<p>I have been accepted to USC and as a National Merit Finalist been awarded half-tuition Presidential Scholarship.</p>
<p>To be honest, I am greatly attracted to this school, however, I cannot attend for my first year.</p>
<p>If I choose to apply for transfer as a sophomore or junior, is there any way the merit scholarship can be held or reserved for me? If it's not, then I don't see myself being able to transfer in future years. :(</p>
<p>Do you think emailing them and telling them about my situation will help?</p>
<p>I’m pretty sure it’s assumed that you’ll get it during your years at USC, if you don’t attend as a freshmen from the start. Just make sure you get confirmation on this. I know for a fact that RHP students will get the scholarship if they find out later that they’re NMF, so your situation should be similar.</p>
<p>I don’t want you to get the wrong information, AX3K. I have never heard of a transfer student getting Merit scholarships for NMF. It might be possible, but I think they only offer the Presidential to incoming freshmen and continue the $$ for four years. One reason USC offers such a generous merit program is to get excellent students to enroll–which I’m sure doesn’t hurt their stats since these very high SAT/GPA students’ scores are factored into the total. The logic here would be not-so-good news for you, however. Colleges do not report the scores of transfers in the same way, so there may not be the incentive for them to offer the awards. In addition, USC will look at a transfer from another college or CC and base admissions on their grades in college.</p>
<p>I hope I’m wrong about this, but it is really wise to call admissions and get this information very clear before you make your decision.</p>