<p>my question is: if you have the SAT/ACT score, do you automatically get a merit scholarship? im only asking because every single person that has been accepted in my school that I know has received a scholarship... including me. im just curious :) and in the merit scholarships, do they only consider SAT score? or what else? thank you in advance</p>
<p>It has gotten to be a fairly long thread now, but if you read through <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/tulane-university/1405876-how-soon-will-we-hear-about-admission-decision.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/tulane-university/1405876-how-soon-will-we-hear-about-admission-decision.html</a> as well as <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/tulane-university/1414026-fall-2013-decisions-thread.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/tulane-university/1414026-fall-2013-decisions-thread.html</a> and <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/tulane-university/1417995-tulane-class-17-admitted-students.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/tulane-university/1417995-tulane-class-17-admitted-students.html</a> you will see that there are a variety of amounts (and sometimes none) given for people that have the same or very similar ACT and SAT scores. It is absolutely not based only on those. They look at GPA, strength of schedule, and I think to a lesser extent the rest of your record. Academics is the main factor, but it does appear to be a holistic review. You obviously have a talented group at your school.</p>
<p>Some have speculated that where you live makes a difference. I am not convinced of that yet, although possibly they would be more liberal with them for students from areas where they usually get much fewer students. But you are from Florida where Tulane gets a lot of students and as you say, you are seeing a lot of them.</p>
<p>I can’t find online any ranges for the merit scholarships. Does anyone know the “average” stats for the 7500, 25000, etc merit scholarships that Tulane gives out? Also- by the end of senior year, can you appeal for a bigger scholarship if your grades or scores went up?</p>
<p>There definitely are no “average stats”, especially this year. In the past it seemed to be tied more directly to GPA (taking into account strength of schedule) and test scores, but this year it seems to be they are really looking even harder at and rewarding students that took lots of AP courses. Of course those students still needed good grades and test scores, but it just seems they are weighting that more than in the past. I could be wrong, definitely. We see only a relatively small sample on here.</p>
<p>You can always point out if you did very well first semester senior year compared to your historical average and/or if you really improved your test scores. Again I can only go by the past, but there absolutely have been cases where some got higher awards and invitations to the Honors Program where originally they were not invited. Sometimes they say no. It really has to be a pretty substantive change. But I also think it would have to be before the May 1 notification date. Once the class is set, I think they wouldn’t want to revisit these issues.</p>
<p>FC: I think class rank plays a HUGE part in the awards this year. IMHO</p>
<p>doingthisagain - perhaps, but then again those items would have a high degree of correlation. Many high schools have stopped ranking, though.</p>
<p>I can tell you now that everyone does NOT get merit money. My son had a 32 ACT and didn’t get anything. His GPA is lower (3.3) so I think his admittance was more ‘holistic’ (community service hours, demonstrated interest, etc., backstory and explanation for low GPA) but clearly the ACT was not enough to get him any $$.</p>
<p>He’ll be applying for the CSS now.</p>
<p>Was a bit of a downer after the great news this past week, I have to say!</p>
<p>Mavitale, were there a lot strong applicants from your son’s school? Did they get a lot of $$$.</p>
<p>25 kids from my son’s school applied and at least 7 have been admitted. Don’t know what the $$ breakdown is, since that’s not indicated on Naviance. He doesn’t personally know any of the people who have gotten in so far.</p>
<p>@mavitale…my daughter had lower ACT score, but higher GPA …, and got $$…so they must put more emphasis on GPA this year…still expensive though.</p>
<p>No $$$ for my DS either in his acceptance letter that came today.</p>
<p>STATS: 31 ACT, 1900 SAT, 3.3 GPA. He has all A’s senior year first quarter, should get all As for semester. He took the ACT this past Saturday, hoping to bump it up a notch. I hope he can submit all this and prevail for a little $$$. Hoping the FA is decent, too.</p>
<p>I’m with you, mavitale, it was a bit of a letdown not to get anything merit-wise after the “high” of the acceptance.</p>
<p>Kelijake1987…is there another opportunity to appeal for $$, based on senior year grades? </p>
<p>Fortunately (or unfortunately) for my son, he has life insurance money as his dad passed away in 2003, but I was hoping he wouldn’t have to use all of it for tuition. But it’s ultimately his choice and if he wants to go to Tulane paying full price he will do that (and probably have to take out a loan for his senior year).</p>
<p>I agree that it seems GPA and class rank were very important for merit scholarships. He got money from the 5 other schools he’s been accepted to, but of course those aren’t the ones he’s interested in… ;)</p>
<p>Mavitale—you were up early this a.m.!</p>
<p>I sure am hoping that Tulane will let us appeal based on senior year. I think DS has been trying to play it cool, but Tulane is definitely a favorite. </p>
<p>I am not working full-time, so income is definitely not what we were used to when I was gainfully employed. We will be reliant on a strong amount of F.A., but I realize that even with that, we will likely be facing a gap in meeting total COA. Any merit would help us lessen loan amounts.</p>
