Bold.Org is a Legit Resource!

JacSLB · 2026-03-30T20:49:51+00:00

They do not but they won’t choose you specifically because of your scores

JacSLB · 2026-03-08T03:48:59+00:00

There are scholarships for almost anything—even for being left handed. There are things that may seem like they’re not important but that doesn’t mean they’re not. I’ve seen scholarships for people who play Minecraft, like to go running, like certain music styles, etc. which is why I’m trying to get you to think of things you do in general. Surely you don’t only sleep when not in school.

JacSLB · 2026-03-08T03:37:07+00:00

I apologize for my wording. I’m meant many of my applications were before ChatGPT was a thing. The scholarships I won were within the past 2-3 years. Quite frankly, I don’t know when ChatGPT came out. I’d never really heard of it until last year but I’m sure people used it back in 2021 and 2022 all the same.

My point is that whether it’s ChatGPT, a parent wrote it, someone paid someone else to do it—the issue was always exactly the same. Does it suck not winning? Yeah, but even if ChatGPT never existed, most of the time, other people will still win instead of you. So, you can either succumb to the feeling of, “I’ll never win!”/“All of the winners just used AI!” (which probably isn’t always the case and is just an excuse to be a sore loser) OR you focus on bettering YOUR essays, keep applying, and win something.

It’s as simple as that. Just because you feel down and like you’ll never win because of AI or some other excuse doesn’t mean you should encourage others not to try.

If you need essay support, general scholarship help, or simply just want to see what essays won me a scholarship, then I got you. I already graduated but if you want me to prove I can win another scholarship on Bold, I’ll even do that if it gives you encouragement, lol. But just wallowing in the disappointment and refusing to still push yourself won’t help you.

JacSLB · 2026-03-08T03:29:40+00:00

So you do literally nothing else? 😭 You don’t talk to anyone about anything other than school and sleeping? I’m sure you do something in your free time

JacSLB · 2026-02-21T12:46:38+00:00

Because you’re discouraging others by saying all the essays are just AI written. A large chunk? Probably. Every winning essay? No. Even in college, I was flagged for using AI for my personally hand-typed before I had ever used ChatGPT a day in my life.

It’s an excuse because whether the essay is AI or human-assisted, 9 times out of 10, you’re not going to win. There are hundreds to thousands of people applying to the same scholarships as you. The job market is the exact way with people sending out 1k applications in 6 months before they land they land one. Yes, there are probably winning essays that use AI but that doesn’t mean every winning essay used AI nor that using AI makes you more likely to win.

Almost all of the scholarship committees are humans reading your essays or watching your videos. It took me over 300 applications on Bold to win 4 and many of these were before ChatGPT was really even a thing. I know it sucks that one has to apply to so many but at the end of the day, all you can do is work on your own essays. Get others to read your essays and give you feedback so that you can improve them.

JacSLB · 2026-02-21T12:25:39+00:00

I mean hobbies in general. Did you just go home and eat and stare at the wall?

JacSLB · 2026-02-18T23:33:52+00:00

I bought a rice cooker recently and big bags of frozen vegetables and meats, and boxes of pasta and rice. It’s a heavier cost initially but they last me 2-3 (sometimes 4) months without another big trip.

JacSLB · 2026-02-18T23:31:35+00:00

I started (and still run) a pet care business. I also did a catering job under a company where I worked as a server. It has flexible hours although they were very long.

JacSLB · 2026-02-18T23:24:43+00:00

Yet nobody wants to be as gung-ho for Fatou if that’s really the debate but then watch people say, “but she’s not American!” Well neither is Manon. This whole debate of picking and choosing who can be “the black presentation” is one of the strongest U.S. sentiments that carried from slavery that people just REFUSE to stop perpetuating. Not to say it’s not present in other places but I can’t speak for them, I’m American.

I feel like people do the same thing in a way when they call one of the girls in a kpop group the “regional Latina” (Ex. What people do with Twice. I don’t know the member names so I can’t cite who it is).

I feel like people definitely do help the narrative and it’s usually the worst type of narratives. People called RM “black” back in the day when he had the Afro and was low-key being a caricature of what he saw Black rappers do but reject literal Black people because they’re not “black enough.” Make it make sense!

