Does Wendy’s Offer a Scholarship?

by Bry Roth

We’re often asked if there’s a Wendy’s scholarship available to support students approaching college. With rising tuition rates, any amount of financial relief is helpful, and Wendy’s is proud to offer more than $60,000 of scholarship money to high school students graduating with the class of 2019.

Wendy’s High School Heisman scholarship is a joint program between Wendy’s and the Heisman Trophy Trust, host and custodians of the Heisman Memorial Trophy (yep, that Heisman). We celebrate the best and brightest male and female high school seniors from across the country.

So, no. This award isn’t to recognize the best high school football player, but we get it’s easy to think it is.

Do I Qualify for the Scholarship?

The qualifications to apply for the award are straight forward. We ask the following of 2019 grads:

• Have a cumulative high school GPA of a B (3.0) or better.
• Participate in at least one school-sponsored sport.
• Demonstrate leadership at your school and in your community.

How Do I Win the Award?

For your best shot of winning, we suggest you apply for the award. You should also read through the steps on our website first: www.wendyshighschoolheisman.com.

Where Do I Apply?

Glad you asked! You can apply on our website.

How Many Scholarships Does Wendy's Give?

• 90 scholarships of $500 are awarded to each male and female state winner.
• Eight (8) scholarships of $1,000 are awarded to four male and female national finalists.
• Two (2) scholarships of $5,000 are awarded to our male and female national winners. Plus, they’ll get some special recognition during the collegiate Heisman broadcast.

Check out our former winners to see what they achieved to win the award.

When Should I Apply?

As soon as possible. The scholarship considers all the stats and cred you’ve racked up your freshman – junior years.

Unfortunately, year after year we see most students wait until the last week prior to the deadline to submit their application and then run into technical issues.

Have you ever tried parallel parking in a space that’s 16 feet long, but your car is 15 feet long? The days leading up to the application deadline are similar. We do our best to up the ante on our servers as we anticipate the mad rush, but if you’d like to get in without issue, and to save yourself a panic attack, apply now.

Note: we don’t want you to put your teacher through an all-night cram session either. There’s a role for them in this, too.

I’m Still Reading This Post, So Clearly, I'd Like the Wendy's High School Heisman History Lesson...

The Wendy’s High School Heisman Scholarship was created by Wendy’s founder Dave Thomas. Dave dropped out of high school when he was 15 years old to work full-time, yet he went on to become one of the most successful entrepreneurs in history.

While this nontraditional path led to his prosperity, it always worried Dave that others would expect to achieve similar fame and wealth by not finishing high school or attending college.

Faced with this dilemma, at 61 years old, Dave took the required classes to earn his General Equivalency Diploma (GED) and was honored at a ceremony at Coconut Creek High School in Ft. Lauderdale, FL. The senior class of 1993 embraced their honorary classmate by inviting Dave and his wife Lorraine to the senior prom and voting him “Most Likely to Succeed.” Inspired by his desire to celebrate the outstanding achievements of youth in America, he launched the Wendy’s High School Heisman program.

Twenty-five years later, Wendy’s has honored more than 600,000 of the nation’s most esteemed high school seniors who share Wendy’s values of giving back to their communities, treating people with respect, continuing education and excelling on the athletic field.

The Wendy's name and design and the Wendy's High School Heisman and design are trademarks of Quality Is Our Recipe, LLC.  The Heisman Memorial Trophy, Heisman name and Heisman Trophy figure are registered trademarks of the Heisman Trophy Trust, used with permission.