No-essay scholarships: drawings, odds and what to expect

What a no-essay scholarship is

A no-essay scholarship asks for little more than your contact details and a few eligibility answers. Many of the best known are run by scholarship sites themselves:

• ScholarshipOwl describes a $50,000 No Essay Scholarship: a monthly random draw for four students at $1,000 each, plus two extra winners in December, with automatic entry when you sign up and no fee.
• Niche lists a $40,000 Niche No Essay Scholarship with one winner and no requirements, and also links a $2,000 no-essay award.
• BigFuture, from the College Board, offers $40,000 and $500 BigFuture Scholarships with no essay and no minimum GPA or test score; you earn entries by completing planning steps.
• Sallie Mae's Scholly offers a $5,000 Grad School No Essay Scholarship and a $2,000 No Essay Scholarship.

How the odds work

When winners are drawn at random, your chance depends on how many people enter, and the sites do not publish entry counts on the pages we read. Large prizes attract large numbers of entries. A drawing with one winner is a long shot, however big the prize.

That does not make them pointless. Entering takes a minute. Just do not let them replace awards where effort counts, such as local scholarships, essay contests and awards for a specific major.

How winners are picked and contacted

Read the rules for who chooses and how you are told. Niche says winners are selected and notified by email by Votigo, its scholarship fulfillment partner, and that official mail comes only from Niche or @votigo.com. It also says that if a winner does not reply within two weeks, a new winner is drawn. Check your spam folder during the notification period.

What you give in return

Entry usually means creating an account. That is how the site grows its audience, and your profile then falls under its privacy policy. Several sites running no-essay awards say in their policies that they may sell or share personal information. Read the policy and turn off the partner contact you do not want.

A sensible approach

1. Enter the no-essay awards from sites you already use.
2. Put a reminder in your calendar for monthly drawings rather than signing up for every new one.
3. Spend most of your scholarship time on awards with smaller applicant pools, especially local ones.
4. Never pay to enter a drawing. A fee to enter is a warning sign.

Keep a record of what you entered

Keep a short list of the drawings you have entered, with the site, the date and the notification window. It stops you entering the same award twice, reminds you when to watch your inbox, and shows you at the end of the year which sites were worth the account.