What is the UIS Donor-Funded Institutional Scholarship?

UIS offers hundreds of thousands of dollars in donor-funded scholarships to enrolled UIS students every year from the UIS Donor-Funded Institutional Scholarship Application. In fact, “just over $1,050,000 was awarded to about 330 UIS students for the 2025-2026 academic year.”[1] The shared application for all of these scholarships is on the UIS website. Students have until mid-February each year to apply for scholarship consideration, which includes several parts:

  • Student Information
  • Classes, Programs, and Future Plans
  • Employment
  • Student Engagement, Leadership, and Athletics
  • Additional Information
  • Release Agreement

Many of the questions are Yes/No, multiple choice, or short answer. Besides providing space to share personal details, the application also helps you indicate whether you qualify for scholarships that have specific requirements, like a particular major, membership, or achievement. This handout will concentrate on the writing portions of the application, which include the Personal Narrative and the Community Service and Volunteerism question. Please note that donor scholarships recipients may have to complete additional writing sections such as Area of Study, Academic/Career Goals, and UIS Experiences. All students are eligible to apply, including international, online, and graduate students.

Required Written Responses

To write within this length, you should plan carefully. You don’t want to include too much, and you want it all to flow and make sense. It is helpful to think of the written portion as a cohesive response rather than four isolated paragraphs. This will help you build on your ideas and prevent you from repeating yourself too often. It is also important to write your responses on a different document first and then paste them into the application, so you don’t time out and lose your progress. This also allows you to edit and revise.

Personal Narrative

The personal narrative is your opportunity to share details about your “personal, educational, and vocational goals” – basically, who are you, and what do you want out of life? This space also allows you to discuss remarkable aspects of your academic experience, such as “awards, honors, and other student activities.” Basically, what have you done that can impress the people reviewing your application, and how can you point toward the scholarships you qualify for? The online application requires the personal narrative be at least 500 words long, but it cannot exceed 750 words. The following is some advice you can use to write a personal narrative that hits all the marks.

How to Begin a Personal Narrative

  • Kick things off with a strong, memorable, and compelling first impression
  • Start with a personal anecdote you can use as the core thematic thread which points toward your goals
  • Share ideas that show the pursuit of success as well as your persistence and dedication

How to Develop Ideas in a Personal Narrative

  • Explain the experiences you’ve chosen to include, with relevant detail and description
  • Reflect on how these experiences have shaped you, or helped you push toward your goals
  • Connect everything together to show who you are, what you’ve done, and where you’re going

How to Finish a Personal Narrative

  • Leave your reader with a solid, singular idea they’ll remember out of all the narratives they’ve read
  • Pull the personal anecdote back in as the core thematic element driving the narrative
  • Make sure to have shown how you’ve persisted and are on the path to success

Community Service and Volunteerism

Students with community service or volunteerism experience are encouraged to share more about what they have done for their communities. Students should seek to answer the question: "please tell us more about the service/ volunteer experience and how leadership and volunteerism made your school, team, or town a better place." This
essay should be 500-750 words. If you do not have any service/volunteer experience, leave this section blank. The following is some advice you can use to consider your community service/volunteerism thoroughly.

Tips for a Successful Community Service and Volunteerism Section

  • Consider starting with a compelling example or story from your community service/volunteer experience
  • Give specific context and relevant detail for your community service/volunteer experiences, such as:
    • Dates and times when you volunteered
    • Locations where you served
    • People with/for whom you worked
    • Activities/work you performed
  • Describe the importance of community service/volunteerism in general – why does it matter?
  • Explain the importance of community service/volunteerism more specifically, including:
    • how it impacted you, your present and future, directly
    • how it has made your community (school, team, town, etc.) a better place

Secondary (Potential) Written Responses

If you become a recipient of any one of our donor scholarships, you will be sent a Google Form to provide the Office of Advancement more information about you. Make sure you are regularly checking your UIS email so you don’t miss this important communication! These questions will cover the student’s Area of Study, Academic/Career Goals, and any Impactful UIS Experiences.

Field of Study

This section asks you to examine the reasons why you chose your major or program. Outline the path you took to get to this point in your educational career, and think carefully about any events, people, courses, etc. that inspired you to pursue this degree path. This section must be between 75-200 words. Consider these questions to get started:

  • What about this field of study interests me? In what ways, beyond the financial motivations?
  • Who or what from this field of study might have influenced my academic goals? How so, specifically?
  • When did you know this was your chosen field of study? Why?

You might feel like you are repeating yourself a bit from the Personal Narrative. That’s okay! These answers should naturally build upon themselves and will probably have similar information in certain areas. Your personal experiences naturally informed your decision to choose a degree. So long as you are adding more new information than repeating old information, you are good to go.

Academic/Career Goals

This section wants you to apply “your past accomplishments to your future goals” in a paragraph between 75-200 words. To do this effectively, you’ll want to think back to your work in a class you took recently. Give an example of when your coursework connected to your future academic and employment goals. This can include:

  • Lab work or research
  • Essay or other project
  • Group project or presentation
  • Reflection work
  • Hands-on learning
  • Volunteering experience

An Experience at UIS

The last writing section of the scholarship application asks you to describe something you’ve experienced at UIS in a paragraph between 75-200 words. You can talk about anything, but you should try to make it matter in the context of the rest of your responses in the application. You also should consider whether you can use this story to indicate your eligibility for particular, restricted scholarships. In other words, this story should tell your readers something about you and your academic experiences and career goals. Here’s some examples of what that might look like:

  • Talk about an experience you had at an on-campus job
  • Talk about meeting a new person on campus and how they have impacted your educational experience
  • Talk about a particular event or activity on campus and how it relates to your broader experience at UIS
  • Talk about research you conducted or presented

Keep in mind that this is the UIS Donor Funded Institutional Scholarship, so any money you receive comes directly from UIS-affiliated donors. They want to know about your UIS-specific experiences–what about UIS is worth the investment?

Closing Thoughts

Remember that the purpose of a scholarship application is to show how you benefit your institution, and how well you will represent your potential donors as the recipient of their funding. You’re an investment; help them see why they should invest in you and how their scholarship will pay off through your future successes.

For scholarship recipients, please note that you must complete the secondary Google Form for the scholarship to disburse. Half of the scholarship disbursements will be processed for Fall and the remaining half will be processed for the Spring. Students will submit these essays and attach their Thank You Letter via the form which will submit directly to the Office of Advancement. Students will also be required to accept their scholarship via their Self-Service. After these actions, the earliest the scholarship will disburse to the student's account will be just after the 10th day of the semester.  

Hopefully these ideas have helped you complete your application – good luck, we hope you receive scholarships!

Learning Hub Scholarship Support

Application Review

The Learning Hub encourages all current and prospective UIS students to request one-on-one tutoring for the written portion of their applications during the winter intersession period and in the spring semester before the mid-February deadline. Use our Request an Appointment form or email us at thehub@uis.edu to schedule an in-person, Zoom, or email session with a member of our writing staff.

Scholarship Workshop

The Learning Hub holds a Zoom workshop that covers the written portion of the Donor-Funded Institutional Scholarship application in January each year. Keep an eye out on our website or UIS Connection or Campus Announcements for details about when, and use our Register for a Workshop form or email us at thehub@uis.edu to sign up!

[1] “Donor-Funded Institutional Scholarships.” UIS Office of Financial Aid, https://www.uis.edu/financial-aid/types-aid/scholarships/donor-funded-institutional-scholarships. Accessed 6 November 2025.