AFSA Scholarships

The AFSA Scholarship Program offers over $260,000 in college aid to children of AFSA members whose parents are/were Foreign Service employees. We provide need-based, financial aid scholarships to undergraduates and academic merit awards, art merit awards, and a community service award to graduating high school seniors. The above activities could not happen without the generous bequests and donations from those in the Foreign Service community. No AFSA membership dues are used in the AFSA Scholarship Program. This robust AFSA member benefit has disbursed more than $4 million to 2,200 students in the last 25 years.

What Do I Need to Know?

The AFSA scholarship program is open to the children of Foreign Service employees whose parents must also be members of the American Foreign Service Association. The employee may be active-duty, retired, separated or deceased. Click here for additional eligibility criteria. AFSA offers aid to high school seniors who can compete for academic and art merit awards as well as a community service award; we also offer financial aid scholarships to tax-dependent undergraduates. For children of parents who are not in the Foreign Service, AFSA offers a high school essay contest - click here for further information on that program.

Our Award Recipients

We are very proud of our over 85 annual student recipients. Their achievements are as varied as they are, and we enjoy following their academic endeavors and careers once we have had the opportunity to honor them. What kinds of students receive AFSA awards and scholarships? Click below to see for yourself.

• View AFSA’s 2016 Academic Merit Awards winners
• View AFSA’s 2016 Art Merit, Community Service, and Best Essay Awards winners
• View AFSA’s 2015/16 academic year Financial Aid Scholars

We strongly encourage any Foreign Service child to apply for AFSA's scholarships and awards. We are honored to recognize the leaders of tomorrow.

Our Supporters

The AFSA Scholarship Fund has had the fortune to receive the support of many individuals and organizations over the years. On the right hand side of this page, we have gathered information on some of our donors. Many come from the Foreign Service and have chosen to give back in a meaningful way to the career that defined their lives. In 2015, retired Foreign Service member Linda K. Fitzgerald bequeathed the largest single donation ever - $950,000 - to the Scholarship Fund. Donations need not be of that magnitude to establish a scholarship or merit award. If you are interested in making a donation to the Fund in order to establish a scholarship, get in touch with us. We will be happy to walk you through the required steps.

Want to Know More?

We are pleased to make some of our promotional materials available to you online if you wish to provide information on AFSA scholarships to colleagues at post, your retirement community, or wherever you may be. The materials we have available for your use are a scholarships postcard and a half-page advertisement. You may also find AFSA's collection of articles on education, excerpted from the semiannual education issue of The Foreign Service Journal, to be helpful.

Click to watch short videos on

• An Overview of the Scholarship Program
• The Value of an AFSA Scholarship

Scholarship Fund Photos

Rachel Silverman, one of our Merit Award Winners, with Gayle Nelson, representative of the Carefirst BlueCross BlueShield Federal Employee Program Award.

Some of the AFSA named Financial Aid Scholarship donors, family members and recipients who were present at the AFSA 2016 Scholarship Program Reception with Amb. Lange Schermerhorn (far left) and Amb. Barbara Stephenson (far right).

Karl Keat, one of our Merit Award Winners, having a discussion with members of the Foreign Service community.

Contact Us!

If you have any questions about AFSA's scholarships programs, or are interested in discussing ways to support it (through bequests, donations, etc.), please get in touch with Scholarships Director Lori Dec at (202) 944-5504 or dec@afsa.org, or Scholarship Senior Associate Jonathan Crawford at (202) 719-9714 or crawford@afsa.org.