College students can always use any type of scholarships to help alleviate the cost of education. There are a lot of scholarships out there in the form of need-based or merit-based awards - students just need to learn where and how to obtain them. However, for most scholarships, there is always a selection committee that decides who gets awarded the money.

What if students themselves are the ones who are casting the votes instead of a selection committee? Well, kind of like American Idol wherein the audiences are the ones who decides who’s going to win and not that arrogant English judge, Paula, or Randy. That’s exactly what Collegenet.com has introduced - The world’s first scholarship election system. The program is conducted monthly by this organization.

The main benefit of the program is that the students have the power to dole out scholarship awards given to the students themselves. The process is that students discuss various topics such as the war in Iraq, abortion, or “one nation under God” issue on the pledge of allegiance and from these, students earn votes from one another. On the last day of the month, the candidates who have accumulated the most voting points win scholarship money. On one of the program’s competitions, the winning student gets awarded $5,000 for first place, $3,750 for second, $2,500 for third and $1,250 for fourth.

Well, just like in any reality contest, not only that contestants vie for the coveted awards, but they would also benefit from the non-financial aspects such as learning from the other contestants, creating new friends, or improving ones self as the program encourages interaction, personal expression of opinion, research and knowledge with other students. One student expressed that his “experience was as enlightning as it was exciting. The spririted discussions brought a lot of different points of view to the table and the need for well-crafted responses to earn votes challenged my wordsmithing skills.”

This is truly a life changing experience for a lot of students.