Ultimate National Fellowship Guide

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Video Introduction: https://youtu.be/zQjNCdFN0wc

What's in the Guide: https://youtu.be/yw34TAdQO7c

Winning a Rhodes Scholarship, Schwarzman, Mitchell, Marshall, Gates Cambridge, Luce, Fulbright, among others, can be a life-changing experience for students, recent graduates, and young professionals. You become a member of a cohort of other impressive, interesting, and intellectual people, and your network will expand dramatically. The scholarship/fellowship year itself is an unforgettable experience that allows you to explore new cultures, countries, and people. Winning national fellowships can also increase your chance to obtain a blue chip job and/or gain admittance to elite graduate school programs after your scholarship year. A fellowship year may be the single most important and impactful experience you could have in your life, so far.

I'm YJ (Yongjun) Heo, and I was awarded three national fellowships (Fulbright, Luce Scholars Program, and George Mitchell Scholarship). I have advised dozens of national fellowship winners over the last decade, including my younger brother, who was a Schwarzman Scholar. I have directly helped students and recent graduates win the Rhodes, Mitchell, Marshall, Fulbright, Schwarzman, Gates Cambridge, Luce, Rangel, Watson, and others. As a product designer, I created and maintain the application system for a well-known national fellowship. Hundreds of college students and recent graduates have asked me for resources to help them apply, and I'm consolidating and sharing as much as I can here and on nationalfellowship.com and nationalfellowships.com. By coincidence, life circumstances, and direct experiences, I believe I know more about these programs than almost anyone else, and I want you to learn everything that I have learned here.

During this last cycle alone, I've had close to a dozen winners for most of the above national fellowships. The guide itself covers (likely) 60-80% of everything I know. That last 20-40% is more tailored to your individual candidacy, and you'd get the full "100%" if you also speak with me directly throughout the process.

How This Guide Can Help You

I am taking everything I did to win multiple national fellowships, everything I did to help friends and those I've mentored win dozens of national fellowships, and everything I did to help my younger brother win a Schwarzman Scholarship, and I'm putting it here in this guide.

You should know that applicants to any of these national fellowships are relatively similar, but many fail to meet some standard on one of several axes–mostly because they are flying blindly or because they received bad advice. Candidacies do not differ significantly if you were to apply to several programs–that is, to stress that this guide is applicable for most, if not all, national fellowships. While some national fellowship winners are, in fact, geniuses (who are difficult to compete against), most winners are not prodigies (my younger brother and I are also not geniuses. Sorry, Jason). The majority of those who win A. are relatively intelligent, B. work extremely hard, C. plan ahead enough, D. market themselves effectively, and E. prepare themselves for interviews effectively. I am here to help you through this guide with some of B, C, D, and E ('planning ahead enough' can help you with B). My younger brother's winning a Schwarzman is a bit of proof that–with enough preparation and dedication–you can increase your chances of winning. You should know that he was a very different type of candidate than I was, albeit slightly better than I appeared (on paper). Understanding how he navigated his candidacy, after I had already helped dozens win various fellowships, made me realize that this process can be more formulaic than it is random or luck-based. There are indeed some recipes that work, and I'm here to democratize information related to these seemingly exclusive programs.

It is very difficult to win any national fellowship. Even among a group of the highest performing students and graduates, your chances can stand between 1% for the most competitive to 20-30% for the most accessible. This guide is meant to give you more than a decades worth of insight and hopefully can help you increase your chances of winning. Of course, winning is not guaranteed, but I can help you avoid critical errors that have sunken the candidacies of those who reached out to me too late in the process, executed tenuous strategies, or lacked enough background information to plan correctly. I not only want to help you learn from others' mistakes, but I also want to help you elevate others' impression and interpretations of you for any type of application.

The guide should help you understand how these programs may judge your candidacy, but with a much higher degree of specificity than you would get anywhere else. The guide does not hold back. My goal is to help you develop higher levels of self-awareness, which will, in turn, improve your ability to make immediate corrections. While these experiences can be absolutely life-changing, you also have a long, professional life ahead. Along with helping you through this national fellowship application process, my ultimate goal for this guide is that its contents can help you far beyond this year.

