Best Personal Essay Writing Scholarships in 2025

The Pride Foundation provides essential financial resources and community support to inspirational LGBTQ+ and allied student leaders across the Northwest. Applicants must be from Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, or Washington to be eligible. Applications open in October of each year and all 60+ scholarships may be applied for through the same application form.

The Helen Lansdowne Resor Scholarship offers its awardees a $10,000 scholarship to put toward their education, an internship at Wunderman Thompson, and other mentorship and post-graduate opportunities. Any female undergraduate or postgraduate student with at least a year left of their studies is eligible. Applicants must submit personal statement, letters of recommendation, and 3-5 creative samples.

The Mary Quon Moy Ing Memorial Scholarship will award up to $2,000 to a graduating high school senior who will be attending a college or university to pursue a journalism career. A winner will be selected based on academic and journalistic achievement, financial need, commitment to journalism and/or sensitivity to AAPI issues. Applicants must submit a resume, brief personal statements, and optional work samples.

We want to know…what do you dream about? Whether it's some bizarre dream you had last week, or your hopes for the future, share your dreams with us for a chance to win $1,500 for college. Response should be limited to 250 words or less.

We award small artist support grants ($500 – $2,000) to individual feminist women in the arts who are citizens in the U.S and Canada. We welcome applications from women artists and writers who exhibit high quality and originality, use feminism as their central interpretive lens, and validate and express intersectional views.

The winner of this award receives $2,000, an invitation to accept the award at our annual awards ceremony, promotion on our website, and a feature of their work in our journal and quarterly newsletter. Candidate must submit a 5-to-10 page story or essay on one of the chosen topics. Candidate must also be entering the sophomore, junior or senior year in the fall at any HBCU in the US.

Arts for Life! annually awards $1,000 scholarships to 25 graduating high school seniors in Florida who demonstrate excellence in creative writing, dance, drama, music or visual art. To apply, students must submit a completed application, a brief essay explaining “how the arts have positively influenced my life,” and a portfolio of work in creative writing, dance, drama, music, or visual art.

Receive up to $15,000 in funding and join a community of more than five hundred alumni now teaching in higher education. Applicants must submit all required materials including personal statements, academic writing samples, and an essay responding to the question: "What is the relationship between liberal education and a free society?”

The Davidson Fellows Scholarship awards $50,000, $25,000 and $10,000 scholarships to extraordinary young people, 18 and under, who have completed a significant piece of work. Application categories are Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, Literature, Music, Philosophy and Outside the Box. Literature applicants must submit a 60- to 75-page portfolio displaying a number of literary styles and genres.

This scholarship is awarded to daughters of career-commissioned officers in the United States armed services. The selection will be based on both merit and financial need. The application process includes: an essay, a secondary school report, a letter of recommendation from a member of the applicant’s community, and a Student Aid Report (SAR).

Each year we award one $1,000 scholarship to an upperclass student at the University of Oklahoma. Applicants should be enrolled full-time during the current school year in a journalism, communication, advertising or equivalent degree program, with plans to pursue a newspaper career upon graduation. Applicants must attach resumé and describe why you are eligible for this need-based scholarship.