Scholarship programs are designed to help students fund for their education. Most of the students interested in pursuing studies get discouraged due to the financial constraints. However, these scholarship programs, especially the ones offered by the government, require the students to be of high academic quality. Apart from the government, others awarding scholarships include private sector, international partners or universities or colleges. Scholarships are also based on specific talents of the students like excellence in sports.
To qualify for scholarships, the students should satisfy certain criteria. The basic criteria are completion of high school with the desired grades. It depends on the level applied for. To get scholarship for a particular level, the student must have completed the previous level with academic excellence.
Another important criterion to qualify is citizenship. Most scholarships award persons only from a target area and thus place restriction based on citizenship. When the programs are sponsored by private sectors, they put limitations on the basis of degree or field of choice to promote education in that particular field of education.
Information on scholarships can be acquired from the colleges or universities offering them. Government education agencies also provide the necessary information. There are numerous scholarship websites which provide all the necessary information and can be relied on.
Planning to give the best shot in both is a challenge.The key word here is balancing! 
Parents get frightened by the fact of to pay thousands of dollars for an education. 
For post secondary education, Federal government has launched loan program. 
Scholarship scams - because many students competing for scholarship.