Guaranteed Scholarship Help--Not So Much

March brings many things--March Madness Basketball; Snow; Spring; and College Decisions. Many High School Seniors and their families are sorting through the college acceptances, making that important decision of where to commit to attend. One factor of where to attend is the cost and scholarships can play a large role in the end cost of the school. Unfortunately, there are unscrupulous companies out there preying on prospective college students--claiming that they can guarantee scholarships for them and that they have access to scholarships that no one else does. All the claims lead the student to pay the company for this "assistance" but does not lead to the student getting these "guaranteed" scholarships. The Federal Trade Commission has great info on scholarship scams on its website. Basically, there's no reason to pay any money to get a scholarship. Research possible scholarships by checking College Board , your school's Counseling Center, your elected officials, the prospective college's Financial Aid office and FinAid's website. I even found a scholarship opportunity for my son on Twitter! Put your hard earned money toward tuition, not scholarship scams.

Leaping Forward

Tonight we will move our clocks ahead one hour--here are some other ideas on what we can leap forward to:

• Taking time to think about what our financial goals are and making a plan to meet those goals
• Comparison Shopping--researching an item for reliability and price before buying
• Knowing how much money we have in our checking account at all times
• Creating a Spending Plan--and checking it every week
• Staying away from deals that seem "to good to be true"
• Checking used items that we buy to make sure they haven't been recalled
• Minimizing our risk by checking our insurance policies
• Creating an Emergency Savings Fund
• And, of Course, Changing Those Batteries in Your Smoke Detector!

Happy Daylights Savings!