Real Insights from the Front Lines: How AI Is Reshaping Scholarship Management at AwardSpring

Recently, AwardSpring hosted a conversation on the future of scholarship management—and the power of AI to make the review and awarding process faster, fairer, and more efficient. The webinar featured a candid discussion with Heather Gennette, Executive Director of the Foundation at Cloud County Community College, and Kurt Reilly, AwardSpring’s Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer.

Here’s a look at the most important takeaways from the session.

A Real-World View from Cloud County

Heather Gennette has been with Cloud County Community College in Kansas for 14 years and currently leads their foundation team. She shared how her institution’s scholarship process has evolved since first implementing AwardSpring in 2015.

“Scholarship management is a passion of mine—and so is making my team's life easier,” Heather shared. “It’s been a wonderful ride, and I can’t imagine going back to the old way.”

Heather highlighted how AwardSpring has helped her small team overcome challenges tied to limited staff capacity, the complexities of fund restrictions, and even unexpected disruptions like COVID-19.

What SpringIQ Actually Does—and Doesn’t Do

Kurt Reilly gave attendees a behind-the-scenes look at SpringIQ, AwardSpring’s AI-powered review and awarding toolkit. He emphasized that SpringIQ isn’t meant to replace human reviewers, but to support and guide them.

“We’re focused on giving reviewers and administrators the tools to make better, faster, more confident decisions,” Kurt explained. “SpringIQ includes SpringScore and SpringAward—two tools that address two big pain points: reviewing at scale and awarding efficiently.”

• SpringScore provides automated application scoring based on custom rubrics, helping to reduce bias and inconsistency in early-stage reviews.
• SpringAward uses award logic and fund requirements to recommend how to allocate awards across eligible students—while letting staff stay in full control.

Kurt also invited ongoing feedback from the community: “We want to hear what you like, what you don’t, and what’s missing. That’s how we keep improving the platform.”

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The Human Side of Tech

Throughout the conversation, both Heather and Kurt emphasized that technology works best when it enhances—not replaces—the human decision-making process.

Heather noted that even with automation, there are still unique cases where her team needs to manually intervene. But now, they’re not buried under administrative tasks—they have the time and tools to focus on the students who need it most.

Final Thoughts

This session wasn’t just about product features. It was a reminder of why we do this work: to support students, simplify processes, and create more equitable opportunities through scholarships.