<p>Colleges (like TU) that use a lot of merit aid are VERY sophisticated in how they use it. The pricing method is similar to that used by commercial airlines. </p>
<p>No one on these boards knows what algorithms they actually use, but they bake in lots of factors beyond test scores and grades. Gender, intended major, geography, demonstrated interest, likelihood of enrolling, family income etc. etc. etc.</p>
<p>Do you know this for a fact, or are you just assuming? I only ask because before this year, I was right approximately 95% of the time in predicting merit aid level based solely on test scores and GPA/strength of schedule. In charting out the data on Excel spreadsheets, the awards were extremely consistent between this data and the amount given. This year it does appear they have changed the factoring to some degree, but I really don’t think it is based on all those factors you mention. At this stage they wouldn’t even know family income, and we never applied for need based FA so they have no idea what our income was. Intended major would be highly unreliable since at least half of all undergrads change majors at least once, or at least that is what articles in the NYT and other publications have asserted. Other schools almost undoubtedly have their own methods.</p>
<p>It seems to me it is still highly based on test scores and GPA. Interest plays a role in the initial admission decision more than the award, from what I can see. The change this year seems to be that they are taking strength of schedule (usually number of AP courses) into account more than in the past. But you are right, it is still a guessing game to some degree.</p>
<p>Thrilled to be accepted but no $$. Even a small amount would cushion the sticker shock some. With no FA & no merit, it is very hard to justify the very high cost of TU. Now it will come down to weighing each offer against the other and factor in the value of each school and it’s cost of attendance. Oh well, you can’t always get what you want… but you just might get what you need. (Sorry, got the Stones on my mind).</p>
<p>Well, you knew merit aid was a long shot, pushydad. I agree with you, sticker price at these kinds of schools really squeeze out the upper-middle class, if that is what you are. That is usually the situation for people that are fairly sure they will get no need-based aid but cannot really afford sticker price. Thank goodness there are so many reasonably priced alternatives out there. What are some of hers?</p>
<p>FC – I don’t know anything about what TU specifically does (now or in the past). But a couple of things would generally be true about the use of merit aid by colleges.</p>
<p>First, the goals/needs of the institution and their use of merit aid will change over time. Enrollment management pioneer Boston College used to do tons of merit aid; today, they do almost none. Could be that TU now (i) has less merit money to spend than it used to, (ii) can spend less on merit money than it used to but still get the desired results, or (iii) is targeting its merit money to different places than in the past. If TU is getting many more applicants with high ACT scores than previously, then other factors may count more in the equation.</p>
<p>Second, family ability to pay is often a factor in the equation (for obvious reasons). Colleges can use demographic information from the application and other sources to guess-timate how much a family might be able to pay. That’s why many college applications ask, for example, if the student intends to apply for financial aid. A kid attending a costly private high school would be another big tell. Or the zip code of the family home. Or whether both parents have college degrees. All other things being equal, a $20k merit aid award to a kid whose family can pay $35k will bring in more net revenue per student than the same merit award to a kid who is also going to need additional need-based aid in order to attend. </p>
<p>Price discrimination is how an enterprise maximizes revenue by charging customers different prices for the same product. Merit aid is how colleges practice price discrimination. For a college, though, there are other things they are looking to maximize in addition to net revenue – gender balance, balance among majors, geographic balance, admissions selectivity, etc. etc. etc.</p>
<p>FC, among the value propositions, Elon is up there. It is not the school TU is but it is about 65% of the cost. UDel is her top choice among OOS state school and American while almost the cost of TU is a bit lower (but then you have to factor the high cost of being in DC). I consider myself lucky to be able to even consider these alternatives but I wish I could get past resenting being among the small minority paying full ticket price and feeling the pinch.</p>
<p>northwesty - What you say makes sense, but I guess Tulane decided on some different rationalization for who they give merit aid. Maybe something radical like just looking at past performance. Because if they were looking at the factors you mention, my D wouldn’t have received the Presidential. We were not applying for need-based aid, my wife and I both have post-graduate degrees, and we live in one of the two most expensive zip codes in Rhode Island.</p>
<p>Dealing with dozens, maybe even hundreds of cases on here and in PMs clearly tells me that Tulane is distributing merit aid based on just that, merit as defined by performance to date. They may be adjusting the criteria some within those parameters, but I see zero indication that they are taking gender, income, location, etc. into account. Just my take looking at quite a few data points and talking to so many people. Obviously to get a truly complete picture one would have to see all those parameters you mention for everyone and crunch the data. But I feel pretty confident in my assessment as far as how Tulane is doing it.</p>