@itsgettingreal17 I accept your feedback and suspect we have just had different perspectives. In my experience, neither grad schools nor corporations care about high school awards. Not to take away anything from the incredible accomplishment… my S is NMF this year and I’m super excited about it. Just trying to put some perspective on worrying about the distinction once you get past college $$s.
@catmomof3 - I am not aware of any school officially having a cap (even USC). I doubt a school would admit a NMF without having a NM scholarship available for them.
I’m not saying it’ll get a student a job, but just like top firms ask about SAT/ACT scores even decades after high school graduation, I see some top firms asking for whether a student received any awards, and NMF/Scholar is always an option (as is Fulbright, Rhodes, Goldwater, Robertson, etc). It was surprising to me. (btw, My D was not an NMF).
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@usma87 – Bingo!!! What I cannot explain is why they have a NMF scholarship that is so generous but not automatic. I just think it’s a relic of a time when USC was less prestigious and more interested in the credential.
On a related note, the bloom might be off the USC rose just a little bit after today. If you don’t know what I’m referring to, Google “college admission cheating.” 
USC seems to have distinguished itself by being the only school to have more than one administrator named in a federal indictment today.
@catmomof3 – most schools that sponsor scholarships are chasing the credential, so they take all comers and give them all a scholarship to make them National Merit Scholars, if they are not already designated as such by winning the National award or a corporate sponsored one. A few schools do limit the number of scholarships they award – if you are asking about them, the school itself decides who gets a scholarship and who doesn’t, since it is the sponsor! In your example, the school would decide who are its 155 strongest candidates, using the same criteria it does to make admission decisions.
By the way, I think you messed the term up when you asked about NMSF – they are semifinalists, and don’t receive any National Merit award if they don’t become NMF (finalists), although some schools do give some money to NMSFs who do not become NMFs. That money, though, has nothing to so with National Merit Scholarships.
That’s little too harsh?
Dear my son, being a NMF “frankly, once you get past college applications, it won’t ever go on your resume again.”
Now, we know NMF is not included!
What would be included in the resume?
How would anyone separate oneself from other 1000 resumes? I got to believe NM on the resume helps overall.
After my Hawaii trip in 2000, I decide to share photos with friends, In 2019, I don’t even know where they are.
So, if my son is NMF 2019, I hope he shares with future employers in 2023. If graduate school is in your card, In 2027, please share on your resume that you were 2019 NMF.
Good Luck, to each his own.
Howdy @texaggie Glad you responded in case I left the wrong impression. I don’t intend to be harsh but just trying to put perspective on the value of 1 test my S took in the 11th grade. Getting NMF was not the best day in his life and for those that didn’t quite make it, it should not be the worst day either. I am not saying it’s not a big deal and to the extent it increased the scholarship at his desired school by an incremental $104k over 4 years, I am ecstatic.
All I am saying is that in my experience, professional schools and future employers will be much more interested in what students did in college rather than what they did in high school. As an example, I’m confident the typical admissions counselor would recommend against putting your junior high spelling bee championship on your college application resume.
To be clear, I am very pleased with my S’s NMF accomplishment and we celebrate it. I am pleased with his other accomplishments as well (candidly, a great resume). For a 17 year old, he is much more accomplished than his parents were at his age. What I am most proud of, however, is that he’s a good human being that doesn’t hold up his accomplishments as his identity. Again, all about perspective. be blessed!
@usma87 @NJDad00 so why the himuge drop from NMF to scholar?? From 15,000 to 7,500 or so?? Is it just that that many decide not to go to schools that participate in the program?? Because the 7,500 includes the corporate and special as well.
@catmomof3 – because NMSC does not have the funding to provide scholarships for 15,000 NMFs. The toughest one to get is the “National” one-time $2,500 scholarship that is good at any school in the country, whether or not they participate. There are only 2,500 of them. Then there are about 1,000 corporate sponsored scholarships. They vary in amount, depending on the corporation, and are also good at any school in the country. The catch with them is that a parent typically has to work for a sponsoring corporation, so lots of NMFs are not eligible to be considered.
