We just had to follow-up on this story: a high school senior has landed herself a $20,000 scholarship after tweeting her “essay” about why she deserved the KFC-sponsored money. We reported earlier that this contest was in full swing, and after all tweets were read in late November, a single student has won her way through college in 140-characters or less.

KFC Colonel’s Scholars sponsored this Twitter-centric scholarship contest, requiring US high school students send in not a 2,000 word essay about why they want to go to college, but rather a single tweet.

Amanda Russell, 17, from Long Beach Polytechnic High School in Long Beach, California is the lucky winner of the $20,000 scholarship. And the winning tweet? Simple, and straight to the point:

“#KFCScholar Hey Colonel! Your scholarship’s the secret ingredient missing from my recipe for success! Got the grades, drive, just need cash!”

Altogether, there were more than 2,800 entrants who submitted their applications on Twitter. The judges had a hard time of it, apparently, as there were some pretty compelling tweets from very bright (and brief) high school seniors. Ultimately, tweets were judged based on creativity, quality, compelling nature, entrepreneurial drive and desire to attend college.

We’d like to congratulate Amanda, and we hope she keep up the tweets!