<p>Not to beat a dead horse, but were still unclear about this. Heres the situation:
DD has been accepted at state school and LAC. State school offers, I believe, 35 full rides to the first 35 NM Finalists who have applied, been accepted, and listed said school as first choice with National Merit. LAC doesnt offer any full rides but does offer a generous scholarship, which can be combined with other scholarships, to a few NM Finalists (I dont think they say how many) who have applied, been accepted, and listed said school as first choice with NM. State schools deadline for listing it as first choice is end of February; LACs deadline is sometime in April. Heres the question: If DD lists state school as first choice and is offered a full ride there but decides to attend LAC instead, can she change her first choice with NM and be eligible for the LACs scholarship? We hesitate to call the LAC and ask because of course we want them to believe they were always DDs first choice. (It feels sneaky, but dont hate the player; hate the game.) Suggestions? Thank you very much!</p>
<p>You might want to call NMC and ask them directly. My understanding is that once a NM scholarship is offered, no other NM scholarship will be offered. Normally it is April or later that NM will announce who gets what scholarship. State school’s February deadline might be for determining the first 35 Finalists rather than the day that the scholarship will be offered. In that case, changing your first choice school will be OK. My only concern will be whether it is ethnical to do so or not.</p>
<p>I agree with Christian2 in that after you receive a scholarship from a school, you cannot receive another one.</p>
<p>I’m not sure how universities find out who reported them first, but the National Merit packet says:</p>
<p>March 1 Finalists who have reported a sponsor college as first choice by this date will be included in the first group referred to the institution for scholarship consideration</p>
<p>I don’t know how schools would know before March 1st, but I think you should pick by then. You can go undecided if you have to. I have no idea what would happen if you had the state school as the choice and then after the school received that notification you switched. I suppose the best thing to do would be to ask National Merit.</p>
<p>I am wondering about this as well…</p>
<p>My daughter is only a freshman, but she got a 192 on the selection index with zero preparation. We are in LA and the cut off selection index for NMSF has been 207, 208, 209 over the last 3 years, so we feel this score is within her reach by her junior year.</p>
<p>She wants to major in musical theatre and has to audition to get into two schools that do offer scholarships to NMSFs, and the auditions are in Jan/Feb. Not sure when she’ll know if she’s accepted before the deadline to name your first choice school…</p>
<p>I know I’m starting this early, but I have a son who’s a freshman in college and I wish I would have started things earlier with him. He’s attending a state school and majoring in engineering. He did receive some scholarships, but I know that if we had started earlier we could have improved his PSAT score to get NM consideration…</p>
<p>So March 1 is the deadline to let NM know your first choice school?</p>
<p>No, March 1st is when National Merit will start sending out the college choice. If you have listed a school, but are not sure about it anymore, you should change to undecided by that date.</p>
<p>“May 31 Deadline for NMSC to receive reports of college choice for identifying the final group of candidates for college-sponsored Merit Scholarship awards”</p>
<p>May 31 is the deadline, but some schools offer competitive scholarship, so let them know as early as you can.</p>