Before you start filling in the application:

Get to know your audience.

• Find out how the selection process works. How much will the person reviewing your application know about your field. Most scholarship selection committees review applications from a broad area of science. The number of applications reviewed is often huge.
• Your application must be clearly and quickly understood by a non-specialist. 
• You must write your application such that your excellence leaps out of the page.

Try to clarify in your mind what you want to achieve in the long run (say the next ten years).

• In many applications you must outline a career plan. You must demonstrate that you have thought through your long term goals.
• You must demonstrate
  • how what you plan to do fit with what you did in the past
  • how this next position fits into your future goals

Select a potential supervisor. Selecting a supervisor is important because:

• It will give your application focus. You can give details as to why this particular training is critical to your career goals.
• It will demonstrate clearly that you have a definite, well thought out, career path in mind.
• You can get help from your potential supervisor. If you are uncertain with your future, be honest. Most potential supervisors will help anyway.
• You can still change your mind later, as to your potential supervisor, later. Most scholarships are portable.

Get letters of reference. Select people who

• know and like you
• are willing to give you a good reference. If they seem reluctant try someone else
• have the time to write a good letter.
• Do not select people on the basis of who you think would be considered more famous. Often the selection committee members will outside your field and will not have heard of them.

To help make these letters superb, provide the people you have asked for references with ammunition, including:

1. a copy of your marks with your ranking in each class
2. an updated CV
3. a short letter in which you highlight
   •  what you have achieved and what you hope to achieve.
   • concrete evidence of any outstanding performance
     • courses in which you have done particularly well in. If you know your ranking, state it.
     • progress in your current  research. Progress in publications. Meetings attended. Techniques mastered.
     • courses taught. TA's (ratings if available).
     • other research jobs (publications if available).
     • contributions to the dept., university (e.g. student rep., committees, events organized).
4. It takes time to write a good letter of reference. So make sure you give the person you ask lots of lead time.

Order your transcripts

• Don't wait till the deadline. Getting transcripts can take time.

Read the forms and take the directions seriously.

• Place information where the referee expects to find it and in a format that is clearly understood.

Check the deadline (internal and external).

• Many applications are screened by the department and have early internal deadlines.
• Write out a schedule/timeline for completing the application