The high school guidance counselor is responsible for identifying all students at his/or her high school who are eligible to apply for the Palmetto Fellows Scholarship and providing them with instructions on how to apply. Please refer to separate instructions provided on identifying all eligible applicants.

Counselors should inform students of the website address ( https://www.applyweb.com/apply/scpfs/) to access the student's portion of the application (Part I), which must be submitted electronically by midnight on June 15, 2009, to be considered in the final awards. Both fully eligible students and pending students (PENDING students MUST be registered for the SAT or ACT in June and have score reports sent DIRECTLY to the Commission on Higher Education) should be notified about their responsibility to complete the online application by the established deadline.

Note: Counselors should ask all pending students for registration verification for the SAT or ACT before allowing them to apply.

You should also provide each student with your e-mail address because this is a required field for the student to complete. We will use your e-mail address to notify you when the student has successfully submitted his/her portion of the electronic application. You should note that, if the student does not provide your correct e-mail address, then you will not receive this automatic notification. However, you can still complete the application for that student from the counselor web site.

You may also want to provide your students with an earlier deadline to submit their portions of the application. This will allow you the opportunity to follow-up with any students who have not completed this step without missing the application deadline. Students will receive confirmation that they submitted their portion of the application by obtaining a confirmation receipt, which contains a unique identification number.

The guidance counselor is also responsible for electronically submitting the counselor's portion of the application (Part II) by midnight on June 15, 2009, in order for the student to be considered in the early awards.

Counselors may submit their portion of the application prior to the student submitting his or her portion. Please do not submit your portion of the online application until the information for the END of the senior year is available.

For your records, you should print a copy of the receipt (which includes an identification number) confirming that your portion of the student's application has been submitted successfully (you should have a receipt for each student).

Please note that you will not be able to revise your portion once it has been submitted. You should contact the Commission on Higher Education if you provide incorrect information on your portion of the online application.

Additionally, counselors cannot save their portion and return later to finish completing it.

Fully eligible or pending students who do not wish to submit an application must complete a Declination to Apply form* (PDF), which must be returned to the Commission on Higher Education no later than June 15, 2009. If a student decides to decline to apply for the Palmetto Fellows Scholarship, this is a permanent decision. By completing and submitting the Declination to Apply Form, the student is relinquishing all rights to receive this award at a later date. This means that if the student declines to apply for the scholarship to attend college out-of-state and then changes his/her mind and would like to receive the Palmetto Fellows Scholarship at a later time, he/she would not be eligible to receive the Scholarship since the student did not complete an application and was not awarded the scholarship.

All required items:

• Eligible Applicants Form* (excel)
• Pending Applicants Form* (excel)
• Required Student/Parent Signatures Forms* (PDF)
• Necessary Decline to Apply Forms* (PDF)

Official Documentation

• Official senior year transcript(s)
• Sophomore/junior transcripts if used for qualifying rank
• Official rank report (if applicable)
• Test score verification

All paperwork from your high school must be returned in one package by certified mail with return receipt requested to the Commission on Higher Education, postmarked by June 15, 2009, to be considered in the final awards.

Each high school should give one counselor lead responsibility for this step. This counselor should be listed on the Eligible Applicants Form (excel) and will be contacted by the Commission on Higher Education if there are any questions about the information submitted from your high school.

Official transcripts must match the academic information submitted on the electronic Palmetto Fellows Scholarship application (cumulative GPA, class rank, class size and/or test scores) and must indicate your high school's grading scale. You need to ensure that the transcripts you submit for your students all have consistent class sizes for each year (except for students using ranks from previous high schools). You should also submit a copy of the official ranking report if used to determine eligibility. In order for a transcript or ranking report to be considered official, it cannot contain any handwritten or strikethrough information.

* Available in PDF format. If you don't have a PDF viewer, you can download the plug-in from Adobe's web site