I trying to find out if boarding school kids who go to school out of state are handicapped when it comes to being selected as National Merit scholars or finalists. Does anyone know of any who were actually chosen? We know how it supposedly works but are curious what actually happens.
I know plenty of boarding school kids who were NMSF and NMF but come to think of it I don’t recall any of them actually being awarded a National Merit scholarship. That might have something to do with the colleges they chose to attend. I don’t understand all the workings myself, but my understanding is that it is basically impossible to actually get a NM scholarship to an Ivy or most selective private schools (with the exceptions of U of Chicago and USC I think?), while it is much easier to be awarded the scholarship (and then some) at some of the big state systems, especially in the South (U of Florida and U of Alabama are two names I’ve heard).
NMF are 90% of NMSF. Some don’t submit an NMF application, don’t score high enough or take the SAT. Some have some grades that disqualify them. There are threads every year on CC about this. I’m not sure about NM Scholars. I think they take out kids who have a parent who works at a company with NMF support. There are also colleges that have internal NMF support (University of Oklahoma and Kentucky that come to mind).
Yes of course it is possible that a student could have scored high enough to be a NMSF in their home state and not at boarding school.
Once you make NMSF, you just have to submit grades, principal recommendation, and SAT scores senior year. Though I heard putting it together is a bit of work, concurrent with college admissions process. Maybe some are just electing not to deal with it, since they are going to colleges which don’t give $ for National merit anyway? (ie, many private colleges do not, I think?). But yes, there are threads on this on CC. Maybe the BS don’t encourage it?
The public schools usually release an article on who made NMSF and NM Commended, but not sure if BS do that. My son’s school mentioned it in an assembly.
Ds school does not put a whole lot of stock in the NM but a scholarship is a scholarship, even if it is not a huge amount. Ive read a lot of NM threads on CC. I am trying to figure out the BS angle. I’ll revisit and see if any address NM and BS.
Yes, they get them. But if you need a score that corresponds to the highest tier, regardless of where the school is or what state you are from. (Unless it has changed, but I don’t think it has.)
Few BS really focus on test prep so if this is important to you, take an SAT prep class during the summer before junior year
D already qualified, achieving an SSI qualifying score of 224. It makes it in home state, in school’s state, and in the highest scoring state of the regional cohort. Trying to learn if NMC actually awards to BS kids or only to kids who attend schools in state of residence.
Well, if they announce them but don’t award them, that’s pretty sleazy.
Kids in DS’ class were announced so I assumed got them.
Too many get those recognition.
I believe that only about 60% or so of National Merit Finalists actually receive any scholarship money. I believe those students are named “National Merit Scholars.” (I’m getting this from the National Merit Corporation’s 2015-16 Annual Report, p. 5, available here: https://www.nationalmerit.org/s/1758/images/gid2/editor_documents/annual_report.pdf.) So, just being named a National Merit Finalist does not mean that you receive a scholarship. As I said above, I think it is very hard to get money at private universities in general.
interestingly, from that same page, it appears that about 1,100 even more valuable (based on average dollars awarded) “Special Scholarships” are awarded to students who are NOT National Merit Finalists, which sounds very fishy to me. They set up a whole, ostensibly transparent competition based on scores, and then turn around and award about 25% of the overall dollars to a bit more than 13% of the total students - and those students didn’t even make the NMF cutoff scores. Hmmmm.
The actual money is mainly awarded by colleges themselves or by corporations (back in the day, I got some money because my dad worked for a company that sponsored one). National Merit says only about half of finalists get scholarships. So it’s really a lot of fuss about not much unless a student wants/needs to go to one of the few colleges that offers big money to NMSFs. Plus, the standard for winning a scholarship is so variable that it doesn’t mean what it should. It’s no wonder that prep schools pay comparatively little attention to the whole thing.
Makes sense @twinsmama - esp since I don’t think most of those colleges giving big $ to NMSF are that common amongst BS applicants.
Andover’s School Profile lists the number of NMF; 20 for the class of 2017.
@AppleNotFar Just curious, how many students per grad class at Andover?
~330. The class of 2018 is 339, including PGs.
It also depends on your definition of getting money - offered or accepted. My NMF was offered $ at a school he chose not to attend so he had to turn it down. The college he chose to attend was not a participating school.
I’m pretty sure the OP is asking about the National Merit $2500 Scholarships, not the corporate scholarships or the ones offered directly by the colleges. This scholarship can be used at any US college. No one really knows how they pick the students for this scholarship. There is a theory that they are alloctated by porportion by state as they do with the number of NMSF, if that is true since BS regions have very small numbers they would get a small precentage of the scholarships.
7D2 (SAS 2015) was a finalist, but did not get NM scholarship. IMO, the money matters much less than whatever prestige is conveyed by being a scholarship recipient.
@3scoutsmom Yes! That is what I am trying to get to. those $2500 not tied to particular corporate or university awards.
PEA’s latest college profile says there are only 11 NMSF in the Class of 2018.
https://www.exeter.edu/sites/default/files/documents/Profile%20for%20Colleges.pdf
This number is very low for PEA, which has always been 30+ so far as I can tell (sometimes 40+), and always significantly higher than Andover. Any insights into this?
Also, is Andover’s figure of 20 NMF for the class of 2018 or 2017? (It’s hard to tell from the profile, but it would seem to refer to Class of 2017).
I’m wondering if there has been a significant change to the test score distribution. The SAT score ranges were shifted upwards again in the latest change back to 1600, and most of the PSAT state cutoffs for NMSF were raised, but that would had had the effect of making boarding school cutoffs less onerous, rather than more, so the PEA number is puzzling.