Columbia Chamber of Commerce Scholarship Selection Procedure  (Version 1.0)

1. No scholarship applications will be accepted if submitted after the cut-off date.
2. A minimum of five Columbia Chamber of Commerce Scholarship Committee members will be used to review the scholarship applications, and one additional Columbia Community Foundation member will be assigned to accept all printed materials from scholarship applicants, assign the materials with the correct scholarship applicant number, blacken-out any information that would allow a reviewer to know the identity of the applicant, and make appropriate copies of the submitted materials for each of the other reviewers, and will verify application information with submitted printed materials provided (like GPA, SSN, activities list, higher education acceptance letter, etc.).
3. Each scholarship application reviewer will be given access to each scholarship application with personally identifyable information either blocked from view or blackened out so that the identity of the applicant is not know to each reviewer, thus providing for an honest and unbiased review and ranking of each application.
4. Each reviewer's total score per application will be added with the other reviewers' same application score, and then the total will be divided by the number of reviewers in order to come up with an average score for each application, thus providing a natural ranking at the end of the process for each application.
5. After all of the applications have been received, rated, totaled, and verified for accuracy, then the top ranking applications will be revealed to the reviewers along with the personally identifiable information for those particular applications.
6. Scholarship application winners will then be contacted by the Columbia Community Foundation.  No reviewer shall discuss any applications, personally identifiable information, or scholarship winners outside of the Columbia Chamber of Commerce Scholarship Committee membership or the Columbia Community Foundation.
7. The Columbia Community Foundation will take possession of all materials submitted, in either electronic or other formats, concerning this scholarship and will not return the materials.  If the applicant receives a scholarship, all materials gathered will be kept in an active file for 365 days after, at which time they will be destroyed by the Columbia Community Foundation.  All other materials received for non-scholarship awarded applicants will be kept active for 30 days, at which time they will be destroyed by the Columbia Community Foundation.  No personal or financial information will be shared outside of the Columbia Community Foundation without prior specific permission from the applicant.