<p>Do schools often award merit scholarships to ED applicants?</p>
<p>If merit awards are often carrots to entice desirable candidates, it seems it would be a "waste" to award merit to those applying ED.</p>
<p>Speaking only from personal experience, D was not offered any merit aid by her ED school, but the two other schools she had applied and been accepted to before her ED acceptance, both offered her significant aid. We naively assumed the same would be the case with the ED school - clearly I had not spent enough time on CC at that point!</p>
<p>When H called the ED school to inquire, he was told quite frankly that they limit the merit aid awards in the ED pool to the very top applicants. I assume this is for the very reason you say - they have no need to entice ED applicants, but if they didn’t award ANY merit aid in the ED round, students from families like ours who don’t qualify for need-based aid but are hoping for merit aid would be less likely to apply ED. I get it now and won’t make the same mistake with D2.</p>
<p>I would imagine that this depends on the school in question; I have heard both sides; kids getting merit at their ED schools and, like PRJ, not getting merit at the ED school…</p>
<p>while it would be easy to generalize that those who are hoping for merit do not apply ED, not sure it’s that cut and dry…</p>
<p>^^especially at schools where they list the test scores/GPA needed for $X merit. If you fall in that range, I would think merit would be automatic.</p>
<p>At least one school claims to make (holistic) merit decisions independent of ED, but I have reason to believe it the exception to the rule. Giving merit aid to ED applicants requires that the college put equal principle ahead of strategic enrollment management, which is often not the case.</p>
<p>If a student has a good enough record to be a reasonable candidate for a competitive merit scholarship, the presumptive boost from ED should be completely unnecessary. I cannot think of a good reason to apply ED if you want a significant (non-automatic) merit award.</p>
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<p>I don’t think it is always that black and white, at least it wasn’t for us; it was both lack of knowledge and a timing issue. This was our first go-round with college admissions and I had only recently discovered CC. D applied ED because our assessment was that the school was a high match - no guarantee she’d be admitted RD and it was far and away her first choice. </p>
<p>When she submitted her application, she had two other applications pending at similar calibre schools with early notification dates. It was only after those acceptances arrived, with significant merit aid, that we started to think merit aid was a possibility at the ED school.</p>
<p>I was very pleasantly surprised when my son received a significant merit award despite applying ED. I had become very cynical about the entire process and that was a welcome reminder that some institutions will do the right thing.</p>
<p>Since ED is in a school’s interest, I would think most schools would treat their ED candidates well or they will stop having them.</p>
<p>^True for need-based aid, perhaps, but merit-based aid is implicitly recognized by most applicants as a recruitment tool. Schools can “treat their ED candidates well” by offering higher acceptance rates.</p>
<p>^ Lots of factors go into whether an ED app is right for any student. It is important to ask very specific questions at each college as to its ED/merit awards practices – we did find that colleges approach this differently, but it was also our experience each was candid when the follow-up questions were pursued (but in several cases it took a bit of persistence to get the on-point response). </p>
<p>You then have to decide if you trust the integrity of the college’s response. I like to assume honesty in those I deal with but that’s a personal choice.</p>
<p>BTW, I’m not so sure the higher acceptance rate is always actually true or really applies comparing apples to apples – we are aware of several cases in recent years of EDs being deferred to RD pools and then accepted, which would seem to validate the integrity of the ED pool.</p>
<p>^I don’t think that all schools offer preference to ED, just as some schools reserve significant merit scholarships for RD while others guarantee full need met for ED but not RD. Policies differ so much. However, the implicit or explicit preference to ED is a commonly used method of attracting ED applicants. For the elites, it’s often unnecessary to actually offer an ED preference because even if they deny it publicly, many applicants will decide they are lying and apply ED hoping for that preference.</p>
<p>^ Agreed. We ended up in a position where D had a clear first choice. So equal parts desire to end the search agony early if possible and the idea (in our own heads) that the college knowing a “sure thing” matriculation could be a nudge factor to an admit in a “no sure things” applicant pool.</p>
<p>Another reason to apply ED: Ivy schools generally do NOT offer merit aid unless there is also a financial need. Therefore, if need will not be part of the package and your child is sure of their choice, he or she may as well end the process early. If the family wants to consider the non-ivy merit offers they receive before making the decision, ED would not be appropriate even for an ivy.</p>
<p>Another way of saying this – Ivy schools do not offer merit aid, they only meet financial need.</p>
<p>Merit aid, in contrast, is offered at some schools in cases where an applicant is not eligible for financial aid.</p>
<p>Therefore, do not apply ED to an Ivy if you want to consider merit aid from other schools.</p>
<p>Editing to add: My younger daughter applied Early Action to a school and was awarded a merit scholarship, even though she did not apply for financial aid (and, even if she had, she would have been deemed ineligible.) The school’s website made clear that her stats would make her a likely candidate to receive this merit aid.</p>
<p>In addition, my older daughter applied as a transfer student to a school and was awarded a small merit scholarship ($5000/ year). In this case, I think the school was hoping that she would choose to attend, as the merit scholarship would put the COA of this college more in line with the school from which she was transferring.</p>