A few questions from a recent admit

Colleges and Universities A-Z Southern Methodist University
1

Hello all,

I recently received my acceptance letter from SMU. With the letter, I also received the Provost scholarship and an email invite to the university honors program. While I am super excited with everything I received, I do have a couple of questions that make me hesitant about SMU.

  1. While I was accepted into the university, my letter did not state which major I was admitted to. I applied to cox for finance so would it be safe to assume that I was accepted for that? If not, where can I find info about which major I was accepted for?

  2. Although the provost scholarship covers a good portion of tuition, SMU still will cost about 46k (76k cost of attendance-30k provost). I haven’t seen anything about financial aid or additional scholarships in my acceptance envelope, and while I understand that those could come later, the current expenses make me uneasy about attending the university. Could anyone share their thoughts on the situation?

  3. The honors program looks to be a very rewarding experience (I’m still a little confused about what it entails) and I expect to be a part of it if i were to attend. My question lies in AP credits and how they transfer over. If I were not a part of the honors program, I should be able to graduate earlier with my AP credits, thus reducing the total costs. What are the benefits of UHP and would the benefits of UHP outweigh the AP credits I would receive?

Thanks to everyone who answers!

2

Congrats! DD applied EA for a business major, received Privost with acceptance in mid Dec. then about a week later received word from Cox, received BBA scholarship (and admit to Cox) with an additional $5k scholarship. There are 3 ways to get into Cox— BBA scholars (from HS), business direct (from HSj or once you get to SMU completion of pre business classes with a 3.5 gpa. Later, DD was invited to be a Hilltop Scholar (not Honors). As an Honors student with a business major, I would expect you may hear news soon regarding Cox.

3

@Screenname409 Congrats to your DD and all. My DD was admitted as out of state student with FA but no merit scholarship. We applied later than you did, not accepted til after January.

I am interested in your DDs stats to receive a BBA scholarship. Mine did not apply as a business major. I need to exhaust all scholarship opportunities to make SMU doable. Thank you and best of luck to her.

4

I believe that Cox Business school acceptance from HS for direct or BBA scholarship did require an intended business major election on SMU application. Here is her profile: SAT 1490, Weighted GPA 4.16 (u/w ~3.95?), 7 APs, EC leadership in service club + women in business club + Model Congress, co-captain of Varsity sport. We live in suburban Philly in top 5 Public HS in state, which is a very underrepresented geographic region for SMU and at Cox. BBA Scholarship was $5K on top of generous Provost merit Scholarship. Hope this helps you a bit.

5

  1. Look at the website (www.smu.edu/cox/Degrees-and-Programs/BBA/High-School-Class-of-2019) and talk to your admissions counselor for more details, but it looks like you are accepted only into the general university, not Cox. Then, you can matriculate into Cox the Spring semester of your sophomore year, assuming you meet the 3 requirements (complete the 7 business-subset courses, have a minimum of 39 credit hours, and a minimum cumulative 3.5 GPA). The only way to get fast-track admission into Cox is via the BBA Scholars program.

  2. Cost is a huge issue that I see coming up on CC boards, and it makes sense. SMU doesn’t seem to have very generous FA, compared to comparable schools. Financial Aid packages do some out separately. Enter your info into the net price calculator (www.smu.edu/EnrollmentServices/FinancialAid/NetPriceCalculator). It was almost exactly spot on with our package. It will come out on your SMU account financial aid info online, and you should get something in the mail a few days later. If I recall correctly, I got my package 6 weeks after admission, but as EA, Christmas and the Holiday season was in the middle, so things probably took longer for EA packages than RD in the spring. I got Provost and BBA, but couldn’t make the money work, so I’m not attending. It really is too bad that money stops so many from coming. I hope that’s not the case with you and that you are able to make it work. Let us know what happens and what you decide.

  3. I’m not qualified to answer, but I bet if you emailed the Director (www.smu.edu/Dedman/StudentResources/UniversityHonors/ContactUs), he could let you know or put you in contact with someone who could answer your questions.

6

Regarding UHP, from my own research (and I could be wrong, it was difficult to find specifics), UHP appears to make a student eligible to take extra courses and curricular activities. UHP doesn’t seem to apply to a student’s core curriculum. While some schools have honors based core curriculum, I wasn’t able to find evidence of that being the case at SMU.