My son was accepted with a Presidential scholarship for class of 2019. His interests are to double major in Finance and Economics with a minor in Compsy. Since Compsy is part of the Engineering program , he changed the major to Compsy to qualify for the additional $2500 per year. My question is this, are there any other scholarships out there that would allow him to major in Finance and Economics while still providing the additional $2500 or more? We have a visit to the honors college next month and hope to ask this there, but wanted to see if anyone had any experience with this. Not sure if it’s relevant, his ACT was 34, SAT - 1470 w/o the writing, GPA 3.5 UW, 4.5W, 11 APs after this year.
Thanks much
With these stats, I would suggest applying for outside scholarships in his major field(s). There are many organisations and industry groups which have tons of free money to give away to top students every year. I have heard from a scholarship committee member directly that they sometimes face the dilemma of not having enough highly qualified, deserving students each year, so the funds can go un-awarded.
Start with a scholarship clearinghouse with a good search engine (Cappex or similar), and then develop a system in order to narrow down the apps. It can take a lot of time/effort upfront to weed through the 1000s of scholarships out there, so really have your student laser focus on only those which he feels he has a VERY high likelihood of winning, based on merit, on financial need, on special interest/hobby/talent, or on your heritage. Avoid the ‘lottery’-type apps, with low payouts (e.g., 1 award nationwide of $500 with 100,000 applicants) - these usually require next to no effort, and can be tempting, but you might as well buy that lottery ticket instead, IMO. Instead, your student wants to find those multi-1000$ awards which only have a few applicants, usually because the criteria are so narrow or the stats required are so high or the effort required for the award is heavy. Once you’ve weeded through the initial plethora of scholarships, your student can develop his own spreadsheet to manage the remaining relevant scholarships for years to come. The time spent up front is well worth it. Students should aim for a strong list of about a dozen solid win-able scholarships…and hoping to get awarded at least 1 to make it all worth it. If you are fortunate enough to win an award, that can be highlighted in subsequent years, of course.
You got to be quick, tho, and jump on this process immediately if you’re truly serious about chasing these as a graduating HS senior - many deadlines are occurring right now, for the 2015-16 school year. After Freshman year, many students simply don’t bother to apply for scholarships, but that can be the absolute best time to apply, because your student will have many more things to talk about on his applications and in his narratives. 
It is not too early to look forward a year or two. Even if you don’t receive an award, if the scholarship is a good fit, don’t necessarily give up on it. Sometimes you can re-apply for the same scholarship (competitively re-apply, that is), and you may have a better chance in a subsequent year, once you have more experience/research/etc. to put on the app.
Probably the best advice is to have your student start thinking now of who they can tap for letters of recommendation. Almost any scholarship worth applying for will require an extremely well-written essay, a highly-tailored resume, and multiple, strong letters of rec. You need to have these ready. Essays can be recycled somewhat from app to app, I suppose, but letters and resumes need to be fresh and highly relevant to both your student and the scholarship.
PM me if you want specific advice on the process. I can’t give you any info in the finance or econ fields, but I can give you some pointers in eng’g. I’ve written most of this advice in other threads…but hopefully this stuff never gets old to new parents! Good luck!!!