College Applications and Scholarships-Automating

[BobHank]

Hi,
My daughter is a junior in high school.
We are trying to simplify the process of applying for
scholarships, and college applications.

My question:
Is there a way to automate (or semi-automate) the process
of scanning in paper applications that are PDF format,
and then using MailMerge or some feature within Word,
to fill out the standard Name & Address fields?

Or, can you think of an efficient way to simplify the process of
getting, filling out, and sending applications from different sources?

thank you.
Bob Hangsterfer

 

[Doug Robbins - Word MVP]

With the multitude of different forms that you are likely to encounter,
there is probably no realistic way to automate the process.

Quite often however, I use the ability of Snagit (from www.techsmith.com) to
"print" a .pdf file one page at a time to create a .jpg file of each page
that can then be inserted, one page at a time into a Word document and then
the picture can be formatted so that it is behind the text and locked in
position so that the required information can be entered into the positions
on the form. It is a bit fiddly, but produces an excellent result if
appearance is what you are after.

--
Hope this helps.

Please reply to the newsgroup unless you wish to avail yourself of my
services on a paid consulting basis.

Doug Robbins - Word MVP

 

[Peter Jamieson]

I suspect there would be a lot more work infvolved in that particular
automation than there would be in doing whatever it is by hand.

I'm not sure I've really got a handle on what you really need to do - it
seems to me that you are either
a. starting from .pdf format application forms produced by colleges etc.,
and you need to put your address into their applications
the complete process - is it:
a. you get a .pdf format application form and you need to fill in your
address (i.e. your daughter's address) and perhaps other stuff on that form,
or
b. you have your own standard application form and you want to grab the
addresses off .pdf files from the colleges and insert them on your own
application form (i.e. you can put the address where you like - all you need
to do is identify it and get it), or
c. something else

(a) seems significantly harder than (b), but I wonder if
c. any of these colleges have had the foresight to make their .pdf forms
fillable forms that you can fill in with Acrobat Reader or whatever is
necessary now, or
d. if you had the full Acrobat (or perhaps some other software that can
edit Acrobat files), you might be able to insert your own text, then print.
Or some variation on those lines

If it's (b), I think I would
a. regard "address capture" as a separate step from "address re-use".
b. try to get a list of all the college addresses - perhaps there are lists
of the relevant organisations on the web and pick most of the addresses off
that - eyeballing the existing addresses and saying "I need that one" might
be quicker than retyping or scanning. Obviously you might have to make
changes and add specific department and individual name info.
c. consider cutting/pasting text direct from the .pdf rather than
scanning+OCR.

As long as you are designing your own form, you should be able to avoid
splitting the address into bits, except maybe you need to separate out the
addressee name/job title. So maybe if you are going to merge a lot of
addresses into a standard application form you just need a couple of fields
in your address list rather than Street, City, State, Zpi, (Country?)

Just my 2c-worth,

Peter Jamieson

 

[BobHank]

Doug and Peter,
Thanks for your replies.
You both gave me a lot of information to work with.
The main point i'm taking away is, there is no simple, easy way.

Both your answers are something i'll work with.
-bob