A new scholarship is giving away $2,500 to veterans, active duty troops or their direct family members, including veteran spouses.
That's a broad applicant category. Many scholarships focus on only active duty families or veterans, not the families of those who have already left the military.
The scholarship does maintain one common qualifier: applicants must have not previously earned a bachelor's degree to be eligible. That means it's not available for those looking to fund a masters program, for example.
The one-time payment scholarship is being offered by Bonsai Finance, a veteran-owned business focused on resources to build financial credit, according to their release.
"As a veteran of the U.S. Navy, it's important to support students with a military connection," Britton Smith, CEO and founder of Bonsai Finance said in the release. "Bonsai Finance encourages all students to become more educated about their finances and we established this veteran's scholarship to help alleviate some of the financial burden of higher education."
Originally the scholarship had a GPA requirement. But when I asked if they had considered whether or not that rule would discourage from applying veteran or military spouses who had not been in school or had any kind of GPA for a very long time, they decided to remove the rule.
"We hope this is helpful for military spouses actively looking to go back to school," a company spokesperson said.
To apply for the scholarship applicants must write a 500 word essay describing "how they strive for excellence in their lives, including what accomplishments and challenges they have overcome to achieve success."
The online application has a deadline of Sept. 28, 2018. A winner will be announced Nov. 2.
