How scholarship review processes work
Scholarship providers usually only start reviewing applications once the deadline passes. They then usually choose a winner within 3 months of the deadline.
If you’ve won, they’ll contact you by phone or email, and explain to you how you’ll receive your scholarship prize money. Sometimes it will go directly to you (via check or bank deposit), whereas other times it’ll go directly to your college (so you’ll just experience it as a discount on your tuition bill).
If you haven’t heard back from a scholarship provider yet, and it’s been 3+ months since the deadline, then unfortunately that means you probably didn’t win.
Tracking your submissions
You can track/check the statuses of all your submitted applications on your application dashboard, which you can find by clicking Your Scholarships on the left-hand menu of your account.
Once on your My Scholarship Applications page, you'll notice a few tabs at the top of the page:
🔖 Saved - Your saved scholarships appear here
📝 In Progress - Scholarships in draft mode (not submitted) AND external scholarships you've viewed appear here
📨 Submitted - Scholarships you've submitted on Going Merry AND scholarships that you've self-reported to have applied for outside of Going Merry will appear here
🎯 Results - Scholarships that have a 🎉 Won or 🥲 Not selected status will appear here
🔖 Saved tab
Any scholarships you've added to your Saved shortlist will appear under the 🔖 Saved tab.
📝 In Progress Tab
Scholarships submitted outside of Going Merry (these are external scholarships, where you submit your application on another site) will appear under the 📝 In Progress tab.
Scholarships that you're still working on but haven't submitted yet will also appear under the 📝 In Progress tab.
Here's your cheat sheet summary of all the possible statuses on the 📨 Submitted tab:
% Complete: This means you are still working on completing an application that is submitted directly on the Going Merry site. There will be a percentage displayed which will reflect how much of the application you've completed so far. For example, if you're halfway done with the application, your application status will say "50% Complete."
📝 In Progress: This means we noticed that you clicked “Start application” and visited a scholarship's external scholarship link. This is just for your own personal tracking because external scholarship providers don't update Going Merry on your scholarship progress, and we can't know for certain if you applied to a scholarship on an external site or not. You can change the status once you have submitted your application or delete the card if you decide the scholarship wasn’t for you after visiting the external site.
If you submitted a scholarship on an external site, you can change the status of the scholarship from 📝 In Progress to
📨 Submitted,
🎉 Won, or
🥲 Not selected
by clicking the 🖊️ Change Status button to the right of the 📝 In Progress status:
Change the status and be sure to click Save.
If you update the status of your scholarship to 📨 Submitted, the scholarship will then appear under the 📨 Submitted tab. The scholarship will no longer appear under the 📝 In Progress tab.
If you update the status of your scholarship to 🎉 Won or 🥲 Not selected, the scholarship will then appear under the 🎯 Results tab. The scholarship will no longer appear under the 📝 In Progress tab.
📨 Submitted tab
On the 📨 Submitted tab, each scholarship you've applied to is listed, and a banner at the top of the card shows its status.
For example, this scholarship below has a "📨 Submitted" status. Notice that each status has a tooltip you can click to learn more about its meaning (the question mark icon).
Here's your cheat sheet summary of all the possible statuses on the 📨 Submitted tab:
📨 Submitted: This means you’ve submitted your application, but the scholarship provider hasn’t started reviewing it yet. Usually, providers only review applications once the deadline has passed. A 📨 Submitted status will only appear under the 📨Submitted tab.
👀 Under review: This means the scholarship provider is now reviewing all their applications, including yours. Usually, they decide on a winner within 3 months of the scholarship deadline. An 👀 Under review status will only appear under the 📨Submitted tab.
🎯 Results tab
The 🎯 Results tab will display the status of the scholarships that you've won or lost.
External scholarships will only appear here if you self-report the outcome (external scholarship providers don't tell Going Merry who won/lost, which is why you're able to change the status on external scholarships to track if you've won/lost scholarships you've applied to externally).
Here's your cheat sheet summary of all the possible statuses on the 🎯 Results tab:
🥲 Not selected: Sorry, unfortunately, you weren’t selected for the scholarship. Remember that the most successful students still get rejections sometimes. The most important thing you can do to win scholarship money is to just keep applying. A 🥲 Not selected status will only appear under the 🎯 Results tab.
🎉 You Won: Woohoo! This means you’ve been selected as the winner of the scholarship. The scholarship provider should be in touch with you about how you’ll get your prize money. A 🎉 Won status will only appear under the 🎯 Results tab.
On all tabs, you can filter your scholarships to view
All Scholarships
Only Going Merry Scholarships
Only External Scholarships or
Only Local Scholarships
using the Filter by: drop-down menu on the upper right side of the page.
On all tabs, you can arrange your scholarships by
latest deadline
earliest deadline or
most recently added
using the Arrange by: drop-down menu on the upper right side of the page.
Plus, email notifications
In addition, we will send you an email notification when one of your application statuses is updated. We will also notify your counselor when you win a scholarship (but we do not inform them about any other outcomes). This is only applicable to scholarships you submit on Going Merry directly.
External scholarship providers don't tell Going Merry who won/lost so you won't receive an email if your application status changes on an external scholarship (because you're the one who would've changed the status to reflect if you won or lost an external scholarship).
If your financial aid offer wasn't enough to cover your bill, we recommend you submit an appeal. Learn more about financial aid appeals here.
If you'll need a student loan to cover the rest, begin by researching the lender that will give you the best rate. Most private lenders allow you to answer a few questions risk-free and then get your estimated interest rate. You’re under no obligation to actually get the loan. We recommend checking with Earnest first. Get your rate estimate from Earnest here.