Best Scholarship Management Software
Scholarship management software streamlines the application process for organizations that award scholarships. Scholarship decision-makers use these tools to make the process faster and more efficient for both candidates and reviewers, from collecting applications to selecting award recipients.
Higher education institutions, nonprofit foundations, professional associations, and corporations all use scholarship management software to manage their scholarship programs. Automation functions in scholarship management software enable the collection of customized applications from candidates and assign them to the proper reviewers. By digitizing the process, these tools also reduce paperwork and allow for more frequent communication between applicants, administrators and reviewers.
At college and universities, scholarship management tools often pull student data from student information systems, shortening the amount of time it takes for candidates to fill out applications. Scholarship management software may also integrate with tools that institutions use to manage accounting, human resources, financial aid or academic advising.
To qualify for inclusion in the Scholarship Management category, a product must:
Best Scholarship Management Software At A Glance
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FACTS Grant & Aid Assessment is a comprehensive solution designed to simplify and enhance the financial aid process for K-12 schools. This software solution provides school administrators with fle
SmarterSelect makes managing scholarships, grants, and awards a breeze. Our easy-to-use online platform helps you create applications, review submissions, and pick recipients – all in one place. Wheth
36 Twitter followers
AwardSpring is a powerful, intuitive, and smart scholarship management platform that reduces work for admins and creates powerful connections between donors and applicants by getting more dollars to m
145 Twitter followers
Submittable powers you with tools to launch, manage, measure and grow your grant, giving and volunteering programs, locally and globally. From grants and CSR to awards and scholarship programs, we pa
Transform your institution's student awards program and revolutionize its donor stewardship practices with Blackbaud Award Management. Built for higher education institutions of all types and sizes, t
32,597 Twitter followers
Kaleidoscope is a full-cycle scholarship management platform built to support programs beyond the award. Organizations use Kaleidoscope to manage applications and review, communicate with applicants a
177 Twitter followers
Submit.com is the all‑in‑one platform to collect, manage, and evaluate submissions with ease whether it’s for grants, scholarships, awards, or government programs. From start to finish, Submit.com str
661 Twitter followers
OpenWater streamlines program management with its end-to-end solution for accepting and reviewing applications, awards, grants, scholarships, proposals, and abstracts. OpenWater’s secure, all-in-one p
5,757 Twitter followers
Select your best candidates faster, for grants, scholarships, awards, and other programs. SurveyMonkey Apply simplifies applications and automates workflows so that you can focus on what truly matters
42,961 Twitter followers
Good Grants is an internationalised grantmaking platform that helps small to medium sized grantmakers around the world affordably accept, manage and fund good grant applications, their way. Designe
1,491 Twitter followers
Kinobi is a student success SaaS system provider for universities looking to move beyond traditional academic-focused education and embrace a more comprehensive approach to holistic education. Our sys
Zealous is a cloud-based submissions management platform that helps you focus on your program's impact, not its paperwork. We eliminate the administrative burden of running competitions, awards, grant
Scholarship Lifecycle Manager (SLM) is designed to organize, manage, and streamline your scholarship workflow in one easy-to-use, cloud-based solution so you can free up time to focus on student succe
Reviewr is applicant submission management software utilized by organizations to streamline and enhance various selection processes, including recognition awards, scholarships, grants, fellowships, co
527 Twitter followers
Evalato is the next-gen awards management software that helps you collect applications with ease, empower evaluation and pick the worthiest winners for your programs. It’s the go-to solution for award
2,148 Twitter followers
Learn More About Scholarship Management Software
What is Scholarship Management Software?
Colleges, universities, and nonprofit organizations handle hundreds or thousands of scholarship applications per year, which means administrators must develop efficient processes for gathering, reviewing, and making decisions on scholarship applications. Scholarship coordinators, who are responsible for awarding limited pools of scholarship money, must ensure that their processes attract a robust pool of qualified applicants and identify the recipients who most deserve the funding. Scholarship management software provides a streamlined way for education administrators to manage their scholarship programs. Digitizing scholarship applications with user-friendly software can make the process simpler and more accessible for both students and reviewers, ultimately resulting in a fairer and more efficient system.
Key Benefits of Scholarship Management Software
- Offers user-friendly, clear application processes for applicants
- Automates repetitive administrative tasks
- Simplifies and streamlines the review process for application evaluators
- Improves matching of qualified applicants to scholarships
Why Use Scholarship Management Software?
Simplifies and clarifies the scholarship application process — Using scholarship management software, scholarship administrators can customize application forms according to their needs. Officials can design applications that incorporate workflow with conditional logic, so the questions change dynamically, depending on the applicant’s answers. Colleges and universities can use portals that incorporate the institution’s branding to provide a sense of continuity with the rest of the institution’s assets. Email notifications and personalized applicant portals keep applicants informed about the status of their application. The result is a more accessible process and a better experience for applicants, which should reflect positively on the institution’s reputation.
