Open to Oklahoma residents. There is no application fee, and you never need an account. Most students finish the form in about 30 minutes.
You may apply to more than one, but you'll be considered for the best fit automatically — so a single application is enough.
The exam fee, prep course, or licensing renewal standing between you and a credential you have already earned the skills for. This is the gap that quietly ends careers before they start, and it is the one we most want to close.
Apply for this grantThe required tool list. The safety gear and the boots. Union initiation fees and books for the classroom hours. These are the costs that land before your first paycheck does, and financial aid almost never covers them. Paid directly to your school, your union hall, or the supplier.
Apply for this grantTuition support for students enrolled in or accepted to an accredited program, whether that is a degree or a trade. Paid directly to your institution. Applications are due April 15 and decisions are announced by May 15; apply any time — if you apply after April 15, we hold your application for the next year's round.
Apply for this scholarshipThe micro-grants have no deadline. Most scholarships make you wait for an annual deadline, then wait again for a decision. But an exam fee is due in March, not in whatever month is convenient for us. So we review micro-grant applications every month and aim to give you an answer within 30 days — because money that arrives after the deadline is the same as no money at all.
The Hands and Minds Scholarship is awarded once a year. Its deadline is April 15, with decisions announced by May 15. You can still apply at any time; an application that arrives after April 15 is held for the next year's round rather than turned away.
Every award is subject to available funding. When qualified applications exceed the funds we have on hand, we award as many as our resources allow and hold other strong applications for a later review rather than decline them. As a growing nonprofit, our capacity depends on the donations we receive — so the number of awards we can make will grow as our support does.
We read every application. We shortlist based on what you tell us in the form and in your two essays — not on documents. If you make the shortlist, we'll then ask you for a transcript or proof of enrollment to confirm what you told us.
Awards are contingent on those documents matching your application. Be accurate.
Your safety matters more than our convenience. This application will never request:
If anyone claiming to represent Hands and Minds asks you for these during the application stage, it is not us. Please tell us immediately.
Take your time. Nothing is submitted until you review it on the last step. Your progress is saved in this browser as you go.
We're an Oklahoma fund, and we can only award scholarships to Oklahoma residents. You can study anywhere — including out of state or online — but you need to live here.
Hands and Minds is a small Oklahoma fund, and every dollar we have is committed to Oklahoma students. We'd rather tell you now than have you spend an evening on an application we couldn't accept.
That doesn't mean there's nothing out there for you. The resources we list are free, national, and genuinely useful — they're where we'd point our own family.
If you're moving to Oklahoma, or you think we've got this wrong, tell us. We read everything.
We've received it. A confirmation is on its way to the email address you gave us — check spam if it doesn't land in a few minutes.
Keep this reference number. If you make the shortlist, we'll email you to ask for a transcript or proof of enrollment — so watch for that.
Trouble with the form? Email us at handsandmindsfund@gmail.com and we'll take your application by email instead.
