By now, hopefully, you’ve started planning for your Balanced Man Scholarship (BMS) for this summer and fall. Last month, I wrote an article about the best marketing strategies, as well as services we offer to help you increase the number of Balanced Man Scholarship applications you receive. Many BMS chairman reached out in response to that article about a template letter for high school guidance counselors and the best approach to distribute this information. They recognized that high-achieving high school students can be a gold mine for recruitment.

Here’s how to get your application into the hands of high school seniors:

1. Talk with your university admissions office and ask them which high schools have a large number of seniors attending your university. If they aren’t willing to offer that information, ask around. You probably know where your own brothers typically come from.
2. Once you know which schools to target, find the high school’s website. Look for the faculty directory and find the contact information for guidance counselors, administrators, principals, etc.
3. Send them this template email and ask them to distribute scholarship information to all of their graduating seniors who are attending your university.
4. Follow up with them in a few weeks to make sure they did so, and see if they need any additional information or flyers.

When should we start?

The best time to distribute this information is … NOW! Early spring is the time when seniors are applying for college scholarships, so guidance counselors are going to be especially willing to help you. Guidance counselors are evaluated based on graduation rates, college acceptance rates and total scholarship dollars awarded to their graduating seniors. THEY WANT TO HELP get their students more scholarships … all you have to do is contact them and ask.

What do other chapters do?

Many chapters are actively engaged with graduating high school seniors before they even set foot on their respective college campuses. Here are a few unique examples of how chapters are shaping high school students’ perspectives:

• Ohio Theta — Cincinnati: Through the Sigma Phi Epsilon Leadership Academy, organized every year by the chapter, the brothers offer leadership and professional development seminars to local Cincinnati high school students. With the help of sorority women and college professors, they encourage all participants to apply for the scholarship.
• Maine Alpha — Maine: Brothers utilize spring break to distribute scholarship information to their own high schools. In addition to these in-person visits, the chapter has collected counselor information, emails, and physical addresses for every high school in the state. The brothers mail a cover letter and application to each high school, along with a digital copy via email.
• Kentucky Zeta — Morehead State: The chapter actively communicates with high school guidance counselors across the state to market the scholarship. It also started using SigEp Headquarters’ email services this semester to track engagement, click rates and responses of 50+ counselors in the area.
• Ohio Nu — Cleveland State: Through dedicated support from volunteers, the chapter maintains active relationships with college access programs like CollegeNow Greater Cleveland to distribute information about the scholarship to high school students. Over the last two years, the chapter has nearly tripled the number of guidance counselors it interacts with throughout the state.

If you have additional questions on how to utilize high school guidance counselors in your quest to advertise the Balanced Man Scholarship and recruit great men, reach out to me at zac.gillman@sigep.net.