Automates administrative tasks — Manual scholarship application processes can be cumbersome, requiring administrators to manage paper forms, send out reminders to reviewers, and manually contact applicants to ask questions and communicate decisions. With scholarship management software, many of those functions are automated as paperless applications are automatically passed to the right people. Automated notifications keep both applicants and decision-makers informed.
Makes review process more efficient — Instead of having to collect and manage hundreds or thousands of paper forms, administrators and reviewers who use scholarship management software have all of their records stored digitally in one place. Cloud storage means reviewers can access and review application materials no matter where they are, and automated notifications ensure each applicant, reviewer, or administrator knows when their input is needed. The improved efficiency can lead to quicker decisions on applicants and more time for staff to work on other projects.
Improves scholarship matching — Digitizing the scholarship process means that valuable scholarship opportunities can be opened up to more applicants, since the applications can be distributed via modern channels like email or social media and filled out from anywhere. Some scholarship tools include a database function that allows students to search for scholarships and filter by different eligibility criteria, helping them find scholarships that are a closer match to their unique needs and interests.
Who Uses Scholarship Management Software?
Scholarship management software can be used by any organization that distributes scholarship funding, including colleges and universities, nonprofit organizations, and private K-12 schools. Within those organizations, here are some people that are most likely to be using different aspects of the software.
Applicants — Scholarship applicants may fill out forms generated by scholarship management software, attach letters of recommendation and other files, and check an applicant portal to review updates on the status of their application.
Scholarship coordinators and administrators — Officials who are in charge of managing scholarship programs use these tools to run the process from start to finish. They can design the application form, set up the review workflow, assign reviewers to applications, and configure other aspects of the software to meet the institution’s needs. Administrators can use analytics functions in scholarship management software to generate dashboards that display key metrics on a single screen.
Scholarship reviewers — For people tasked with reviewing and making recommendations or decisions on scholarship applications, scholarship management software can offer a streamlined way to evaluate applicants’ credentials. Many products come with reviewer portals that allow reviewers to see the prospect’s application side-by-side with scoring and commenting functions. The software can also send automated notifications helping reviewers stay informed about where applications are in the process.
Scholarship Management Software Features
Scholarship management software products may have some of the following features, which can generally be broken into two categories: collecting applications and reviewing them.
Application collection:
Customizable application forms — The ability to create a custom application form means institutions can ask the questions that are most relevant to a given scholarship.This provides reviewers with all the information they need to make an informed decision. Administrators can include customized instructions, word count limits, application deadlines, and other elements, depending on the tool.
Smart forms — Many scholarship management tools allow administrators to incorporate conditional logic into their forms, so the questions change dynamically depending on the answers an applicant inputs. This functionality can help filter out applicants who don’t meet a scholarship’s requirements.
Branded website — To create a more seamless connection with the rest of an institution’s online presence, scholarship management products offer application portals with the organization’s branding.
Letters of recommendation integration — For scholarship applications that require a letter of recommendation, scholarship management software can allow applicants to upload a letter and attach it to their application, or even send automated notifications to the people they are requesting a letter from.
File attachments — In addition to letters of recommendation, some products allow applicants to attach other files that they would like reviewers to consider as their application is being evaluated.
Automated messages — After an application has been submitted, scholarship management software can send out email confirmations so applicants know their materials are being processed. Users can also send automated “thank you" notes.
Scholarship matching — Some tools offer matching features that can filter scholarships by eligibility criteria and identify which scholarships an applicant is eligible for.
Application review:
Reviewer portal — Scholarship management software allows reviewers to see application materials in a reviewer portal alongside tools for scoring and commenting. This side-by-side layout means reviewers do not have to flip back and forth between application materials and scoring tools.
Flexible workflows — Scholarship processes vary depending on the institution, so many scholarship management platforms give administrators the ability to customize workflows for applications. For example, administrators could change the number of rounds an application has to go through or who the application goes to after an initial screening.
Automated review assignment — Once an application has been submitted, scholarship management software can automatically assign it to the appropriate reviewer.
Analytics and reports — Scholarship management platforms can display data on an analytics dashboard to give coordinators insight into whether the institution is meeting its goals. These data visualizations could include a variety of information about applicants, like gender, race, region, or test scores. Many programs also offer the ability to export custom reports based on scholarship data.
Communication and application tracking — Much like a CRM system tracks interactions between sales representatives and customers, scholarship management software can track applications and automate communications throughout the scholarship process. These communications could include follow-up questions from reviewers, thank you letters to applicants, notifications of receiving an award, or other messages. Some also include message templates.
Student portals — Some tools include student portals that allow applicants to log in and check the status of their application.
Mobile compatibility — A growing number of platforms are offering mobile compatibility so that information about the scholarship process is accessible on any device.
Potential Issues with Scholarship Management Software
Incompatible integrations — Some scholarship management products offer integrations with other software that colleges and universities use, such as student information systems (SIS). These connections allow the scholarship platform to pull student data from the other system, ensuring that applicant information is up to date and matches the university’s main recordkeeping system. However, scholarship management platforms may not support every SIS, so buyers should investigate a product’s integrations before purchasing to ensure it will work seamlessly with their existing systems.
