The Sterling Scholar Scholarship: A Comprehensive Guide

The Sterling Scholar Awards recognize high school seniors in Utah for their excellence in scholarship, leadership, and citizenship. The program offers invaluable resources, mentorship, and a supportive community, fostering a lifelong passion for learning and a commitment to excellence. Being a Sterling Scholar instills a lifelong passion for learning and a commitment to excellence.

What is a Sterling Scholar?

A Sterling Scholar is a high school senior in Utah who is publicly recognized and awarded for their pursuit of excellence in scholarship, leadership, and citizenship. Each school may nominate only one nominee in each of the 14 categories and a nominee may be nominated in only one category.

Potential Sterling Scholars create portfolios showcasing their work in a specific category and are interviewed by judges in that field. Awards are given at the high school, semi-final, and final levels. At the awards ceremony, finalists in 14 categories are announced, followed by the announcement of an overall Sterling Scholar winner.

Nomination Process

The Sterling Scholar Awards are open to Utah public high school seniors. The selection and nomination of nominees are determined by each high school. To be considered a Sterling Scholar nominee, students must demonstrate extraordinary scholarship scores, as well as service in leadership and community service/citizenship opportunities at their Utah public high school. Each Sterling Scholar nominee’s entire school experience will be considered, although emphasis will be placed on the high school years. High school officials are urged to nominate scholars for categories in which the nominees are genuinely interested and qualified.

The selection process should be open to as many nominees as possible. The opportunity to apply to the Sterling Scholar program should be open to as many nominees as possible.

Read also: Cosmetology Programs in Sterling

Recommended Procedure for High School Coordinators

To determine each school’s Sterling Scholar, the following procedure is encouraged:

The principal selects and assigns a committee of school faculty, including a Sterling Scholar coordinator, to administer the nomination process.
The committee should create a questionnaire to guide nominees in evaluating their activities, achievements, and ambitions within one of the Sterling Scholar categories.
Nominees submit the completed questionnaire and supporting materials to the principal and/or assigned committee for review. Departmental advisors should be contacted for aid in nominee recommendations based on the submitted questionnaire and additional information.
Ultimately, the principal determines which individual in each category will be submitted as the school’s official nominee.

It is important to note that the Deseret News and the KSL Broadcast Group do NOT take part in the selection of nominees.

Eligibility

High school seniors who attend college classes full or part-time or are classified as foreign exchange nominees are eligible for the Sterling Scholar Awards. However, the program is designed to recognize scholastic achievement in Utah public high schools.

To be selected a Sterling Scholar nominee students must have extraordinary scholarship scores as well as service in leadership and community service/citizenship opportunities at their Utah public high school. It is up to each school to determine if an individual has been in attendance enough to experience these leadership and community service/citizenship opportunities.

Each Sterling Scholar nominee’s entire school experience will be considered, although emphasis will be placed on the high school years. High school officials are urged to nominate scholars for categories in which the nominees are genuinely interested and qualified.

Portfolio Requirements

Each nominee will begin preparing their portfolio with the upload of their “Letter of Recommendation”. For the remainder of your portfolio the acceptable file formats are .PDF, .TXT, .RTF, .JPG, .TIF, WAV, WMA, .MP4, .ACC, .MP3 and .MPG. External links to YouTube, Vimeo or other video sharing sites are the preferred path for videos. The nominee will have an opportunity to upload a supporting document within each section and more at the end of the portfolio.

Key Components of the Portfolio

The portfolio is a crucial aspect of the Sterling Scholar application. It allows nominees to showcase their accomplishments and demonstrate their passion for their chosen category. The following are the essential components of the portfolio:

Letter of Recommendation: A letter of recommendation by any teacher/instructor should include the teacher’s assessment of the individual with specific reasons for the recommendation plus examples of evidence as to why “This is an outstanding nominee,” etc.
Category Scholarship Activities: The nominee will have the opportunity to list six different Category Scholarship Activities using 20 words or less.
Category Scholarship Activity Description: Choosing one of the above listed activities, the nominee will write in detail about that activity (in 500 words or less). They will also be able to upload a supporting document (e.g., a pdf of the actual award, a picture of nominee receiving award, or an external link to a video of the activity itself highlighting the nominee’s participation).
Leadership Activities and Community Service/Citizenship: The previous two screens will be duplicated for these two section list/essay requirements.
Unique Qualities (list & essay): Please describe two or three unique things about yourself while relating them to your competition category. The nominee should take this opportunity to relate the challenges they have had to overcome and describe any distinctive experiences they may have had and how they affected them.
Life Enrichment (essay): How do you think your involvement in this category will enrich your life?
Attachments: This section of the portfolio is for the nominee to include examples of their work within their category.

Each essay section will allow only 500 words maximum so it is recommended that the essay be written in Word®, making sure of the word count, and then copied to the essay screen.

Final Preparations and Submission

Upon completion of the portfolio each nominee will submit their completed document to their Sterling Scholar Coordinator. The program will ask the nominee to print out the portfolio. This is the nominee’s opportunity to make a hardcopy of their electronic portfolio. Uploaded documents and pictures will be embedded within the portfolio pdf. Any external links for video or audio files will be included as hyperlinks. The coordinator will be notified of the submission. It is recommended that the coordinator meet with the nominee to review the portfolio. If changes are suggested the coordinator may re-open the portfolio for the nominee to make those adjustments. The nominee will then, again, resubmit their portfolio.

When all portfolios have been completed and certified the Sterling Scholar Coordinator will submit them to the Deseret News/KSL Broadcast Group Sterling Scholar Award Program. Once that procedure has been done neither the nominee nor the coordinator will have access to the portfolios. Only the Sterling Scholar Director will be able to release the portfolios.

At some point after the award ceremony, all portfolios and judging documents will be deleted from the Sterling Scholar Award Program servers and documents will be unrecoverable. Coordinators will be notified of this date 10 days before the actual deletion so that Sterling Scholars may have the opportunity to print out their portfolio if they have not previously done so.

Sterling Scholar Benefits

In addition to the award provided by the Sterling Scholar program to the top 3 of each category in each region, some colleges and universities in Utah offer financial assistance to top nominees in the Deseret News/KSL Broadcast Group Sterling Scholar Awards Program. Some are offered to winners only while other institutions may offer scholarships also to runners-up, and even others offer to finalists or even nominees in the program. Several are renewable based on the nominee’s grade point average.

Examples of Sterling Scholars

Dallin Soukup (2024 Wasatch Front General Sterling Scholar Winner): An exemplary scholar from Skyline High School, Dallin's passion for environmental science and innovative research in sustainability earned him the Sterling Scholar title.
Cedar McDonald (2024 Gail Miller Community Service Award Winner): An exemplary scholar from East High School, Cedar's passion for environmental science and innovative research in sustainability earned her the Sterling Scholar title.
Isabella Nestel (2024 Philo T. Farnsworth Governor's Award Winner): An exemplary scholar from Ogden High School, Isabella's passion for environmental science and innovative research in sustainability earned her the Sterling Scholar title.

These individuals exemplify the dedication, talent, and academic acumen that the Sterling Scholar Awards seek to recognize.

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