The Gates Millennium Scholars (GMS) Program selects 1,000 talented students each year to receive a good-through-graduation scholarship to use at any college or university of their choice. We provide Gates Millennium Scholars with personal and professional development through our leadership programs along with academic support throughout their college career.
This program is more than a scholarship—it’s an opportunity to change your life!
GMS Online Application
The goal of GMS is to promote academic excellence and to provide an opportunity for outstanding minority students with significant financial need to reach their highest potential by:
- Reducing financial barriers for African American, American Indian/Alaska Native, Asian Pacific Islander American and Hispanic American students with high academic and leadership promise who have significant financial need;
- Increasing the representation of these target groups in the disciplines of computer science, education, engineering, library science, mathematics, public health and the sciences, where these groups are severely underrepresented;
- Developing a diversified cadre of future leaders for America by facilitating successful completion of bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees; and
- Providing seamless support from undergraduate through doctoral programs, for students selected as Gates Millennium Scholars entering target disciplines.
The GMS Scholarship Award Provides:
- Support for the cost of education by covering unmet need and self-help aid;
- Renewable awards for Gates Millennium Scholars maintaining satisfactory academic progress;
- Graduate school funding for continuing Gates Millennium Scholars in the areas of computer science, education, engineering, library science, mathematics, public health or science;
- Leadership development programs with distinctive personal, academic and professional growth opportunities.
Program Accomplishment:
- GMS selected 1,000 new Scholars each year and we are now funding over 20,000 Gates Scholars since 2000.
- GMS has awarded $934,092,630 in scholarships between the 2000-2014 academic years.
- The average award was $12,785 between the 2001-2014 academic years.
- The average first-year undergraduate student retention rate is 96.2% (Active or deferment) among Gates Scholars; the average second-year rate is 93.2% (Active/Deferment).
- The GMS five-year graduation rate is 82.2% and the six-year graduation rate is over 86.9%.
- Nearly 50% percent (n=6281, 48.5%) of Gates Millennium Scholars transition into graduate school after earning a Bachelor’s degree; 60.6% into a GMS-funded field and 39.4% into GMS-unfunded fields.
- Gates Millennium Scholars have enrolled in 1,751 different colleges and universities.
- 12,959 Gates Millennium Scholars have completed a degree since the Program’s inception. 10,654 Scholars that started the program as freshmen have earned an undergraduate degree.
- Of the active entering Freshmen in the 2015 cohort, 40.9% (n=399) are attending highly selective colleges which admit one-third or fewer of their applicants. 51.1% (n=499) are attending colleges which admit 40% or fewer of their applicants. 58.7% (n=574) are attending colleges which admit less than half of their applicants
