Columbia Financial Aid and Educational Financing

Search for an Outside Scholarship

Home / Search for an Outside Scholarship / Search for an Outside Scholarship

There are no academic, athletic or talent-based institutional scholarships at Columbia as all of our institutional financial aid is need-based. Our students are often the recipients of merit-based scholarships from outside organizations (state grants/scholarships, local/national merit-based awards, etc.); however, no merit-based aid is offered directly through Columbia University.

Common Outside Scholarship Search Engines

U.S Citizen & Eligible Non-Citizen Students

International / Non-Domestic Students

In addition, most high schools have information regarding local scholarship opportunities and many employers have scholarship programs for the children of employees.

How do outside scholarships affect my Columbia financial aid award?

Many Columbia students receive funding from outside organizations, including merit-based scholarships, tuition benefits from an employer, ROTC and Veteran’s Benefits (Post-911 GI Bill benefits).

The resources that students receive from outside sources become part of the financial aid award and enable students to reduce the Student Contribution and Work Study/Student Employment portions of the financial aid package. These resources cannot be used to reduce or pay the Parent Contribution.

PLEASE NOTE: Outside Scholarships/outside funding may NOT reduce the Parent Contribution.

Tuition benefits from your/your family’s employer are applied to your need-based financial aid award as any other outside scholarship/outside funding (see above paragraph).

ROTC and Veteran’s Benefits: Scholarships received through the Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) and/or veteran’s benefits/Post-9-11 GI Bill benefits are applied to your need-based financial aid award in the same manner as any other outside scholarships/outside funding (see above paragraph). For further information about ROTC at Columbia, please visit http://www.columbia.edu/cu/rotc/.

Current/Enrolling Columbia Students:

Scholarship checks should be made payable to "Columbia University" and sent to:

Office of Financial Aid and Educational Financing
100 Hamilton Hall, MC 2802
1130 Amsterdam Avenue
New York, NY 10027
ATTN: XinHan-Jane Zhang, Special Projects Coordinator

Phone: 212-854-3711
Email: ugrad-finaid@columbia.edu

Please include your full name and Columbia ID# in either the memo field of the check so that the funds can be correctly applied to your account.