Match.com Babies Can Win a College Scholarship

People who braved the early days of Internet dating during their quests for love can finally reap their reward: Match.com is offering a college scholarship to the children of people who met through the online dating service.

Obviously, they have more to be happy about than a potential college scholarship: They’ve seemingly enjoyed years of a loving relationship because of Match, so the possibility of college funding is more like icing on the cake.

Match.com started in 1995 and claims more than 1 million babies have been “made” as a result of its services. With some of those early Match.com babies starting college soon, the company announced the MatchMade Scholarship Contest on May 5, which will award a $50,000 scholarship to the winner. (The parents of the winner get $5,000 toward a “special getaway.”)

It doesn’t matter what your grades or test scores are. All you need to qualify are parents (including stepparents) who met on Match.com. Students ages 13 to 20 can enter by submitting a video recounting their parents’ love story, so creativity (and interesting parents) is the key to success here.

So, parents, if you haven’t yet told your kids that you fell in love to the soundtrack of dial-up Internet, now would be the time to mention it.

Scholarships come in all forms, and they don’t all hinge on your academic performance. For example, David Letterman, a graduate of Ball State University in Indiana, gives a scholarship to “average students with a creative mind” who study telecommunications at his alma mater. Similarly, you don’t need great grades to get the MatchMade scholarship.

It helps to be creative when looking for ways to pay for your college education. There are thousands of scholarship opportunities with various deadlines, and it’s worth your time to find outside funding for school, rather than take out student loans. Student loans can be helpful for closing the cost gap between scholarships and the tuition bill, but taking out more than you need or more than you can afford to repay can have a devastating, lifelong impact on your finances.