GrantMe Reviews: How Abigail Won the $40,000 Beedie Luminaries Scholarship

In this GrantMe Review, we talk to Abigail, who has won over $44,000 in scholarships, including the Beedie Luminaries Scholarship! In this interview, we discuss the Beedie Luminaries scholarship process, her biggest challenge, and some advice for other students looking into scholarships!

For the FULL interview, check out Abigail's video on our youtube channel!

"Tell us about yourself!"

"My name is Abigail. I'm 17, and I started GrantMe a couple months ago -  just a little bit before I graduated, actually. I'm going to university and GrantMe has been a huge help in finding scholarships and learning how to write essays."

"How much did you win with GrantMe and which scholarships?"

“I won $44,500 with Beedie Luminaries, Chacko and Lize Simon Scholarship, and Leonard foundation. For now, anyway.”

"That’s amazing! I was talking to a Beedie Luminaries winner just last week, and we were talking about the interview process. How was that?"

"It was terrifying because I was so nervous right before. There really wasn't any reason to be nervous but I thought, you know, maybe this could be the decision between whether I get it or whether I don’t but it was actually really informal, really casual and it wasn't anything to stress about. So, if anyone gets to this interview, don't stress at all. It's completely fine! I expected a list of questions like, “what are your grades?”, “where are you planning on going?”, “what are you studying?”, but it was really just getting to know who I was."

Interested in knowing more about scholarship interviews? Check out Collin, a GrantMe student who won the Dev Degree Scholarship!

"What was your biggest challenge?"

“What was really hard was making my schedule. You can't procrastinate on everything. You have to make a plan, like, this is what I’m going to do. If you really stick to your schedule, it’s actually not that much work. Another great thing was that a lot of scholarship essays are really similar. If you write for one scholarship, you can kind of copy and paste it to another one or take some paragraphs, and tweak it a little. It gets a lot easier as you go along!"

If you're wondering how the GrantMe team recommends scheduling your time effectively, check out the video below! We summarize our favourite self-development books, most of which are based on the art of time management!

"Do you have a word of advice for students looking into scholarships or interested in GrantMe?"

"I have so much. I’ve been waiting for this. Don't be afraid to apply to the big scholarships. So many times, you’re like “Oh, this is a lot of money. They're going to be for completely spectacular people that I can't be. Don't think like that. Apply for the big ones. Don't be afraid of it. Another thing you should be doing is lots of volunteer work - at least a hundred hours. It’s always going to be coming back and it's always going to be helping you. Even if the volunteer work that I've done didn't come back and help me, I would still do it. It's a blessing. Last, get help. Talk to people who know the area. In the beginning of Grade 12, I was looking into scholarships and I had no idea where to start. I was completely lost. My brother used to tell me to start volunteering, and start working on your grades so that I can get help, and I did all that. And then I was like, “where are the scholarships?" "what do I do?”. So, talk to people who have been on the same path. Go with GrantMe. It’s going to be amazing."

If you'd like the same GrantMe support that helped Abigail win $44,500, take our FREE, two-minute quiz to see if you qualify today!