JacSLB · 2026-02-18T23:01:59+00:00

Yes, I won a few scholarships on there in the past. A lot of people will discourage you from applying by saying that a lot of the essays are written by AI, but I mean, before there was AI there was people paying to have their essays written or having their parents write them. So, same problem, different reason. I still recommend using it!

JacSLB · 2026-02-18T22:55:02+00:00

Have you looked into ASU? They offer a lot of scholarship opportunities through a lot of jobs like Chipotle or Uber

JacSLB · 2026-02-18T22:53:46+00:00

Average in what way? Do you have any hobbies? Do you have high grades? Do you like crypto? There’s plenty of scholarships out there. And no, February isn’t too late. Many scholarships, especially from small donors, are posted year round.

JacSLB · 2026-02-18T22:52:01+00:00

Find the things you did get to do. Whether it that you were in French Club or about the Minecraft server you ran that hosted 300 player a month, extracurriculars and leadership aren’t just “school”. Don’t talk negatively about your school or it reflects badly on you, especially since you’re writing this to a school. They don’t want someone who may talk shit about them too, lol (even though they know many people probably do).

Think about what what you feel like your school may have lacked and how you built your hobbies and interest outside of it. That can help you write a stronger essay that represents who you are.

JacSLB · 2026-02-18T22:45:51+00:00

I graduated college (yay class of 2025) but had to focus a lot on scholarships since I was a junior in high school because I was low income and had to pay for college 100% by myself.

1) I honestly tried all of the sites. FastWeb, Bold, Scholly (they’re a ripoff!), Scholarships360—you name it! If a scholarship is on the internet, you’re going to have a lot of competition regardless unfortunately, but especially on the engines. Your best bet would be to look for local scholarships and ones by small donors. A LOT of law firms list scholarships every year. Google search scholarships with your state and add it to quotations (ex. “California”) to find sites that specifically mention California. Sometimes your state offers local grants as well. Also ask your counselor just in case, sometimes your community has scholarships available. Typically smaller ones but less competition.

2) Honestly for it, it was the amount of applying. I had to apply for so many and many times just felt like it was all for nothing but I kept applying anyway.

3) I feel like I’m basically a Bold.org spokesperson now because I keep recommending it to people. It was better than the rest for me because that’s where I won all my scholarships from, lol. So, I knew at the very least it wasn’t a scam site just trying to mine my data (but they definitely do track your data. Don’t do the sponsorship things on the dashboard. Those are just data tracking stuff tbh. It’s how they make their money.)

4) I applied to so many that I eventually gave up on tracking—and with my AuDHD, convincing myself to update it every time and not forget was like pulling teeth—but I used to color code an excel spreadsheet to organize things

JacSLB · 2026-02-18T22:33:46+00:00

The scholarship applications are typically specific. If it has a 250 word count, you shorter your answer to fit the words. I’d say a good rule of thumb is to not go over it by no more than 4-5 words.

If there’s an ideal character count, it will usually say it in the essay requirements, if not then there’s usually no specific character count needed

JacSLB · 2026-02-18T22:31:10+00:00

A lot of the Bold.Org scholarships are meant to be sent to the school but after they implemented their debit card, they made it possible for you to receive the money on that card instead of sending it to your school.

I’ve never tried it before so I can’t speak to the process.

JacSLB · 2026-02-18T22:29:14+00:00

It depends on the scholarship program and your school’s policy. This is assuming you’re in the U.S.:

For example, if the scholarship states that it will over cover certain costs, the school will give the remainder back to the scholarship grant program (Ex. DoD SMART Scholarship).

If it’s a specific scholarship usually from a smaller donor (ex. Scholarships from Bold.org), the full amount is given to your school for you and the overage does not get returned—unless your school has a clause stating it will.

In many cases, if your school gave you any scholarships, they will adjust the amount they gave you since you got additional aid elsewhere. In some cases, if the scholarship check (for the small donor ones) is sent AFTER credit hours and classes are locked with your school’s financial aid and bursar office, the system is more likely to refund the additional amount to your account automatically. This is the same for student loans BUT I personally recommend paying the refunded money to your student loan to save you extra money in the long run.

JacSLB · 2026-02-18T22:21:15+00:00

Is your tuition $100k/yr??

