Entering the holiday season, many senior students are starting to hear back from colleges and preparing for the next step in life. To help finance the next step, scholarships are a top priority for many students. The Michigan High School Athletic Association (MHSAA) awards $2,000 scholarships to 32 students across the state who have had a varsity letter, have a 3.5 GPA or higher and demonstrate high character off the field by submitting a 350-word essay on sportsmanship.
The winning students are selected in February 2026. Varsity tennis and All-State Matthew Holowinski ’26 has recently applied for this opportunity and is excited to find out if he won.
“I think it’s a pretty cool opportunity to award the athletes that are skilled both on the field and in the classroom,” Holowinski said. “Although it’s very hard to win the award with almost 2000 students applying each year, I’m glad they have that scholarship open to anyone.”
Students aren’t the only people proud of scholarships; coaches get excited to see their players succeed at the college level. South varsity dive coach Tom Mulhern is happy that all of his players are using their varsity letters to help their future.
“With diving being a middle-of-the-year sport, and the deadline for entering the MHSAA awards being in mid-December, I always let my players know if they would be likely to qualify for a varsity letter and make sure they apply on time,” Mulhern said. “That way, they don’t have to worry about playing a sport at the varsity level in the middle of the year and miss out on the scholarships.”
However, some students are disappointed by the poor timeline of the scholarships, with many competitive varsity spring sports not being able to receive early varsity letters. Varsity golf player Will Bishop ’26 knows of many seniors who are on the verge of varsity.
“There are a lot of players who are going to be close to being on the team,” Bishop said. “Golf is a generally smaller sport, so we can only have around 12 kids on the team, and with only a few spots up for grabs this year, there are a lot of seniors who are very close in skill level and may not receive a varsity letter.”
Although most kids won’t get the award, Mulhern is very supportive of the whole process.
“I’m really happy they opened the awards to anyone to apply,” Mulhern said. “Although it’s unlikely any one particular player wins the award, it allows everyone to get a fair shot and set them up well for the future.”
