As seniors complete their college applications and begin to hear back from institutions, deadlines for scholarships are the next target of interest.

New scholarship opportunities are open to all seniors on their Family Connection accounts on Blackboard.

“Family connections is a source for scholarships,” Career Center Specialist Robin Roth said. “It gives them a list of scholarships applicable to them.”

The scholarship applications can be found under the “colleges” tab and in the “scholarship & money” section of the web page. The students will then be asked by the system to answer questions about their college preferences.

The portal will then give access to an entire page of matching and available scholarships. All the information, including scholarships available deadlines, are included in detail in each link. Students are also provided and encouraged to visit the scholarship source site.

The requirements of each application are also explained. This includes service, GPA, race, recommendation and transcript requirements.

All official transcript requests for scholarships need to be turned into student services in order to be uploaded correctly.

The portal includes all available scholarships to AHS students. Therefore, the deadlines are also varied. The first batch of scholarships will be due in early February.

The Al Neuharth Free Spirit Scholarship is due on February 1. The Jimmy Rane Foundation Scholarship is due on February 8. The VMDAEC Scholarship is due on February 9.

Students should gather all their materials before submitting their application.

“I think it [Family Connections] is great because there is such an easy way to find scholarships,” senior Benjamin Lee said. “College is extremely expensive and I need all the financial help I can get.