Microsoft Disability Scholarship

Main Document

"The amount of the scholarship to be awarded is $5,000, which is paid through the Seattle Foundation on behalf of the Microsoft disAbility Employee Resource Group..."

A primary goal of this scholarship is to increase the pool of persons living with a disability enrolling in higher education and, in long term, decrease the unemployment bias for this demographic.

The mission of DisAbility Scholarship at Microsoft is to empower and enable high schools students with disabilities to:

• Go to college
• Realize the impact technology has on the world
• Target a career in the technology industry.

This scholarship will identify promising high school seniors who have potential to enter and successfully complete a vocational or academic college program and have a financial need. The amount of the scholarship to be awarded is $5,000, which is paid through the Seattle Foundation on behalf of the Microsoft disAbility Employee Resource Group (ERG) at Microsoft to the recipient's school's Financial Aid Office.

To apply for the Microsoft DisAbility Scholarship, the student must meet the following guidelines:

• Be a current high school senior with living with a disability (as defined by WHO), whether that be visual, hearing, mobility, cognitive or speech.
• Plan to attend an undergraduate program in a 2 or 4-year University/College or Technical College in the fall of the academic year following high-school graduation. Schools must be in the USA or have a USA-Affiliate for financial transactions (contact Seattle Foundation to verify non-USA school's eligibility).
• Declare a major in engineering, computer science, computer information systems, legal or in business that are approved (ie. paralegal, pre-law, finance, business administration, or marketing).
• Demonstrate a passion for technology.
• Demonstrate leadership at school and/or in the community.
• Have a high school cumulative GPA of 3.0 or higher.
• Require financial assistance to attend college.
• Enrollment status must be full-time or half time.
  

All candidates must be high school students living with a disability who plan to attend a 2 to 4 year University or College program, maintain a cumulative 3.0 CPA or equivalent and have declared a major from the approved list.