<p>Yeah exactly. I’ve even seen a CCer get into Princeton and not get the DHS (not that I fancy myself Princeton material). I’d just encourage everyone reading this not to view not getting the DHS as too much of an indicator of College Season failures. Many colleges look for different things, and, frankly, some of the decisions border arbitrary when you look at the top applicants for something so exceptionally selective. </p>
<p>Hopefully your daughter and I will get secondary awards, and have success in late March for the rest of our choices. </p>
<p>Nice job to all the winners. I’d imagine a full ride at Tulane is pretty hard to turn down.</p>
<p>A brief summary of my stats are 35 ACT, 2270 SAT, 3.9 GPA, taking 6 AP’s this year, and I have a lot of EC’s that include photography and film, including award winning things. National merit finalist, and my box project was a short film about a reverse burglar who delivered things in boxes</p>
<p>oh, asloves, you truly deserve it. 6 AP’s this year alone? Wow. It makes us feel a bit better about NOT winning it, if you KWIM? My daughter is a boxer, actually. And, so her project was a video she made of her "box"ing set to music with some prose she wrote about being a woman boxer. It was personal and heartfelt, though had nothing to do with Tulane. As you demonstrate, however, there was some really tough competition out there. Are you going to go? If my daughter won the scholarship, we were going to visit on honor’s weekend. But we can’t afford the tuition with just the 27,000.00 they offered. I shouldn’t say just because I know that’s a lot but it still leaves quite a bit unpaid for.</p>
<p>Did anyone in Mississippi or the regional South get their package yet? I realize this is a long shot considering Mississippi borders Louisiana, making a 3-day transit for a next day air package immediately implausible, but I’m just really worried for my twin brother. He applied to Tulane, got accepted there and into the Honors Program, and received the 27,000 Presidential Scholarship, and applied for the Dean’s. I worked with him on a collaborative video project for his submission, and I fervently hope that all our hard work didn’t go to waste. Plus I’m going to Vanderbilt while he’s at Tulane, so we really need this scholarship. Also, do students still get financial aid even if they are awarded the Presidential?</p>
<p>Yes, need based FA is still available, although the $27,000 award counts as an asset (for Tulane only, of course). In other words, whatever the family EFC was before getting the Presidential, it is now that plus $27,000.</p>
<p>Another way to look at it is this. Suppose the unadjusted total cost of attending Tulane is $55,000, and suppose the calculations came out that your family EFC is $7,000. Your brother’s cost of attending Tulane is discounted by the award down to $28,000, which means after the $7,000 your family is expected to pay he is eligible for $21,000 in need based FA. This would most likely come in the form of grants plus loans, plus possible work-study.</p>
<p>Alright. That sounds comforting. So if he doesn’t receive the Dean’s Honors Scholarship, then he will still be able to attend Tulane at a reasonable price-“reasonable” defined as not destroying our parent’s middle class income while sending us to two private universities. Thank you fallenchemist.</p>
<p>You are welcome. It all depends on the FA package, of course, but being a top notch student Tulane should be more inclined to be generous with meeting need. The fact that you are currently at Vandy definitely is taken into account on the FAFSA and CSS calculations also. Hopefully your parents have already submitted those forms. They generally announce the FA packages at the end of March.</p>
<p>I’m not sure if this is true, but I was under the impression that your Family is the one with the EFC, thus, if your family’s EFC is 7,000, they’ll be expected to pay (not including loans) $7,000 total. 3,500 for you and 3,500 for your brother. So having two kids in college at once is actually beneficial: EFC x 8 is what they have to pay if there were no overlap; EFC x 4 is what they’d have to pay if you guys are twins.</p>
<p>Yes Dillon, you are correct. That is what I meant when I said the fact that he will be at Vandy at the same time will be taken into account. There are a few different angles from which to look at it, but in the end they always come out the same. The family is expected to have so much to spend on college, and that amount has to meet the needs of all in college at that time. Usually it is a situation with an older sibling already in school, but as you say these two will be tracking at the same time for all 4 years, assuming they follow the “normal” academic track.</p>
<p>The only “hitch” is that I think it is possible for different schools to come up with different numbers for the EFC, although they should be pretty close. But I don’t think, with private schools anyway, that it is a set formula used by all. But I am not an expert in this area, so I could definitely be wrong here.</p>
<p>I’ve read a few things here and there about Tulane offering a select number of people half the amount of the Dean’s Honor Scholarship. I am aware that they offer the Presidential at roughly half, but are there any other opportunities to receive about $25,000? My dad is a small business owner and we can’t pay the whole tuition. Does anyone know of anything?</p>
<p>Last year was the first year they had a set of “runner-up” awards (not sure how many they did) and it wasn’t half, it was $3,000 more than the Presidential. In other words, the DHS is worth full tuition (most likely around $41,000 this coming year, you still pay the fees, room, board, books, etc.), so if they indeed increase the secondary award to $30,000 it is worth about 3/4 the DHS value. And to be clear, this was only awarded to people that applied for the DHS, not like the Presidential which anyone that applies to Tulane is eligible to receive.</p>
<p>I guess the only way to find out if they are doing the secondary awards again this year would be to call admissions or to just wait and see if anyone posts that information.</p>
<p>So, today I got a letter saying I was rejected from it… but on Friday I received a personalized package (saying how they loved my work with this charity and my picture) saying I received it. What happened? Both are addressed from the same date but by different people.</p>
<p>OK, I just finished reading a private message from someone else that said the same thing happened. Obviously I cannot say for sure what is right, but I sure would think that the fact the DHS letter has the personalized information would indicate you did get that award. The denial letter has to be a screw-up, at least I sure hope so.</p>
<p>Anyway, the same thing happened to me and it scared the crap out of me! I already emailed admissions but seeing your post makes me feel more confident that out was a mistake.</p>
<p>Ok, between what is on here and my PM’s, we are now up to 5 occurrences. My theory is that they created a master list of applicants (over 1,000 names) and someone was supposed to remove the winners from this list to create the list of people that were supposed to get the “sorry, but…” letter. This either didn’t happen or someone picked up on the original list to use as the denial list. Either way, I feel very confident those that got the UPS package did indeed win.</p>
<p>Second, my son who recevied the DHS UPS package last week got his “rejection” letter today also. I have emailed Tulane. Since there are several of these, I assume that the second letter was a mistake, but I would sure like to be told this directly.</p>
<p>Now I don’t feel so bad about Vassar’s screw up Surely this is an error (the rejection letters). Wait til Mardi Gras is over and give a call. Congrats to all the winners!</p>
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