The 2020 online application for Frisco Education Foundation scholarships opened Monday at 10 a.m. with seniors having until Dec. 20 at 4 p.m. to apply. 

“We have found that whether it’s three weeks or three months that the applicants pretty much have the same trend in when they decide to submit it and complete it and start their application,” Director of Frisco Education Foundation Director Allison Miller said in a previous interview with Wingspan. “So three weeks gives them a solid deadline with a time commitment, kind of rallying them to get the application done.”

FEF has awarded more than $7.2 million in scholarships since 1995 with some of the funds coming from students who received FEF scholarships in the past. 

“It’s our hope that our scholarship recipients will come back to our community to live, to work, to play, to give back, to pay it forward,” Miller said in a previous interview with Wingspan. “We have had several scholarship recipients who have actually sent it checks to fund scholarships for future students.”

For Tumbleweed TexStyles co-founder and art teacher Jeb Matulich, FEF scholarships are their way of giving back.

“We give back to FEF because when we started the business, both of us were teachers. I’ve been teaching for 23 years. We tried to think of causes that were close to our heart so education made sense and we look for the local scholarship group that does that and that’s the Frisco Education Foundation so we decided to donate to it.”

With the abundance of scholarships given each year, senior Taylor Bullitt is thankful for the opportunity.

“FEF is a convenient tool and a very easy way to help you in your college process,” Bullitt said. “I think it’s important to take advantage of it because it will be beneficial in the future to avoid college debt.”