<p>Admission</a> > Grants and Scholarships</p>
<p>It's very difficult to find more information about this, because there's very little in that link. Is it full tuition? What are they looking for in applicants? How competitive are they? Do they offer any oppurtunities? What do they mean by "middle income"?</p>
<p>I was awarded this scholarship when I was accepted in 2009, although at the time it was referred to as the “Presidential Scholarship”. Basically it’s CMU’s way to throw a little bit of money at good students to compete against lower cost schools.</p>
<p>In terms of what they look for… idk. My stats were great, but not spectacular. My ec’s were diverse, but nothing outstanding. It was good enough to be accepted to SCS…</p>
<p>I think the key really is the middle income aspect. Both of my parents are public school teachers, and my father was formerly an engineer, so I was well enough off to get a grand total of $0 finaid from each of the 7 schools I applied to, but by no means is $55k / year fully disposable.</p>
<p>But CMU would have never known about this situation had I not gone through the whole fafsa ordeal. Basically I KNEW we would not qualify for any finaid, but I convinced my dad to do it with me anyways on the off chance i’d land this.</p>
<p>Long story short: I was notified of the scholarship about 1 week after my admission notice, it was for a VERY random $ amount ~ 9.5k / year, there are no opportunities that go along with it… you just pay less. I have no clue how many are awarded, but I’d guess more now that they did away with the other scholarships. For the same reason, the amount awarded may have also increased.</p>
<p>To support what BCO has already said, my son was awarded the Carnegie scholarship (but has chosen another school) - 10 grand annually. The letter he recieved was that it was the Presdiential merit scholarship, however, I am quite sure he was not the top student who applied. He had 4.2 GPA 2270 SATs and a variety of acitivites and community service. </p>
<p>I think what they try to do it look at the families who fall just above the financial aid cutoffs but obviously cannot afford 50 grand a year! These kids cannot go to a school like CMU unless they are offered something and most have merit offers from other schools CMU considers competition.</p>