Congrats to all the new NRP students.
I thought I’d follow up because I’ve followed this thread for over three years now. My son received this award as a sophomore, so was not ready to be applying to school back then. We had learned about the National Hispanic Recognition award — but by the time he received this, the program was merged into the NRP that covered other URM as well as students from rural areas.
We dug in and explored a lot of schools that were mentioned in this thread over the last couple of years. Unfortunately a number of schools had reduced or even removed merit awards specific for this program in the time that my son was exploring colleges. In general, the move to “test optional” during COVID also seems to have changed the landscape at some schools my son explored as merit that was once reserved for students with the highest test scores became more focused on GPA or other factors.
My son was also a National Merit Commended Student and had a 1500+ SAT once he applied to school. It’s funny because we would generally agree that test scores don’t necessarily predict success. However, just like other kids use their strengths when they apply to schools, my son used his. Of course he is bright, but he just does really well on standardized tests and always has. His unweighted GPA was 3.85 and he had seven IP/AP courses with some additional honors courses. He could have taken more and made a conscious decision not to.
Our DS college list is really focused on large public universities as he wants to major in an area that is generally not offered at private LAC. He focused on large public universities with honors colleges so that he could enjoy a “smaller” cohort experience, smaller classes, the ability to register early (and hopefully graduate in 4 years), honors student dorms, etc.
The only school where he received merit specific to the NRP is University of Alabama. No surprise there — full tuition + one year room + $1000 per year + honors program admittance. It’s a great deal, and he was offered a fee waiver to apply. He applied here as a “safety” because we did not know what kind of merit he’d be offered elsewhere. Unfortunately Alabama does not offer his preferred major (although he could have majored in a similar area and plans to go to grad school anyway). We found Alabama to be really well organized and if he had not started to get good offers elsewhere, we would have liked to make a visit. DS ultimately turned this down.
University of Alabama Huntsville was another school that offered DS a fee waiver to apply. There was no specific NRP scholarship, and he was offered exactly what we expected based on the automatic merit listed on their website. He never explored honors program as he’s decided to go with one of the other schools. This is another school that has great merit for good test scores/high GPA.
Penn State — we knew it was unlikely he’d get any merit here. Well, he received a $4000 one time award. Not nothing — but also won’t put much of a dent in college costs. He’s still waiting on Schreyer Honors College decision.
UW Madison - was hoping that he’d get considered for Mercile J Lee scholar program. UW made it on his list despite not having an honors college (they do have an honors program — but not as comprehensive as other honors colleges). We have family in this area so he pursued this option despite it otherwise being “too big”. Was hoping that he might get lucky enough for MJL as DS is a kid that could really benefit from the smaller cohort approach that this program would offer. While we were told that these scholarships are not all awarded, it’s likely he would have been offered this at admission — so not counting on this and unfortunately school will probably fall off the list.
Univ of Delaware - offered about $3k more than the online calculator indicated (for a total of $13k), which was nice —but not compared to other offers. Was offered honors admission here.
Iowa State - offered full tuition George Washington Carver scholarship plus merit that “stacks” worth another $10k over four years. Admitted to first year honors. DS applied in June (immediately after completing his Junior year) and again, this was a “safety school”. We’ve all been incredibly impressed with the school at this point. Since June it has never fallen off his radar because they communicate with him all the time. We were able to visit and felt like it is a good fit for him. This is one of the programs that always says NRP Scholars are invited to apply to GWC scholars program. We had no idea if any scholars had actually received it in the past — so wanted to highlight that this did work out for my son. For kids that may be anxious about the college application process, they have such an easy admissions process. He was admitted about 2 hours after applying and anyone can do a calculation online to determine if they will be admitted. Thank you state of Iowa for creating a low stress way for kids to think about college! In addition, DS has some health issues and filled out the Iowa State accommodation documentation. We were preparing for several months of discussion on this — his accommodations were approved in THREE days with documentation we already had on hand.
Florida State - offered out of state tuition waiver, admitted to honors, and invited to pursue Presidential Scholar award (semi-finalist). We’ll see how this plays out.
Anyway, we are all glad this is coming to an end (or a “new beginning”) soon here. We’re happy we “chased” merit. Although we are fortunate and our DS could pursue some of the more expensive options here, he gets it and has started to ask what makes a degree from one school worth $100k more. We’re hoping to save the money we saved for his undergraduate years for his graduate school years and beyond. He realizes we sacrificed a lot to save the amount of money we did for his college education and understands the value of that money.
Best of luck to all your students. In the end we really are happy that my son received this NRP award. He’s a kid that did not believe he could go to college and make it (he has had different health struggles throughout his life). This award made him start to challenge those assumptions. While the amount of mail he received from colleges killed a small forest, we are happy that he started to think bigger about what he might be able to do one day.