Which top 50 colleges are best for candidates looking for no financial aid but significant merit scholarships?
Vanderbilt, Duke, Washington U in St. Louis, U. Chicago, Claremont McKenna and Johns Hopkins all have some large merit scholarships – but they are very difficult to earn. A number of college have large scholarships for National Merit Semi-Finalists.
Much will come down to how much money you need, and how competitive you are within that college’s applicant pool. Hopkins gives a few large scholarships, but you need to be a tip-top student to be in the running.
Are you looking at LACs as well as universities? The problem is that the pool is so competitive. at top colleges that your kid has to be a superstar by national standards to get merit. Very tough to do.
He is looking at universities as well as LACs. He is a top student but no hooks, Nobel prizes or Olympic medals. Just a high achiever with decent EC’s.
Case Western offered up to 31K this year (maybe even higher) and they’re not that hard to get if you have top stats. U of Rochester was giving out 15K pretty commonly a few years ago. RPI also. Of course, 15K doesn’t go all that far anymore…
They are fine schools for a top education. A harder question may be if you take the offer when other top schools also offer you admissions.
Sometimes I wonder how “high achiever” is defined. Achieved hight at grades, test scores, and number of APs? Is a “top student” one who gets to PhD level reading in his favorite subjects?
What are his stats? That will help narrow down his options in the top 50.
Stats that will get merit aid at say Boston University may not get any merit aid, or even acceptance, at say Duke.
Getting merit aid to top 50 schools is extremely difficult. A few years ago students from my daughter’s HS with her stats were Emory Scholars. My daughter got into Emory but with no merit aid. A few years ago students from our HS with my daughter’s stats were getting into Vanderbilt; my daughter was wait listed. My daughter was a Jefferson Scholar for UVA and made it through the first two rounds, but not the third (this scholarship does not come directly from the school). She got into Lehigh with significant merit but I am not sure if Lehigh is a top 50 school- I don’t think it is. Her friend is at Lafayette with significant merit and she graduated HS #6.
My D attends a top 5 public and did not get merit or honors, however the school meets full need and can be very generous if there are two students in college, even with having a high income.
@WorryHurry411 my experience was that being a high achiever with decent EC’s means you may not get into many of these schools, let alone get merit. My daughter’s friend (top 1%) was rejected from Duke and NW with a 2350 SAT. There are a lot of variables that come into play here. My daughter was a high achiever with some impressive EC’s (president of an outside volunteer health care organization and raised $30,000) and was wait listed to V. The good news is that these kids often get significant merit to schools that are a few pegs down the list.
Lehigh is 47 according to USNews.
@TomSrOfBoston oh wow thanks for the information!
Does your kiddo have his SAT or ACT scores? Is this the kiddo who will be a junior next year? Or is there another?
It would be helpful if you could post the GPA and SAT or ACT scores.
And so far as I know…no college freshman 18 year old applicant has ever won a Nobel prize.
^ Malala! 
Oh right…one!
But a lot of students do have impressive awards: regional, national, and international. They have demonstrated the strength of their gifts and talents outside of their local school.
Northeastern has great merit including awards for NMF.
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Just a high achiever with decent EC’s.
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The problem with this is that virtually ALL of the students who are accepted to those schools are “high achievers with very good EC’s”…so how do such schools know who to award merit to???
Well, this is what I’ve noticed: Top schools award their merit to “poach” certain students who they believe that that the Ivies/Stanford/MIT will also be admitting. Those students typically have hooks…amazing achievements, URMs (particularly male URMs), etc.
That’s the rub.
Everyone is the high achiever. These schools have a lot of Vals, Sals, and top 5% students. These students test scores are very high.
The down-selection when determining merit at that point will be “how does this student fill a hole at our school.” The Admissions office, maybe the Director, is usually the one that is deciding because Enrollment Management is their job. They’re responsible for making sure that the school’s diversity numbers are adequate, and that they snag some of those students who will most certainly be Ivy-bound.
What is your situation? It sounds like you don’t qualify for aid, but you WANT merit. Do you NEED merit in order to afford college? If so, then what is your desired NET cost for college? How much can you pay each year??
If you NEED merit, then simply applying to these top schools that have some merit awards is not a good plan. Simply, also applying to other schools with competitive merit is not a good plan, because what happens if your child doesn’t win any?
If you NEED merit, then create an app list with 3 groups:
A few top 50 schools that give competitive merit
A few top 100 schools that give competitive merit (these may be top 60 schools)
A few top 120 schools that give ASSURED merit for stats (these would be your financial safeties).
However, if you’re just hoping for merit, but are fully prepared to pay $65k+ per year…then just be sure to have a few schools on the list that you know your child would get accepted to.
We have no way to advise this OP. Yes, NEU has excellent merit awards…for the top very small %age of acceoted students.
Yes, Vanderbilt has merit awards, as does University of Chicago. There are a lot of schools in the top 50 with merit awards (OP should take out all the Ivies, MIT, Stanford, And the others that are need based aid only).
BUT getting these great merit awards at these too schools requires that the applicant be in the top %age of admitted students. TIPPY TOP.
There are plenty of very high achieving students who have been acceoted and received NO merit aid from these top schools.
Schools such as Northeastern and U Miami have been pretty generous recently in giving $15k - $25k merit awards to kids here who have very good ( but not tippy top stats). Fordham
also seems to be pretty generous.
Richmond and Bucknell (may be a shade out if top 50) have some nice merit opportunities
How much can the OP pay? A $15,000 merit award from some of these schools will leave more than $50,000 in net costs. $25,000 would leave more than $40,000 in net costs.