<p>What people tell their friends (even friends from nursery school) and what parents tell their friends (or the clerk in the check out line at the grocery store) and the truth is often quite inconsistent.</p>
<p>In my neck of the woods, a neighbor likes to brag that his kid got an "academic scholarship" to Princeton. Well, Princeton is quite generous with need-based aid, and the kid of course was extraordinary to get admitted in the first place, but no kid gets academic scholarships to Princeton. But do you really want to brag that "although we seem to have a secure lifestyle we haven't saved a penny in 20 years, I've been fired from the last three jobs I had and we've been living off my unemployment, and we're broke". No- people don't get points for being broke and unemployed, they get points for being such great parents that their kid got into Princeton with MERIT MONEY to boot!</p>
<p>Kids like to tell their friends that they're on a football scholarship at Dartmouth; that they turned down Harvard to go to U Conn since Harvard doesn't have a degree program in Physical Therapy; that they're going to do a joint degree at Smith and U Mass but are living at U Mass "for the convenience". (NB- there is no joint degree program; a kid at U Mass can take classes at Smith and vice-versa but the name on the diploma still says U Mass.)</p>
<p>People like to talk. It may make them poseurs or naive or wannabees or whatever, but it doesn't mean that anyone actually lied or stole a spot from someone else's kid. I know it's fashionable to decry merit money as "buying talent" but guess what- an acquantaince's kid turned down Dartmouth last year (his first choice since forever) for a huge award at Brandeis. Parents could have afforded Dartmouth so I guess once could question taking the money.... but after visiting both, the kid fell in love with Brandeis and is now a happy camper there. Kid raises the stats of the school-- so Brandeis clearly feels they got their money's worth, and the kid is an active champion when he comes back home on break at a HS which is "ivy or bust" obessessed... so good PR for them. Brandeis giving kid a fantastic education. So- what's the problem??</p>
<p>In the Florida case, if these two kids are strong enough musicians to qualify, then I say more power to them. If the U wanted to make sure that only kids who were going to be music majors, and only kids who would be successful music majors got admitted and got the money, it would be easy enought to throw a few caveats on top of the admissions/awards to ensure compliance for four years. (This award is contingent upon a 3.7 GPA overall and fulfillment of all of the requirements of a music major at the U. Any change in enrollment status will cause a review of both admissions and the award). See how easy that was?</p>
<p>I've thought about this some more, and it still seems a bit unsavory.
It is the combination of factors and the rising competitiveness of this state university that make it seem wrong to me.
It is common here for good musicians with lower grades and test scores to audition at several nearby state unis to get merit money. The merit money is dependent on their participation in band, both marching and symphonic, or in the appropriate chorus - the money is withdrawn if they drop out. The difference is that they could gain admittance on their own - just no money.</p>
<p>Does someone know, Harvard for instance, if one is a talented musician and submits a tape, and meets with music faculty, and then is admitted, is there ever any "requirement" to participate in a particular group or pursue a particular course of study? I don't think so, that's why I think the competitive schools are different from this situation as well.</p>
<p>Blossom, virtually nobody would accept the scholarship if it meant getting kicked out for a change of major. Even highly committed music majors change their minds. Not even DIV1 full scholarship athletes get kicked out of school if they no longer play, regardless of how far below the norm their academic records may have been. So it's actually not so easy.</p>
<p>Absolutely. In fact, TallSon switched from trumpet to French horn because he found out that two public Unis here in Washington have a shortage of French horn players and are offering scholarships. He thinks he will have an easier time getting accepted in French horn, and will have a greater chance of a scholarship. Once he's in, I don't care if he changes his major. It's no worse than someone who crams ECs to get accepted.</p>
<p>SS- I believe Div 1 athletes get their scholarships on a year to year basis- they can lose it for failure to play. The reason they do not lose them is the word on the street would spread and future potential recruits would remove that school from consideration. There are select cases where the scholarship gets rescinded.</p>
<p>But they aren't kicked out of school, as Blossom's suggested as a solution. They just have to apply for financial aid or come up with the money on their own. An athlete who fails to play because of injury is a different case from one who just quits. And each program handles the scholarship commitments differently -- some honorably, some not. For some schools, the LOI in high school signed means four years is guaranteed, provided the student is physically able & doesn't violate honor codes, get into legal trouble, etc.</p>
<p>"Does someone know, Harvard for instance, if one is a talented musician and submits a tape, and meets with music faculty, and then is admitted, is there ever any "requirement" to participate in a particular group or pursue a particular course of study? I don't think so, that's why I think the competitive schools are different from this situation as well."</p>
<p>Cangel, I know a young woman-- a Wellesley alum-- who says she was applied ED to Wellesley and sent a tape to the person in charge of orchestra. He 'recruited her' (her words-- not exactly, of course, but I would assume this means he contacted her and put in a good word in admissions for her) for orchestra and she was accepted to the college. She said however, that Wellesley was so hard that she didn't participate in orchestra-- she needed the time to study. I don't think there was $ involved and I will take her word that she wasn't being openly dishonest, but I don't think she ever even took the first steps in joining orchestra. I think some people who have years of lessons and orchestra involvement use it as a hook.</p>
<p>""Does someone know, Harvard for instance, if one is a talented musician and submits a tape, and meets with music faculty, and then is admitted, is there ever any "requirement" to participate in a particular group or pursue a particular course of study?"</p>
<p>At Harvard, there is not.
