Maybe a URS as opposed to a URM* LOL. It will probably help, all else (including racial demographic) held equal, simply because schools like to get a variety of top kids from around the country.
- Unless "URM" means "Under-Represented Mississippian"
Anybody else get a letter saying SAT results weren’t received? (Had a minor heart attack when I saw the envelope–I thought it was an early rejection.) My daughter had “thought” she sent them. Thank goodness they bothered to notify her because she would have been eliminated for a very dumb reason.
Just wanting to get my timeline straight here as we head into 2018.
In early January the rejection letters will go out first, right? So initially, we want to NOT receive a letter from National Merit. Then, in early February the finalists are notified? Do those letters go directly to the finalists at their home? We homeschool, so I guess we’ll get it either way but I was just curious.
By March 1 NMSC sends out the list of students who have made their 1st choice college known, correct?
Thanks!
We got that letter too. My D was under the impression the school would send it. However, we did a rush from Collegeboard and they confirmed receipt later last week.
The student is responsible for sending the SAT score, as a couple of posters above just found out 
For future reference (listen up, Class of 2019!) - Sometimes the parents can help out with making sure these little details get done well before the deadline. My sister-in-law had an almost NON-minor heart attack when she found out that her daughter, who was being recruited by an Ivy for her sport and needed to get all her stuff - including all test scores - in by end-of-August, dropped the ball on that last part. I think her DD must have figured that she could just e-mail them a copy of the report or something so no big whoop. The adults know what OFFICIAL means and the adults can also connect the dots and prompt the uber-busy kiddo to send that score in a month early - and print out the receipt while you are at it. Even potentially worse, they barely avoided the ACT end-of-summer week-long shut down (which had been posted on the ACT website for awhile . . . ). They got the score ordered over the phone with ACT - the night before the shutdown and just as Customer Service was about to switch off.
After all the years of hard work, it would be heartbreaking to get dinged on a technicality. I was so paranoid about NM stuff slipping through the cracks that I went ahead and sent my D’s SAT to NMSC before she even knew she was SF. (It was the new test, too, so that was tempting fate just a bit . . . ). It was worth the $15 just to be able to check it off the list early-on.
My DD was accepted ED at her top choice school (and will attend) which offers no merit for NMF. Is there any benefit to listing this school as her top choice or is it better to keep her choice as undecided?
I have a simular question to @Kayak24 does listingg a collge that doesnt offer NM money put us in the running for one of the scholarships from NM.
@Kayak24, I would guess as long as she doesn’t list an NMF sponsor school it doesn’t matter.
If your first choice school is not an NM sponsor school then they may be in the running for the one-time $2,500 scholarship (which isn’t attached to any particular school) or a corporate scholarship. Could be incorrect here, but thinking that keeping your choice as “undecided” doesn’t give NMSC enough information to qualify you for one of those, since you might always specify a sponsor-college at the last minute. You can’t be given more than one type of prize, so the more clarity they have about your choices, the better.
Check out the deadlines on when those $2,500 or corporate scholarships are decided. That might help. My D17 was given a college-sponsored prize but that wasn’t available till May 1. The other ones might have been distributed by that time (though again, check to make sure).
Thank you for your responses. We just went in to make the change. I suppose that NMSC could take any entries with a grain of salt, knowing that those entries can be changed at any time. Nonetheless, if a student is committed ED somewhere, no reason to leave the entry as “Undecided.” Good luck to all!
Did your D save her emails from NMSC? I thought S got one to confirm his college with a link and instructions on how to change it.
Highly doubt that NMSC even looks at any “first choice” selections till at least when NMF’s are named. Right now they are probably tied up with reviewing applications and getting after schools that still haven’t submitted their portion yet (there are always a few . . . ).
Also, just pulled out my daughter’s materials and read through some of them. You actually should list a college choice at some point just because all the scholarships can only be used at an accredited college or university in the US (page 3 of the instructions under College Choice). They need to know where you are going in order to give you any scholarship at all. It doesn’t guarantee that you’ll get one, but not listing a first choice will guarantee that you don’t.
They also say if you are unsure then leave it as “undecided” and report as soon as possible. You may change your mind. On page 2 of the “how are National Merit Finalists Selected” portion (and under the section “How are National Merit $2500 Scholarship winners selected”) It appears that they meet in late January to choose these. Therefore, @Kayak24, your daughter was wise to have listed her first choice by now!
Thanks so much, @JBStillFlying , that is helpful info!
I’m a little confused. If you are waiting for decisions at the end of March, do you just leave it as undecided until then? And then change it asap? You can’t list a first choice before you find out if you got in, right?
I think you all are making this more complicated than it needs to be. If the OP’s D 's preferred school does not offer NM scholarships and she has already been accepted into the school, there is no point in listing that school as the fist choice. What you should list as first choice is your preferred school that offers NM scholarships.
Common wisdom is to make that selection by March 1, which is the earliest date that NMSC starts telling schools the finalists’ first choice. Leaving the first choice as undecided may still get you one of the the $2500 NM Scholar awards, but it precludes you from the big scholarships offered by universities.
@kcheves not sure that’s accurate because there are two other categories of scholarship you could be eligible for. You need a school to win anything. Double check the rules to make sure. We always thought this part of the contest was quite confusing.
@jprtaco if you are waiting on a March decision and your options aren’t college sponsors then any award you win would have to be either be a one time or a corporate. Both of those transfer to any school. So theoretically it shouldn’t matter which School you specify. Check with NMSC to make sure if this is your situation.
If you are waiting on a march decision from a college sponsor then call that institution to get advice on when to specify them as a first choice.
I am the OP with the specific question and I understand what @kcheves is saying in terms of already being accepted, but in this case it’s an ED binding acceptance. My daughter will attend this ED school in the fall (Johns Hopkins) per the agreement we signed, so there is no reason to list a sponsoring college as she will not be eligible for those awards. My question was whether it’s best to leave it listed as undecided under those circumstances or to just list the nonsponsoring college.
In the event we were only taking about EA acceptances and not a binding agreement, then of course the logic would prevail to list a sponsoring college instead. I apologize for any confusion I caused. 
I can’t decide what I think my daughter should do regarding her “first choice” college. She is down to 5 schools, only 1 offers a full-ride National Merit Scholarship for finalists (Oklahoma Christian University). Of the remaining 4 schools, 3 of them do offer awards for National Merit Finalists but none of them are sponsor colleges and therefore she is not required to list them as her first choice in order to receive the award. The remaining school offers nothing for National Merit, but she is in a competition for other significant institutional merit awards.
If she were simply ranking the schools, Oklahoma Christian would be near the bottom of her top 5. She’s pretty much only keeping it around because it’s the only full-ride school she’s still interested in. It seems like it would make sense then for her to put that as her “first choice”. However, would that take her out of the running for the $2500 scholarship from National Merit?
On the Instructions for Semifinalists we received from National Merit, it states “College choice is not considered in determining whether a Semifinalist qualifies as a Finalist or in the selection of National Merit $2500 Scholarships. However, NMSC requests your college choice because every National Merit Scholarship can be used only for attendance at a college or university in the United States that holds accredited status with a regional accrediting commission on higher education.”
It’s so difficult to know what to do. It’s very important she get a shot at the $2500, since she could use it at any of the other 4 schools. Yet, we don’t want to unnecessarily give up her option of attending OKC for free if it comes down to the point where the money matters most. What would you do?