We have found 16 scholarships limited to students in Putnam County, from 7 local sponsors. 10 of them are tied to a school district, so the high school your student attends matters here. We keep searching and add new local scholarships as we find them, so this number grows.
3 of the 16, picked for size and for a deadline you can plan around. The other 13, with every rule, deadline and what each one asks for, are on your student's board.
Each sponsor counted once, by kind. A community foundation often runs dozens of separate funds through one application, so it can be one sponsor with many scholarships.
| Who gives locally | Sponsors | Scholarships |
|---|---|---|
| Community foundations | 1 | 4 |
| Rotary, Kiwanis, Lions and other service clubs | 1 | 3 |
| School district and school foundations | 2 | 5 |
| Memorial funds and other local groups | 3 | 4 |
| All local sponsors | 7 | 16 |
Putnam County Community Unit School District 535 (Illinois) has 10 scholarships only its own students can apply for. If your student goes to school there, the board asks which one and adds them.
None of these have a posted date yet; many local sponsors publish the next round only a few weeks before it closes. Across the 1,788 local scholarships we track nationwide that do post a date, most fall in February and March. The time to get ready is the fall before.
That is about 8 times as many as the typical Illinois county, which has 2, and ranks 4th of Illinois's 102 counties. On top of the local list, Illinois students can look at 22 state scholarships and grants limited to the state but not to one county, and the national ones. Across Illinois we have found 276 local scholarships in 98 counties. See every Illinois county.
2 of the 3 counties that border Putnam County have local scholarships in our catalog too. Some sponsors cover several counties, and a student who lives in one county and goes to school in another can sometimes apply on both sides.
A public four-year college in Illinois averaged $14,921 in tuition and fees and $12,293 for a dorm and meals in 2022-23, about $27,214 a year before any aid, more than the national public average of $22,389. That is the newest federal figure published for every state, so today's prices run higher. The homepage works out what is left after Illinois's own state aid for your student's grades and scores, college by college.
Answer a few questions and see how many of the 12,000+ scholarships we track fit your student, local ones included. Their own board, with every name, rule and deadline, is $149 for the school year.
See which ones your student fits30-day refund, no questions asked.
The full list, with each one's rules and deadlines, is the product. We read each one from the sponsor's own page and recheck it on a schedule, and that work is what the $149 board pays for. The 3 above show the list is real; the board shows which of the 16 your student fits.
No. Most local scholarships add their own rules on top of where you live: one high school, a GPA floor, a planned major, a parent who is a member or a customer. The board asks about those once and shows the ones your student fits, with what each one still asks you to check.
Counted from our catalog on November 2, 2026. We add new local scholarships every week, so the numbers here usually go up.
Counts, amounts and deadline months come from each sponsor's own published rules and can change without notice. Totals add one winner of each scholarship; sponsors that do not publish an amount are not counted in the dollar total. A deadline month is from the most recent cycle we could find. College prices are estimates to plan with, not a quote. Confirm anything you act on with the sponsor or the college.