Meanwhile, at Harvard, according to the admissions office, the majority of students on campus participate in some kind of music-related EC at Harvard. That's why at Harvard's annual arts weekend, Arts First, literally hundreds of student musician display their talents. Most are in groups that the students formed themselves -- for the pure love of music. They range from performances by students who literally are professional musicians to performances by students who are, as an admissions officers tactfully put it, "less experienced."</p>
<p>The time that I got to go, one of the performers was Joe Lin, who was a professional violinist who had turned down Julliard to go to Harvard and major in comparative religion while continuing to perform around the world.</p>
<p>I remember speaking with a parent whose child applied to the University of New Hampshire, is an out of state student from NJ, and applying a business major. The parent did not know her child wrote business as a major. Her child was denied admission and she was so angry. She told him that he should have jotted down some less popular major and then transferred in. My point is that many parents are not only supporting deception, but are upset when their perception is that their child was not rewarded for being honest and straight forward. We don't know why he was rejected. Was it because of major, being OOS, from NJ, so so stats, not the greatest essay, some or all of the above? Only admissions knows. She wanted to warn me in case my kids wanted to apply there that they should not tell them that they want to major in business, even if that is what they would like to major in.</p>
<p>Also, I know of 2 kids who discovered back door ways to get what they wanted. One wanted to go to a school at night with adults because he was rejected from that U. mainstream program. I don't think that he followed through with that plan. Another person refused to take the SAT (years prior to test optional schools). He took 2 classes as a nonmatriculating student and performed well. He then applied to the college with his grades from the 2 classes at their school and was offered admission. This student was just one of those peoples who marches to his own drummer. He wanted to advise me that he believes that this is how one can gain admission to many schools.</p>
<p>My daughter was advised to apply to the nursing school of a certain university and switch to foreign service later on. (This was told to her by the mother of a previouly rejected applicant, she said it came from someone in the admissions office.) She chose not to follow this advice because it felt wrong to her - we'll see if she gets in.</p>
<p>mamabear, If it's a certain DC school... I know of someone who applied to a one college of that univ hoping to transfer into foreign service. She was never able to transfer.</p>
<p>We encouraged our S to apply to UVA as an engineering major because we believed it would enhance his chance of acceptance. He did not apply to engineering programs elsewhere. He was accepted at UVA while fellow students at his school with higher GPAs and similar overall SAT, ECs did not get in, presumably because they were competing in a different candidate pool. We do not believe he would have been accepted into the college of liberal arts and have no regrets in advising him to take this approach.</p>
<p>He is doing great and plans to graduate with the engineering degree (in his 2nd year now), but still not sure he will ever work as an engineer. He just likes the discipline of the major. If he had decided to switch majors after a year, we would have supported that decision. About 50% of the engineers drop out, I believe. However, we would not have been supportive if he had tried to switch majors immediately upon acceptance, which some have done. I guess that is where we draw the line at a pure bait and switch versus using a hook.</p>
<p>What is important to us is that he can take a variety of classes, including classic liberal arts and business courses as well as engineering. We have told him the main point of college, in our mind at least, is to spend four years stretching your brain as much as possible. We believed UVA offered one of the best vehicles to deliver that promise, at a bargain price, so it seemed entirely reasonable to maximize his chances of acceptance.</p>