I’ve looked back a few pages here and can’t find a thread of posts about this.
How likely are the academic scholarships (Presidents Endowed, Lechner and McFadden) at A&M? It lists the eligibility criteria but then also states the awards are competitive. What is the likelihood of a student who meets their criteria actually receiving those scholarships?
I believe the statistics, at some point, said there were 300 PES (President’s Endowed Scholars) named for all majors but that was a couple of years ago. McFadden and Lechner scholarships seemed more prevalent (again a few years ago) but the criteria were minimums and it was fairly competitive as well.
My older son was far above the minimum academic criteria listed for the scholarships. He even had excellent and many extracurricular activities. He got no merit aid from A&M. This was 4 years ago. My younger son was a NMF and A&M was very generous with automatic scholarships. So for any student not a NMF those scholarships are very competitive.
I think A&M likes to see lots of volunteer work, community involvement and leadership besides just academics and general school extracurricular activities.
I am a Hispanic National merit and had a good SAT, like 1300 in the new scale, and over 500 community service hours. I had multiple high ranking positions in community service clubs and I don’t believe in what “tr4metwo” said. The people who I have seen get the “Presidents Endowed Scholarship” are usually valedictorians or salutatorians of big high-school’s. The salutatorian of my class got it and the salutatorian before her got it. Neither of them had good volunteering experience. Mostly all of those scholarships are just given to people with high GPA’s and ranks in competitive high schools.
I would say there is more hope than merit scholarships being awarded to primarily only kids who are a salutatorian or a valedictorian. My kids were very not close to either of those two distinctions in our large, competitive high school nor were they NMFs but did receive merit scholarships (PES and McFadden/Lechner) so definitely apply for it. I think we heard back on those scholarships in the spring.
@justanotherjose The Presidents Endowed Scholarship was automatic for NMF the year my son applied. Unless awards have changed and there are levels awarded for National Hispanic just like there are for National Merit Finalists and National Merit Semi-Finalists.
You could be right that valedictorians / salutatorians get preference. But I know that A&M also considers community service and leadership for selection (either additional awards or programs) because of what my younger son was offered. Guess each case is different so the only way to find out is to apply.