What's Included

1. Introduction. This is where I share updates with you and background about the Guide.
2. Strategy & Planning. Should you apply to multiple? Just one? Which one is your 'best fit' program? Which is most accessible given your background? Included: Timeline Calendar.
3. Winning Characteristics. You have to understand the backgrounds of those who do win in order to understand what you need to do to improve your application.
4. Candidacy Review: Self-Assessment. You have to thoroughly understand your strengths and weaknesses to learn how to lean on your strengths to overcome any gaps in your candidacy.
5. Fellowship Types & Selection. What are the 'on-ground' characteristics of these fellowships? Which have the right 'cultural fit' for you? What kinds of profiles of people do they prioritize over others?
6. Winning Personal Statement & Examples. The best way to learn how to shape your story is to read examples of what has worked. The most important elements of what is shared with you here are the annotations that describe why something was written the way it was. The criticisms are there to help you avoid potential errors. Read the non-annotated versions first and judge what you see harshly. Then see if your assessment matches mine.
7. Your Narrative & Personal Statement. Before submitting your application, this is the most important aspect of your candidacy. You must learn how to 'zoom out' and tell your story from start to finish. Who will you become? Why should these programs invest in you? What is interesting about you? Can you craft the perfect story?
8. Résumé. Some programs encourage you to share your resume. Because of its universal nature, resumes can be a great way for external parties to 'understand you at-a-glance.' How do you make yours perfect?
9. Online Presence. Before you even submit your application, you need to review your online presence and search results for your name. Reviewers may search for your name to move you to the finalist/interview stage (or not!). Your profiles can matter, and push you over the fence. Here, I go through what you need to do to maximize your 'showing' (over just the 'telling' you do in your application).
10. Recommendations. Second (or even tied with) your personal statement, recommendations are incredibly important. They are the only obvious way that fellowship programs can 'see how others' judge you, and you need to be able to get the best possible recommendations. How do you ensure that your recommendations can be as good as they can be?
11. Recommendation Package. This has its own section because you also underestimate how important it is to 'package your candidacy' appropriately for your recommenders. You need to 'make it easy' for them for the exact moment that they're writing your recommendation. How do you do that?
12. Fellowship Office/Advisor. They are the gatekeepers of some of these fellowships, but many might not know the best strategies. This is how you can approach and work with them to reduce the chance that they filter you out of programs for which you might otherwise be a great candidate.
13. Application. You will also have to double some of your efforts and re-organize your resume materials within the application systems. Many will ask specific, tailored questions for their own programs. This section dives into how these systems function.
14. Video Interview. Some fellowships require a video interview at the semi-finalist stage. This is the first mini-barrier before the actual interviews, but it's obviously extremely important that you perform well. How do you make sure that your video interview is high quality?
15. Interview Preparation. These are unlike most interviews you have ever done. 99% of you will underestimate how important it is to prepare for interviews effectively. This is the final barrier, and I would weigh it at 50% (importance level). Here is how you can effectively prepare for them.
16. Interview Weekend. This is typically an exciting, anxiety-filled weekend, where you will meet your competitors. You need to know what to expect so you aren't caught off guard, and you want to be prepared with background about potential social pitfalls. What exactly happens during this incredibly important 'final step?'
17. Rejection? + Next Steps. If you apply to several programs, you will–statistically speaking–be rejected by the majority of them. Some people apply multiple times throughout multiple years until they finally win. How do you prepare your next steps in life, in parallel with your applying to these programs? How can we continue to strategize intelligently so you can maximize your potential professionally?
18. Won? Winning doesn't mean your entire life is set. It's merely a big step forward before the rest of your life. Here is all that you can expect, and here is what you can do to maximize your year(s) abroad.

*disclaimer: I'm a designer-entrepreneur who also runs MWDL, a web design and product development company (https://midwestdesignlab.com). MWDL built and manages the George Mitchell Scholarship application system. I do not assess, select, or weigh in on any application. This documentation or any advice that I offer does not guarantee your winning a national fellowship. However, I believe that the mere act of going through the process will help you develop a plan for the next steps in your life, which can ultimately be helpful.