least something for you to put down. And if you aren't truly doing anything now, you're never too young to start. Start volunteering, being involved in your community or whatever—it all helps.
Jasmine Meraz 45:46
Even if it's once a week or once a month.
Evan Franulovich 45:49
Whatever you can.
Jasmine Meraz 45:50
Yeah, whatever you can. And sometimes it doesn't even have to be that volunteer work. There's often students who are maybe supporting a family member in caregiving, and that's something that they like to put on there. It's great—their parents and their full-time job is taking care of their children, and that takes up most of their time. That's all part of who you are as a student. That's all something we want to see in students. So just because it's not what people may see as engagement or involvement, it still takes up your time outside of classes, and that's what we want to see—what are you doing outside of school.
Evan Franulovich 46:21
And this is really important to hear because when I'm overseas, a lot of students in the regions that I serve are so used to it all being about grades. It's all about what's your grade point, or how are you doing in school? Kind of the cool thing about the United States, in my opinion, is that we try to look at you as more of a whole package. Yeah. So guys, we do things a little differently here. We want to know who you are, what your story is, yeah. Of course, we want to see you getting good grades. But all these other things are really important as well. Let's see. I think we've covered most of the really important things. I just want to check my notes here. Great. Well, is there anything else you want to make sure that they know that I haven't asked before we start to wrap this up? I think it's important that they get all the information from you that we can while we have you here. And there are just some things I don't know, what I don't know? I mean, something I haven't asked that they need to hear about.
Jasmine Meraz 47:26
Yeah, I think whether you're questioning any form of yourself academically, that's completely normal. I mean, it's easy for students who are doing this for the first time and don’t have family or some form of support system. It's often easy to get discouraged by an application, but we are truly here to help. We have office hours available through Zoom. Of course, time differences may vary, but we can accommodate a lot of students. I studied abroad when I was in college, and the time difference was, I think, 11 or 16 hours.
Evan Franulovich 48:02
Oh, where'd you go?
Jasmine Meraz 48:03
I went to Kampala, Uganda.
Evan Franulovich 48:06
Shout out to Kampala!
Jasmine Meraz 48:10
That's often what we see a lot of with students. So if you have any questions regarding the application, as small as they may seem, always send us an email with whatever questions you have. Just make sure that you're writing the text in the actual message body and not in the subject line. Often, we have gotten emails from students who write it through their phone and try to send it, and it says, "I need help with the..." but then it cuts off because it's in the subject line. So then I'm like, "Actually, can you repeat that?" Also, please ensure that your message is in English; unfortunately, we can't understand all languages. Just try to make it as simple as you can—just say, "I have a question about the application," and we will follow up and ask what it is. We can go from there.
Evan Franulovich 48:57
So if you're a current student here at Seattle Colleges, definitely apply. You have nothing to lose here, guys, and you have a big window to do it in. So no excuses. If you're a prospective student, apply. If they get awarded, they can actually inform admissions, and that can be put on their I-20. So that can be something you can show a visa officer. It's like, "Hey, I've already received a scholarship." It doesn't cover everything, but it is significant. That's really good.
Jasmine Meraz 49:26
Just make sure you communicate with us and the financial aid office for those things, because we don't have it in our system. We would have to notify the financial aid office, as they have all of the coding that indicates you have a scholarship from us. We give you the award notice, and often that's what students may want to use. However, for more formal documents, you may need to go to the financial aid office and ask for that.
Evan Franulovich 49:46
Cool. well, thanks so much for your time. I learned a lot today myself. I'm gonna have to listen to this episode a couple times to make sure I remember it all. It's really good stuff, super so. Super big thanks to you, and thanks for all the work you guys do. Yeah, it's really great. We're just so happy that students are able to defray the cost of the university expenses, especially in the States.
Jasmine Meraz 50:15
And in Seattle, out of all places.
Evan Franulovich 50:17
Seattle, yeah.
Jasmine Meraz 50:19
It's a great city though.
Evan Franulovich 50:20
It is a great city, absolutely. If you do your research again, there are always ways to explore. In my opinion, you just have to keep looking. All right, great to meet you! Thanks so much. Don't forget to like and subscribe; we're here every Wednesday with lots of valuable information. Whether you choose Seattle Colleges or another school, much of what we discussed today will apply elsewhere, but this is definitely a Seattle Colleges episode. Take care, and thanks again! Bye-bye!
Evan Franulovich 50:57
'Conversations with' is painstakingly crafted for you by the Seattle Colleges International Programs department and supported by the lovely folks here on our campus. This show is produced and edited by me Evan Franulovich. We welcome your emails and questions about coming to Seattle Colleges. Please reach out to us via our website or just give us a rating and a review on Apple podcasts as this helps others discover the show. Also, don't forget to follow us on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok or YouTube at Seattle Colleges Intl, that's Seattle Colleges Intl. And be sure to check out all of the shows here on 'Conversations with' Thanks for listening, and we'll see you next week.