The Junior League of Cleveland (JLC) Scholarship application for the 2023-2024 is now closed. Please check back next December/January for updates to our next year’s scholarship.

What is the Junior League of Cleveland Scholarship Fund?

The Junior League of Cleveland Scholarship Fund was initiated in our 2003-04 season with a fundraising campaign. The goal was to help non-traditional women students. Specifically, we wanted to help women whose educational paths had been interrupted by lack of opportunity and hardship but who had found a way to resume their education and needed financial assistance to realize their potential and improve their lives. In our 2010-11 season, the scholarship program expanded to also help women who had been placed in a foster care system.

Today, a committee oversees the program and selects scholarship recipients annually. The committee is comprised of Active and Sustaining members; and, they review anywhere from 40 to 100 applications per year. Thus far, we have supported the educational dreams of 53 women.

Members of the JLC raise the money needed for the scholarship program. Funds collected are kept in a designated fund and are invested by the JLC until needed for distribution. Funds are awarded annually in May for the student’s use for her current or upcoming term or year’s educational needs. The JLC presents the money directly to the institution of the recipient’s choice.

Who qualifies for our scholarship?

Applicants must be women who are nontraditional students and have overcome obstacles to resume their education. Applicants who identify as women are eligible to apply. Some examples of non-traditional include:

• An applicant whose education was interrupted, preventing her from continuing to college after completing high school or requiring her to get a GED
• An applicant whose education was interrupted and is seeking a non-traditional career (e.g., computer programmer, skilled construction worker, chef, engineer, etc.)
• An applicant whose education was interrupted and whose life responsibilities, such as work and/or family responsibilities, require her to pursue her post-high school education on an unconventional schedule
• An applicant who was placed in a foster care system; these students may apply even if their education was not interrupted
• Applicants must be at least 17 years old; THERE IS NO AGE CAP
• Applicants must be permanent residents of one of the following Ohio Counties: Ashtabula, Cuyahoga, Erie, Geauga, Lake, Lorain, Medina, or Trumbull

Please note: Applicants pursuing post-secondary educational opportunities directly after high school, except for those who were placed in a foster care system, will NOT be considered.

What types of assistance are available?

• Funds to assist with the cost of accredited instructional programs and/or workforce training programs
• Funds to assist with additional educational expenses that may restrict the student’s access to education such as program supplies, accredited daycare, accredited preschool and after-school childcare, and the recipient’s transportation

Important Information

Inquiries may be made to the JLC by calling 216-231-6300, extension 3 or emailing [email protected]

All scholarship application materials must be submitted by March 1, 2023 to:

Junior League of Cleveland
Attn: JLC Scholarship Fund Committee
3615 Superior Avenue E.
Building 44, Fourth Floor, Suite 4404C
Cleveland, OH 44114

or via email at [email protected]

What are the real stories of scholarship recipients? 

The Scholarship Committee has contacted some past recipients to see where they are now.  Here are a few stories. We are extremely gratified to know that our scholarship awards have had such a significant impact on the lives of such deserving women.

Dorene was our first scholarship winner and has a 4.0 average in the Masters Program in adult education at Cleveland State University. Our scholarship helped Dorene complete her Bachelors Degree at Ursuline College, where she held top honors and was one of the first class of outstanding students on the Wall of Fame. Despite receiving a kidney and a heart transplant, Dorene is active in Newberg Heights city politics along with her work on her Masters degree. We can all be proud of her!

Monique graduated from the Central School of Nursing in September 2005 and began working as a nurse right away. She is currently employed by the State of Ohio in the Medicaid department. She has also provided home nursing care for nearly five years. She notes that although the year she received our scholarship money were difficult because several bad things occurred, and she was going to school as well as raising her four children by herself, the Junior League scholarship money enabled her to complete the program that year. As she noted on the phone, “That money saved my life!” She also noted that she knew that if she had not continued with her education, her children and others would think it was ok to give up their dreams. She hopes to someday become a donor to the scholarship fund, so she can give back to the program that “saved her life!”

Wendy wrote us the following letter in May 2011.

Friends at Junior League of Cleveland,

With a most regretful heart and fervent hopes of your forgiveness, I write this letter to extend my thankfulness at your gracious gift to me in 2009. First, I must address the evening of which I speak, and which vividly lives in my memories. The reception, the dinner and the pampering I was subjected to can only be second to the scholarship that was granted to me.

I would like your members to know I put to good use the scholarship you bestowed upon me. I graduated in June 2010 with National Technical School Honor Society, second in my class and a GPA of 3.75.

Since graduation, I took 14 credit hours in fall 2010, 18 in Spring 2011 and had a GPA of 3.61 making the Dean’s List at Lorain Community College. I have been accepted into Ashland University and CSU’s Bachelor of Nursing programs and will be attending CSU in Fall 2011. I intend to pursue a Masters in Nurse Practioner post-graduation from CSU.

Again, I would like to thank you for your graciousness and let you know I was most blessed by your kindness and gift.