After that, you are correct. Around 4,000 NMFs who did not otherwise win an award become Scholars by receiving an award from a participating school. Theoretically, all 15,000 NMFs could become Scholars if the remaining 7,500 all chose to attend UTD, Alabama or another sponsoring school that does not limit the amount of scholarships they are willing to fund, but, after doing this for a long time, NMSC knows the number will be around 4,000, which will make around 7,500 of the 15,000 NMFs NMSs. The so-called Special Scholarships are NOT included in these totals. I am pretty sure those are funded by corporations outside the “official” corporate sponsored award program to participants who were not NMFs.
@catmomof3 – bear in mind that the odds are extremely high that the 7,500 NMFs who do not become Scholars likely receive significant need-based financial aid, so have no incentive to chase a scholarship, or are so financially well off that they also don’t care about being a NMS. A third choice, of course, is that yet other families are not so well off, but believe it is worth spending the money to go to an elite school and forgo the opportunity to be an NMS at a sponsoring school, in order to bask in whatever prestige is associated with attending a more elite institution.
As you have observed, any NMF who wants to be a Scholar can be one by attending a sponsoring school. If you go through all of the older posts, you will find an active debate over whether being a NMS is a bigger deal than being a NMF. While being named one of the 2,500 National winners is a big deal, NMSC doesn’t distinguish between them and the other 5,000 Scholars, so, in my opinion, there is no prestige difference between NMF and NMS, since any NMF can make him or herself a NMS just by picking a sponsoring school.
Actually, @NJDad00, I got the impression that NMSC does distinguish the $2500 winners from the rest of the NMF. From skimming on their website, they seem to have some sort of forum for keeping up with that subset and highlighting what they are doing in later years. Note that I don’t know this for sure (and don’t care enough to spend time to figure it out), but that was the impression I got from the website.
Also, my D19 is choosing between a sponsoring college that will make her a NMS (with a full COA scholarship) and a non-sponsoring college that offers a full ride for NMF but which will not end up with her being a NMS. Her decision doesn’t hinge on Scholar status, but rather perceived fit. So, you can add that to your list of possibilities for the 7,500 NMF-not-NMSes.
@Reebtoor – Okay!! Just out of curiosity, which school gives full rides to NMFs but doesn’t sponsor an official National Merit award?
Also out of curiosity, why do you think NMSC is making a distinction in its NMS profiles of National award winners versus other NMS award winners? I don’t see it, and if you click just on the kids highlighted in the banner, you see school sponsored winners, corporate winners and National winners. In fact, the only place I have ever seen a distinction is on CC!
@NJDad00 University of Alabama Huntsville (listed as the Platinum Award of something). Not a sponsoring institution. Only requires a copy of the award letter to upgrade the scholarship offer.
I don’t remember specifics - just the impression from a year of visiting their website. Sorry to be vague. I don’t care enough to spend the time going back to see why I have that feeling.
@Reebtoor – you are absolutely correct!!! Kind of strange that they don’t participate, since Tuscaloosa is one of the biggest NMS schools in the country, but they don’t, so you are right! I guess you can then add to your point by including any school that offers significant merit money that isn’t associated with NMSC (even though for Huntsville you need the NMSC letter to get the award you are referring to).
Bottom line – there are plenty of reasons all NMFs do not become NMSs, but any NMFs that cares about the label can become NMS if they are willing to attend a sponsoring school!!! And, as I said before, for that reason, I don’t think the NMS label is any more prestigious than the NMF one, although I fully realize everyone doesn’t agree with that, and everyone is certainly entitled to their opinion. Your example is a great one, because if Huntsville is a better fit than Tuscaloosa, nothing about the student changed, the scholarships are substantially similar, and both schools are part of the UA system, but the student is an NMS at one and a NMF at the other. No real difference in terms of achievement or value of scholarship.