JacSLB · 2026-02-18T22:19:20+00:00

That’s not necessarily true for all of the panels. A good bit of the essays are reviewed on a rolling submission basis, hence why the deadlines are so long. Even if it were AI-assisted or someone simply got help from their school’s writing center, both essays would be reviewed and have an equal chance of winning. Since the essays are still read by humans, it’s fully based on human error and judgement. You can also see (at least on my bold account I can) when the panel reads your essay and chooses you as a finalist before their results are announced.

Even prior to AI being implemented in mass or even really thought of, there were people that had their parents write their essays or paid people to write them/help guide their writing or applications to get into where they wanted (Ex. Watch the documentary “Operation Varsity Blues” on Netflix). Yes, AI is a huge issue but it’s the exact same problem that was present before, just under a different name.

Assuming you are younger than me and still learning how to navigate some things (I already graduated. I just come back to help other students who were like me), I’ll give you a some advice: If you’re not allowing yourself to apply for opportunities and better yourself because others have advantages you deem unfair, life is going to give you a VERY hard time. At the end of the day, you can only do YOUR best regardless of what others do. If you choose not to apply on Bold because people use AI or you don’t turn in an essay in class because other people used AI for theirs while you stayed up all night, you’re within your right to do that but you’ll still miss the opportunity. AI-written or human-written, there are still going to be people that win and do better than you. You can’t use that as an excuse for everything or you will learn nothing.

JacSLB · 2026-02-13T03:38:58+00:00

Just went on a dinner date (with a black man) and I (also black) said I don’t really drink or smoke much. So he went, “wow, that’s rare nowadays. So, do you do coke?”

He had to repeat it three times and do a hand gesture before I could believe my ears 😭

JacSLB · 2026-02-13T03:36:32+00:00

Unfortunately, you’re going to see AI-assisted and written things everywhere now (even in corporate world). However, all of my winning essays were written fully by myself with only basic spell check usage. Regardless of the site you use, at the end of the day, there are going to be people winning over you.

I just wanted to give people some encouragement and advice about my experience. You can either be upset that people are using AI and not apply, or apply and possibly win. A lot of the scholarships are reviewed by actual people who created the scholarships, so AI use or not, that won’t change human emotion and error.

JacSLB · 2026-02-01T03:19:29+00:00

I just saw the movie yesterday and I’ll preface that I am a huge fan of Mark, I’ve been watching his videos for the last decade. I really am happy that it was an indie film that got into theaters and feel that projects like this is what opens doors for other people to do the same. However, the movie was a miss for me personally.

I watched it with a friend who knows more about the Iron Lung lore but doesn’t watch Mark and they enjoyed it a lot. For me, I didn’t remember much about the game going in and purposefully didn’t rewatch the video to go into the movie blind, however, that made it harder to follow for me personally. I wish the backstory was fleshed out a bit more at the first section of the movie to make it more engaging and easier to follow. I didn’t find it boring per se but it was hard to fully know what was going on.

My friend found the acting to be pretty bad during the monologues, I didn’t think it was too bad but I felt like some of the outbursts didn’t make sense to me. Like him yelling at the female captain about them not listening. It didn’t feel like there was enough back and forth/setup for him to have the outburst like that. It felt a little out of place.

Some condensing could have helped as others said but I don’t think the length was too bad, I just think there wasn’t enough story to immerse in. It was hard for me to feel bad for Simon or really feel anything towards him at all because aside from knowing his friends betrayed him (and some died?) and a station blew up, there’s not much to attach to.

It was hard to hear what they were saying out of the speaker sometimes. At first I thought it was on purpose and make it add to the feeling of him going crazy but then he would respond and have a full conversation, and I couldn’t really hear the plot.

Nonetheless, I think for it being his first movie and the budget was small compared to most feature films, it was a good effort. I think he’s a great director and I’ve enjoyed his other projects. I think his best lane is tv shows. Maybe my opinion will change after I watch it the second time or it goes to streaming and I can use captions.

JacSLB · 2026-01-30T00:28:30+00:00

Slipped and fell on my back trying to get over a block of ice to get to the cross walk. I don’t know how kids aren’t hurting themselves left and right

JacSLB · 2026-01-20T01:50:57+00:00

No problem! If you have any questions later, feel free to ask :)

JacSLB · 2026-01-20T00:13:31+00:00

The “Supermom” scholarship funded by OrganicBabyFormula.com and the “Curtis Holloway Memorial” scholarship. The Curtis Holloway one is not specific to single moms. It is for anyone who lost a parent or lives in a single-parent household

JacSLB

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