Match students to scholarships with Claude AI, Airtable, and Google Sheets

Description

This workflow ingests student profiles from a form submission or CRM, loads the active scholarship catalogue, uses Claude AI to score each student's eligibility against every available scholarship, filters strong matches, and automatically notifies eligible candidates with personalised application guidance.

How it works

Trigger — Form submission webhook or nightly scheduled batch run
Load Student Profile — Fetches or normalises the student's academic and personal data
Load Scholarship Catalogue — Pulls active scholarships from Airtable / Google Sheets
Pair Students × Scholarships — Builds evaluation pairs for AI scoring
AI Eligibility Scoring — Claude AI scores fit, flags eligibility, ranks scholarships
Parse & Rank Results — Extracts structured scores, sorts by match strength
Filter Qualified Matches — Keeps scholarships above configurable match threshold
Check Deadline Urgency — Flags scholarships closing within 14 days
Personalise Notification — Builds tailored email per student with top matches
Send Student Email — Dispatches personalised scholarship digest
Notify Advisor on Slack — Alerts academic advisor for high-value matches
Update CRM Record — Writes matched scholarships back to Airtable student record
Log to Audit Sheet — Appends full match report to Google Sheets
Return API Response — Returns structured match results to caller

Setup Steps

Import workflow into n8n
Configure credentials:
Anthropic API — Claude AI for eligibility scoring
Airtable — Student profiles and scholarship catalogue
Google Sheets — Audit and match history log
Slack OAuth — Academic advisor notifications
SendGrid / SMTP — Student notification emails
Set your Airtable base ID and table names for students and scholarships
Configure match threshold (default: 70) in filter node
Set urgency window (default: 14 days) in deadline check node
Add your Slack advisor channel ID
Activate the workflow

Sample Webhook Payload
{
"studentId": "STU-2025-4821",
"firstName": "Priya",
"lastName": "Sharma",
"email": "[email protected]",
"gpa": 3.8,
"major": "Computer Science",
"yearOfStudy": 2,
"nationality": "Indian",
"residencyStatus": "International",
"financialNeed": true,
"extracurriculars": ["Robotics Club", "Volunteer Tutor"],
"achievements": ["Dean's List 2024", "Hackathon Winner"],
"intendedCareer": "AI Research",
"disabilities": false,
"firstGenStudent": true
}

Scholarship Criteria Evaluated by Claude AI
Academic Merit** — GPA, honours, academic awards
Field of Study** — Major/discipline alignment
Financial Need** — Demonstrated need indicators
Demographic Eligibility** — Nationality, residency, gender, Indigenous status
Year of Study** — Undergraduate, postgraduate, PhD level
Extracurricular Profile** — Leadership, community service, sports
Career Alignment** — Intended career path vs scholarship mission
Special Circumstances** — First-gen, disability support, regional background

Features
Batch processing of entire student cohort nightly
AI-powered multi-criteria eligibility scoring (0–100)
Deadline urgency detection and priority flagging
Personalised email with ranked scholarship list and tips
Academic advisor Slack digest for high-value matches
Full audit trail in Google Sheets
Airtable CRM auto-update with matched scholarships


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