Iowa State undergraduate students will have a new, one-step routine to retrieve university scholarships for the 2019-2020 school year.

Previously, students were required to fill out multiple applications when in search for Iowa State scholarships, but with the new system called OneApp, students will submit a single online application that will be used by different departments and units for use on a multitude of scholarship opportunities.

“We are really trying to keep the student experience at the forefront, that was really the driving force behind it,” said Ann Wessman, program manager for student financial aid. “I worked with scholarships since 1995 here and we have been talking about it that entire time. That it is confusing to students and they don’t understand there are many different entities that award scholarships.”

OneApp is also going to change the way students fill out the loan application. Students will not be asked to provide relevant information that Iowa State already has like grade point averages, demographics, hometowns and financial need. The software will import that data automatically and help students find scholarships accordingly.

Once basic information is submitted, students may receive suggestions for scholarships they could apply for that require additional follow-up, such as an essay.

As new scholarships are added after students apply, they will be notified of the additional options.

“What we wanted to do was really improve the student experience so that they can, in the end, fill out one application and be considered for college and departmental scholarships as well as scholarships awarded through the financial office,” Wessman said.

For OneApp’s trial run, current students and incoming transfer students used it this past spring to apply for scholarships in the College of Engineering. So far, Wessman said the feedback has been positive.

“The trial run last year was incredible,” Wessman said. “The number of questions we had received in the past versus what we had in the last year dropped dramatically. Everybody was excited about getting this going because it was well overdue. It took a lot of people devoting lots of hours.”

After a successful trial run, the system is expected to go live on Monday, Oct. 1.

“We aim to eventually grow university-wide with Greek affairs honors program, and all these different departments that have their own application process,” Wessman said. “We have all the colleges and departments on board for this year and hopefully we will expand next year.”