Oxford Scholars program was to be out today around said 6 pm EST. But we saw some announcement on their website. very disappointed with the offer. Due to the fact, that they put these 55 kids above a pedestal and said how great it is to be part of the Scholars program and how nice offers will be coming out which will be much better than the regular student admissions. We waited for this for another 10 days post the big April 1st date of all the Ivies. But after all the drama that Oxford made, the amount is so low, that other prestigious colleges(Duke, Wash U, etc., ) “regular fin.aid” is much better than their “exclusive Scholars award”… 18k Scholars award has been easily beaten by other regular college financial merit aid etc., etc., we made up our mind that Oxford will be our 1st pick based on the hype that was provided about this value of the scholarships during the retreat to where the hype has failed to stand regular decisions… now the re-eval to reconsider other admitted college continues… was hoping for a better friday close :(… hope the other kids got good offers and can make good decisions…
Oxford Scholars program was to be out today around said 6 pm EST. But we saw some announcement on their website. very disappointed with the offer. Due to the fact, that they put these 55 kids above a pedestal and said how great it is to be part of the Scholars program and how nice offers will be coming out which will be much better than the regular student admissions. We waited for this for another 10 days post the big April 1st date of all the Ivies. But after all the drama that Oxford made, the amount is so low, that other prestigious colleges(Duke, Wash U, etc., ) “regular fin.aid” is much better than their “exclusive Scholars award”… 18k Scholars award has been easily beaten by other regular college financial merit aid etc., etc., we made up our mind that Oxford will be our 1st pick based on the hype that was provided about this value of the scholarships during the retreat to where the hype has failed to stand regular decisions… now the re-eval to reconsider other admitted college continues… was hoping for a better friday close :(… hope the other kids got good offers and can make good decisions…
@bsmdeager. Is it possibleyou are reading it wrong? $18k per year sounds low for scholars award. Also maybe you are getting financial aid on top of that merit number?
If you are correct , then just re-evaluate your other offers and take the best one!
@desie1 The Scholars offer came today that had this number. The Financial aid of Emory came 2 weeks ago and that had around 5k (unsubsidized Federal Loan). so i am assuming Oxford will give the same. But that is not the Merit aid. Most of the colleges gave the same Federal unsubsidized loan. so i would think my Son will get the same. But you are right, the Merit number is so low, that many other colleges that he got admitted has much higher numbers as a “regular student”… and all this drama of Scholars of Oxford and all the flight cost etc., etc., that was wasted… we were really putting them as our no. 1 hoping for a better Merit aid … but now have to reconsider the other offers and pick the financially viable college which is almost ranked similar… thank you for your note though…
@BSMDEager Oh… Anybody can get the unsubsidized loan so that doesn’t even count as financial aid in my opinion. I am just going off my knowledge from last year when everyone got big scholar awards. (And all expenses were paid for…we didn’t pay for airfare) $18k sounds low . wonder if you could call and get it raised if you say it is his first choice?
Good luck. I’m sure he’ll end up happy wherever he goes!
@desie1 … thank you for your encouraging words… It was not his first choice. His first was Wash U and Duke. both of them gave him reasonable Merit award which is still higher than Oxford. He was a little pumped up with all the hype given by Oxford about how great “these 55 kids are - for being selected as Scholars” and how he will get a lot of Merit aid,etc.,. so he made up his mind that he would rather go to a decent school that offered him better Merit aid. This led to him to change Oxford as his first choice and for the last 2-3 weeks- he made up his minds after all the results have come out. after all this, the Oxford merit aid results are the “last” to come yesterday and he is definitely heart broken to revisit the same college selection choices/process… so we are back to square one as far as finalizing… We wish we didnt visit the Oxford Scholars program to be this heart broken… 18k??? that everybody of these smart kids receive… what is so special about Scholars… even i cant get out of this shock from last evening… you are right… I am glad atleast he has really competitive offers to choose from and make himself happy… thankgod, we were not “single-threaded” on Oxford…
@bsmdeager I private messaged you.
I am wondering if main campus offered financial aid (or did he not apply there). If not, that is quite unacceptable for Emory main, a place with a similar endowment to those other two schools, to have completely inferior financial aid. Given this, Emory should have no wonders about why it isn’t able to yield as many students with ultra high stats. or NMF status. What is amazing is that in an old state of the university report Wagner (the president) suggested that getting more high caliber students is something we still need to work on (and this was 2013). Gee, I wonder what the problem is…because it isn’t really the academics. The fact is, when places are academically comparable and a person sees themself at any of such schools, they will just follow the money. It is also not okay for the merit aid to be underwhelming like that. If Emory doesn’t fix this, it can expect to stay in the same position it is now. You’ll notice that despite the increase in apps, that the stats of the selected stayed the same…maybe that is due to stinginess. It is less of a risk to offer spots to full pay students with great, but not ridiculous credentials than it is to get someone ridiculous who may need aid in additional to merit award and then have that person turn them down because they know the aid will be unacceptable. Soon it will be time for Emory to revisit Emory Advantage. The place is getting so expensive that EA in its current form is not doing enough to yield the more middle class (who appear to be upper middleclass, but when a school cost over 60grand, 100k-200k houshold income makes such a place a struggle) applicants.
