Colgate Toothpaste Scholarships

Producers of a wide variety of personal hygiene and household products, the Colgate-Palmolive company sells its products in more than 200 countries all over the world. The company strives to give back by offering community programs for children and adults. Colgate also provides several scholarships to high school and college students across the United States.

Function

Colgate Toothpaste scholarships help students wanting to enter the dental field defray some of the costs of attending college and dental school. Many of Colgate’s scholarships encourage minorities to pursue degrees in dentistry or in a related field by providing them the funds to help pay for school. Some of the scholarships increase interest in a particular field of study, like dental hygiene.

Types

All of Colgate Toothpaste’s scholarships go to dental students or dental hygienist students. Colgate has partnered with various dental schools and organizations to offer the scholarships, including the American Dental Association, Ohio State University School of Dentistry and American Dental Hygienists Association. Some of the scholarships are set aside for minority students wanting to pursue dentistry degrees, like the Colgate-Palmolive and Hispanic Dental Association Foundation Scholarship.

Features

Each scholarship comes with a different award amount, from $1,000 one-year grants to providing half or full tuition for a year. The total number of students who receive each scholarship also varies. Most of the scholarships specify that funds must go toward tuition costs, while some provide research funds for graduate and doctorate dental students. Scholarships can be used at any accredited four-year college or university offering dentistry degrees or with a dental school.

Qualifications

Depending on the scholarship, qualifications can include maintaining a certain grade point average, being a full-time student and working toward a dental degree. The Colgate Bright Smiles Scholarships requires students to be pursuing a dental hygienist degree and to be African-American, Hispanic, Asian, Native American or male, states Ed Fed. Other qualifications include financial need, United States citizenship and community and extracurricular involvement.

Time Frame

Each scholarship has its own application deadline, which ranges from early summer to the end of the calendar year. Each also has its own date for award announcement. Most of the scholarship applications can be found online through the Colgate website or the partnering organization’s website. Students may also be required to answer essay questions and/or submit letters of reference or recommendation with the application.