Project Overview
Project summary:
ScholarHub is an innovative platform that combines Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning and
a collaborative academic community ecosystem to comprehensively optimize the scholarship
search and application process for students worldwide.
The platform not only offers personalized scholarship recommendations based on intelligent
profile analysis but also supports users in identifying skill gaps and suggests concrete strategies
to enhance their success rates. Additionally, ScholarHub features a chatbot assistant that
provides real-time support, guides users through each step of the application process, and
delivers tailored information based on individual goals.
What sets ScholarHub apart is its vibrant academic community, where students can actively
connect with mentors, alumni, professors, and university representatives to share experiences,
receive emotional support, and expand learning opportunities. ScholarHub aims to build an
inclusive and comprehensive scholarship environment - where every scholarship journey is
accompanied, supported, and empowered through a meaningful and value-driven community.
Identifying the Challenge
The social problem:
Despite the increasing number of global scholarships and funding levels each year, only about
30% of students succeed in their scholarship applications. Research indicates that 20-40% of
students abandon scholarship applications due to lack of information, with the main reason
being that scholarship information is scattered across multiple platforms, making it difficult for
students to track and easily miss important opportunities (2012).
Furthermore, up to 67% of international students face obstacles in searching for scholarship
opportunities due to language barriers, while existing platforms only support a limited number of
languages or offer no support at all (2024). Studies also show that students who receive support
from advisors or communities have a 65% higher success rate in their applications (2015),
making the lack of support a significant challenge.
These difficulties create substantial barriers for students in accessing and utilizing scholarship
opportunities, thereby limiting their prospects for international education and career
development.
Innovation and Uniqueness
Why Our Project Stands Out:
ScholarHub revolutionizes the scholarship discovery process through a unique combination of
advanced AI technology and a community ecosystem. Instead of just performing basic keyword
searches like existing platforms, we apply Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, and
Natural Language Processing to recommend the most suitable scholarships, while also
helping to overcome language barriers.
Additionally, we have integrated AI into intelligent profile analysis tools to compare
applications against scholarship requirements, and into personalized virtual assistants to
provide step-by-step application guidance.
Our most standout feature is our comprehensive community ecosystem, which connects
students with mentors, alumni, professors, and educational institutions. Here, students can
exchange experiences, build valuable relationships, and find research opportunities that help
expand their access to scholarships. The direct participation of universities and organizations
helps create a centralized, reliable database, transforming the scholarship search from a
solitary effort into a fully supported journey with comprehensive guidance throughout the
process.
Insights and Development
Learning Journey:
Developing ScholarHub taught us valuable lessons. Through research, we gained a deep
understanding of students' struggles in finding scholarships and designed solutions that address
real needs.
From a technical perspective, we enhanced our system design thinking and gathered data from
multiple sources. We extracted key information using entity recognition and parsing techniques,
then organized it into a structured, multi-field database optimized for retrieval. We also learned
how to build AI algorithms to enable personalized matching via semantic understanding, scoring
systems, and handling incomplete data. Additionally, we integrated multiple LLMs to improve
query understanding and the quality of recommendations.
Our biggest challenge was unifying the diverse scholarship formats into a common schema for
accurate matching.
Teamwork played a critical role-effective planning and leveraging each member’s strengths
helped us stay aligned and productive.
Development Process:
The development process was divided into three main branches: the Frontend & UX team
focused on designing and building prototype interfaces, the Backend team developed the
database and collected scholarship information, while the AI team worked on intelligent
algorithms to match scholarships with student profiles. The biggest challenges were collecting
comprehensive and accurate scholarship data, and optimizing the algorithm to deliver relevant
suggestions. Working as a team improved our collaboration and project management skills.
Although still in the prototype stage, our project has a strong potential for real-world application
once refined and scaled.
