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Didn’t get as much merit or financial aid as you were hoping for and want to decrease the out of pocket expense coming due this summer on you college tuition bill?  SCHOLARSHIPS!

Did you know that nationally unused grant and aid money averages $________ per year? (Answer at end of post)

A. Over $1 Million

B. Over $50 Million

C. Over $2 Billion

Local scholarships are one of the best ways to hack away at your tuition bill. Why you ask? Because it's free money that doesn't need to be repaid and there are usually no strings attached! Scholarships are much like grants in that they don't need to be repaid, but they sometimes have requirements you must meet in order to win them, or you may be required to send in a separate application for the scholarship. If the scholarship is awarded by the school itself, you may need to get your admission application materials in earlier than normal to be considered. 

The holidays are quickly approaching which means it won't be long before it's time to hit the slopes and make snow angels. Thankfully, December is a low key month in  for many students terms of college planning and college applications, but that doesn't mean you can slack off. Both Seniors and Juniors have things they can be doing in order to be prepared for the next step. Being proactive and getting ahead will save you the frustration and stress of struggling to meet deadlines in the future.

We've gathered the most important college planning tips for the month of December to help you stay on track.

If your child is heading to college next fall, you've likely spent some time pondering/worrying about how you are going to pay for it. Financial aid, the general term for financial assistance provided to families with a college-bound student, comes in two basic forms: need-based and merit-based. Below, we'll discuss the differences and how each is awarded.

Your child has made a big commitment by choosing to go to college. Likewise, you are putting a large commitment in your child by agreeing to pay for college. But many parents, like yourself, can't help but wonder, "how the heck am I going to pay for this?"

The sticker price on a college education can no doubt lead to shock. If you see that number and wonder how to pay for college with no money, know that there are options available. Most families these days don't pay the sticker price published on a college website.

Here's what you can do so you don't need to either. 

While "shopping" for a college, the sticker price can be quite overwhelming. And unfortunately the trend shows that tuition and fees keep rising higher than the year previously. But on a positive note, there is a pattern in the net price that students are paying. There has been significant increases in grant aid (including scholarships), which allows students to attend college for less than what the college lists on their website. 

There are a handful is mistakes repeated by rising students every year – the age-old errors that frustrate industry professionals primarily because they are so avoidable! Here are the 5 financial aid mistakes that we’d love to never, ever see again:

Scholarship dollars are perhaps the most valuable currency in the financial aid game. Each scholarship represents free money – no repayment, no monthly bills. They also, importantly, represent the faith that an individual or organization is placing in a rising college student. So, how to score them? Read on.

"Scholarship" is a magical word, full of promise and possibility. It's a gamble, really - not for the recipient, but for the individual or organization awarding the precious thing. It's a calculated risk that a student will take a sum of money and that the education she receives, having put that money towards tuition, will make her better, will make the school better, will make us all, by proxy, better. It's a gamble, yes. But it's noble and worthwhile, and students - sometimes the most deserving of students - have been using scholarships for generations to pursue academic careers that would otherwise be completely cost prohibitive.