@bernie12 , yes main campus offered 15k as financial aid. The challenge we are having is - due to the "special scholars status and before travelling we called the school to find out details. We were said Full ride (incld tuition+boarding etc., for 2 students) and a high-number of full-tuition. With that combination, we decided to go in person for the scholars weekend. Based on the heavy marketing of “small campus advantage”, and this scholarship benefit, we did make up our mind post the March 31st Ivy deadlines. So the challenge now is to make my son re-look everything as he started telling his friends etc., i wish he wasnt that confident (but he felt he will atleast get 30-40k)… but this low number - makes us reopen the case… it is what it is…
We were also disappointed in the aid from Emory. D was accepted to both main and Oxford, with 18k merit if she started at Oxford. From what we understood from talking to the FA office there, the merit would replace the need for the work and loan portion of FA. Then before a 2nd trip to see the school, we were told (by the FA office) that getting the merit aid would not reduce the need based aid. Like the previous poster, we were fairly convinced this would be the school. D wore the t shirt, pictured herself there, told a few people this was the likely choice…but then then when the actual FA award came in, none of what we had been told turned out to be true.
The merit aid did simply replace the need based aid, and the work study and loan (fed) were still listed as part of the aid package. Additionally, the CSS profile calculated our EFC a bit higher than the FAFSA. We knew that Emory would be expensive, but thought the merit would make it workable. Unfortunately, when merit just replaces need based aid, that merit is really only helpful for wealthier families who would otherwise be full pay, or very nearly full pay.
Wow, this is not okay…to me stuff like this basically says: “we don’t want you, despite us thinking that you’re worth merit money”. If they really want the high caliber, they need to show it. I would honestly tell them how you feel mislead and that your child really wanted to go, and would honestly flat out ask them how they expect to yield the best students of all socioeconomic levels with policies like this. From what I have heard the CSS profile sometimes basically says: “You should be willing to sell your property for our extremely expensive education”. If they want your child enough to throw merit aid at them, they should also not want you to struggle paying the rest. That is ridiculous. Parents should start complaining and letting Emory officials know that their fin. aid is subpar in comparison to similar and higher ranked schools with similar endowments. I feel that unless someone starts telling them, then they won’t respond and it will continue on like this. I’ve noticed that this has been happening for a while, Emory losing prospective students only for this reason. If they want this place to be good, they will have to bite the bullet with the costs in the short term…
2 models that do not work:
1)Bring in awesome students, but have and make little to no change to academic environment that is not special in comparison to other schools with similar student bodies.
- Begin to change/improve academics, but refuse to more aggressively recruit the students who would enjoy or engage well with any changes being made…instead let us just force the changes on full pay students who can care less…(I can just see the complaints coming if more depts start requiring capstones, the new chemistry curriculum, and the new QEP events given the current types drawn to Emory). It isn’t possible to draw those that fit the changing direction of the university when you aren’t willing to pay for it but other schools are.
Isn’t it fairly common that need-based aid and merit-based aid don’t stack?
@Skrunch, Yes I think it is, and originally I didn’t think it would stack. At first we hoped for need based aid, but realized that it would likely be partially loans. After researching (here on CC and talking to the FA office), our understanding was that if D got merit aid, it would first reduce the loan /work study portion, before reducing the need based grant aid. Then in talking further with the FA office, I asked about the merit aid changing the amount of need based aid and was told that it would not as long as the total aid did not exceed COA.
This is a confusing and emotional process. It would really be helpful if all the colleges would clearly state their policies up front.
Right now, I’m really stuck trying to choose between Stanford and Emory Scholars. I’m interested in international relations/studies at either school, but I’m not entirely aware of the perks of being a scholar. I know scholars are extremely successful, but is it enough to turn down Stanford?
Hi guys. Im too scared to check the contents of the email! What did the subject of your email say, those who got in?
I did not get in. The email just said that they had a large pool this year and that the rejection does not influence my current application.
@divisionexpert and @pacificocean561 did you know there is a 2016 thread about this. you are posting on the 2015 thread. My son also did not get the scholarship. Good luck to both of you in the ED2 or RD round.
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/emory-university/1831243-emory-scholars-applicants.html#latest
Hi msmithcollege! where did you end up going? My daughter is in the same situation, Stanford vs Emory full ride. Hope you’re happy with your decision.
They went to Stanford…
oh awesome! @hapymom I really wanted to go to Emory but decided to stay in state since that was the better chance for me since emory (oxford scholars) offered half tuition…which was not enough considering the need based aid they were willing to give. Good luck for your daughter! I would say go to the option that results in less debt in the end but if she really prefers Stanford and it “fits” better than Emory, then got for it! 