Outside Awards

Overview

Why apply for outside awards?

Outside awards benefit undergraduate students by reducing and even eliminating your need to work to help meet your student budget. Your outside awards will reduce the Student Responsibility portion of your financial aid award dollar-for-dollar. Your Stanford scholarship will be reduced only if your outside awards exceed your Student Responsibility. Outside scholarships cannot, however, be used to replace any expected parent contribution if you are receiving need-based aid. The examples below show how outside awards can change your financial aid package.

Outside Award Comparison

Total Outside Awards	0	2,500	5,000	7,500
Academic Year Earnings	2,800	300	0	0
Summer Earnings	2,200	2,200	0	0
Stanford Scholarship	30,000	30,000	30,000	27,500
Federal/State Grants	6,000	6,000	6,000	6,000

In certain cases you may not be able to replace the entire amount of the Student Responsibility with outside awards due to eligibility requirements for federal and state need-based aid funds. You will receive an updated copy of your individualized financial aid award letter when your aid is adjusted for outside awards.

Receiving outside awards

Undergraduate students must notify our office of all outside awards received, including awards paid directly to you. Failure to report this information will result in losing eligibility for Stanford financial aid.

Please report your outside awards after May 15 using the “Report Outside Scholarships” link in the Finances section of the Student Center tab on Axess.  You will find tools there for tracking the status of your outside awards.

• Scholarship agencies should send your awards directly to our office. See the Contact Us page for address information.
• We prefer that your scholarship check be made payable to Stanford University in order to credit it directly to your university bill. Your full name and Stanford ID number should be included in the memo section of the check.  
• Awards made payable to you, or co-payable to you and Stanford, are disbursed by the Student Services Center in Tresidder Union.
• Awards of $500 or more are divided into thirds and credited over the three quarters of the academic year, unless an agency specifies otherwise.
• If you have multiple outside awards that impact your eligibility for need-based funds, you may want to postpone disbursement of some of the awards until future academic years. Stanford cannot hold outside award funds for future years, so you will need to ask the scholarship provider if they would be willing to wait until a future year to disburse your award.

Outside Awards for Graduate Students

Graduate students should report any expected outside awards in the Anticipated Resources section of the Graduate Application. If you receive outside awards after you have filed your application, you should report those awards to us using Axess.  You will find a link for “Report Outside Scholarships” in the Finances section of the Student Center tab, where you will also find tools for tracking the status of your outside awards.  Outside awards may affect your eligibility for loans and Federal Work-Study.