CHARLESTON, S.C. — College-bound high school seniors anywhere in South Carolina can now apply for as much as $10,000 toward their first year of college, after the Meeting Street Scholarship Fund opened its application to every county for the 2027-28 school year on Monday.
This is the first year the award has been open in all 46 counties. Until now it reached students in 14 counties on private donations alone. The statewide reach comes from a public-private arrangement that pairs private philanthropy with recurring state money, and legislators set aside $18.7 million in the state budget to make it happen. Program leaders project about 3,000 new recipients for 2027-28, and state lottery profits are expected to cover an estimated 2,300 of those awards.
The money is not limited to tuition. Students can put it toward housing, food and fees as well.
To be eligible, a senior has to earn the LIFE Scholarship or the Palmetto Fellows Scholarship, complete the federal FAFSA form, be eligible for a Pell Grant, and attend one of 16 participating South Carolina colleges as a full-time student. Applications go through myportal.meetingstreetscholarshipfund.org, and the fund says applicants get word on their candidate status inside of two weeks.
The fund says it has fielded more than 4,300 interest forms, with at least one from every county, and that its staff has logged more than 7,000 miles on the road visiting schools.
The program was started in Charleston County in 2021. Beemok Education, which runs the fund, now requires sophomores and juniors on the scholarship to put in 250 hours of work, whether a part-time job, an internship or research, to hold on to it.
Keeping the statewide version going will take more money from lawmakers. Covering both freshmen and sophomores next year is projected to cost more than $30 million, rising to an estimated $60 million a year by the fourth year.
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