Our mission

It is the mission of Gettysburg Area Dollars for Scholars to engage students in pursuit of academic achievement and post-secondary educational opportunities by awarding scholarships and by providing academic support.

Who we are

We are volunteers in our community who help local high school graduates continue their education by providing a simple process that links students to local scholarship opportunities and which for the Class of 2023 and beyond will link them to national scholarship opportunities as well.

We help students planning to attend accredited trade schools or vocational programs or 2- and 4-year college degree programs. To date we have given over $1,486,457 to more than 909 students. 

Our scholarships have helped students attend programs for diesel mechanics, nursing, culinary arts, electronics, teacher education, social work, broadcasting, biology, art, computer science, auto maintenance, graphic arts, engineering, and many more.

ANY graduating senior living in the Gettysburg Area School district--including those attending other high schools or who are home schooled--are eligible to apply through our organization. Some of our scholarships are open to only students graduating from Gettysburg Area High School, but many of them are open to everyone, with no requirement to attend GAHS.

Our annual report

   

The application process: A brief overview

ALL the applicants' work will be done online. They will fill out a personal profile which will include their academics, work, and activities in and out of school, plans for their continuing education, and much more. That profile will be used to match each student (anonymously) with those of our scholarships for which the student is eligible. Parents will have a hand in the process by submitting financial information (again, anonymously) to determine a student's financial need (most of our scholarships have a financial need component) and the guidance office and references will play a role in completing the student's profile as well.  

After the deadline for profile building, we will make our recipient selections based on the students' profiles; we will not know whose profiles are whose until the anonymous selection process is complete.  Scholarship America, the national organization chartering the hundreds of Dollars for Scholars chapters across the country, will also use the student profiles to help match to national scholarships the students probably didn't even know existed... This new system is a win-win deal for all of us involved!!

Detailed directions on building student profiles and more specifics on how the new system works can be found by clicking on the "Students & Parents" link at the top right of every website page.  Students can start working on building their online profile at any time; we encourage them to keep the profile updated with new information and changes to old information. The actual application portion will begin in early February and last about two months; watch for annual opening/closing dates through this website, an article in the Gettysburg Times, posters and announcements in your high school, and in a letter package which will be sent to all parents of Gettysburg Area High School students. And come back to the website often for additional announcements and helpful hints.

PLEASE take advantage of what we offer. There will be "support" buttons and contact information along the way so you can get help from national gurus and local Dollars for Scholars representative who will try to answer your questions along the way. 

We hope to see you as one of our scholarship recipients this coming May!