Valentino Scholarship

Valentino Scholarship is sponsored by Department of Physics, The Ohio State University. An $8,000 scholarship for incoming students majoring in physics or engineering physics at Ohio State University.

Valentino Scholarship | Department of Physics The Ohio State University Department of Physics The Department of Physics is pleased to announce the Valentino Scholarship, which is an $8,000 per academic year scholarship awarded to one incoming student per year who plans to major in physics or engineering physics at The Ohio State University.

This scholarship competition is open to any high school senior applying to Ohio State who has declared a major of physics or a pre-major of engineering physics. Eligibility for this scholarship is limited to students enrolling in The Ohio State University in Autumn 2026 who will major in physics or engineering physics.

To clarify, applicants do not need to have been admitted to OSU or have accepted an admissions offer by the Valentino application deadline as we understand these decisions can happen later. In order to receive the funding in the autumn, the scholarship awardee will need to accept their OSU admission offer and enroll in autumn classes - both of which will happen after the Valentino application deadline.

If the scholarship awardee chooses to not attend OSU, or is not admitted to OSU, the scholarship will be given to a different student. The scholarship is open to both U.S. citizens and non-U.S. citizens and is not limited to residents of Ohio. This competition is not affiliated with the application process to The Ohio State University.

All application materials for this scholarship, including high school transcript, must be sent to the address below to assure full consideration for the scholarship. Unlike the other requested materials, the committee does have access to view the ACT/SAT scores you've sent to the university so you will not need to resend your official test scores.

The scholarship is renewable for up to 4 years as long as the student continues to make good progress toward a degree in physics or engineering physics. If the student withdraws from the physics or engineering physics major, or fails to make adequate progress toward a physics or engineering physics degree, the scholarship will be terminated.

The scholarship recipient will be determined by a combination of high school courses and grades, letters of recommendation, SAT or ACT scores, and the online application completed by the applicant. The amount of this award will be added after any other non-need-based financial aid is awarded, up to the maximum allowed by The Ohio State University.

Scholarship Decision Timeline Expectations Because the Valentino scholarship is awarded to only one student per year, the recipient of the scholarship will be given 10 days to accept or decline the scholarship . If the recipient declines, the student who was ranked #2 by the committee will be offered the scholarship and given time to accept or decline the scholarship, and so on.

Once the scholarship is formally accepted by the scholarship awardee, the other applicants will be notified that they did not receive the scholarship. Our goal is to have all decisions finalized and all scholarship applicants notified by the May 1 university admissions acceptance deadline.

Required Application Materials Online Application (link will be active when applications are being accepted) Two letters of recommendation from people who know the applicant well. At least one letter must come from a high school teacher and the other can be from a teacher, or in exceptional cases, someone else qualified to evaluate the applicant's mathematical and scientific abilities.

High school transcript to be emailed to Lindsey Thaler (thaler. 21@osu. edu) The 2026 application deadline was 11:59pm on March 13, 2026.

The 2026 application is closed. For questions or further information, please contact Lindsey Thaler by email at thaler. 21@osu.

edu.