<p>The University Honors College oversees the Chancellor’s Scholarship application process. In my experience, the UHC is not very enthusiastic about awarding money to students shooting for STEM disciplines. They prefer students doing interdisciplinary work, or straight humanities. I believe I only got the scholarship because I listed as my intended major a hilariously impractical dual major that I had no intention of pursuing (went with engineering instead). Als0, in my time as a Chancellor’s scholar, I don’t remember a single scholarship winner who was a university athlete.</p>
<p>Thanks, raneck. I love your " hilariously impractical dual major that I had no intention of pursuing" quote. Sounds as though you may have beat them at their own game.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>THIS THIS THIS. It irritates me to NO end that in the past 4 years (I believe) there have been maybe 1-2 engineering students TOTAL who were Chancellor’s scholars. Compared to the number of A&S students, it’s really disheartening to see. I know part of the reason they do it is because it can be harder to get a scholarship in the first place for the humanities, but to punish a student who really truely wants to be an engineering because their passion is (more) profitable in the future is a really stupid “policy”.</p>
<p>IIRC, my year had 10 scholars, 1 of whom was an engineer for 1 semester before dropping out. The following 2 (maybe even 3) years had 0 engineers as Chancellor’s scholars. Major bummer.</p>
<p>IDK guys I just got an interview and I was accepted to the College of Engineering… MommyDearest’s son (who also got an interview) is as well I think. I think ECs and the essays are the biggest factors.</p>
<p>Yes, S was accepted to engineering. Certainly not all, but the stereotypical engineering student might not be a good candidate…lopsided academic interests, lack social skills, leadership. I guess we shall see! </p>
<p>Awesome…do Chancellors Scholars get any other benefits/preferential treatment, or is it just additional money? Some premier scholarships at other schools S is in contention for also comes with perks…networking opportunities, special events, and other special considerations.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Okay here’s the thing, CS are not <em>supposed</em> to get preferential treatment in the UHC beyond receiving the money, going on a retreat (to get to know each other) and having a “seminar” every semester (a lot of meeting the other students from across the years, discussing readings, etc.). <em>However</em>, I have heard of interesting circumstances of the current dean giving preference to students by including them in a special “student advisory” committee he created. In once instance, someone couldn’t find funding for summer work, emailed the dean stating so, and happened to land a new scholarship for the summer to pay for the summer work/living. But they only emailed the dean because he had his secretary email out <em>select students</em> asking how they were doing in the summer.</p>
<p>Side note: I will fully admit to not being a fan of our new Dean at all. He seems to marginalize engineering and the humanities because they are not the hard sciences/pre-med (which is an unfortunate focus that many feel the UHC has taken). In an interaction I had with him last year, he was somewhat rude to me, and I had to deal with his secretary and another high-ranked staff member to get him to respond to my requests.</p>
<p>I have also heard of instances of special, private lunches with possible UHC donors where only a select number of CS or highly-regarded students were invited to attend. </p>
<p>Anyways, long story short: No, the CS doesn’t have any special opportunities beyond those that are extended to every member of the UHC. IMO in terms of engineering, the SSOE offers better opportunities than UHC because they actually have networking events etc. geared towards engineers, which I have never, ever seen the UHC do. The CS is just a nice way to say you’re a great academic student who is well-rounded and that you have a full ride.</p>
<p>Thanks, Awesome! Good info!</p>
<p>I have not looked this up, but I wonder how many of the national scholarship winners over the past ten years were Chancellor’s Scholars? One of the draws of Pitt was the number of Rhodes, Truman, etc., scholars. Doc Stewart worked with kids from what I understand. My DD had those aspirations when she was a HS senior; then she went to college, found a BF, Doc died and her extra time went to something other than higher academic aspirations.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I don’t think it’s really the CS scholars at Pitt so much as the highly involved UHC Students in general. I got a pretty prestigious DOE Fellowship for grad school but was never a CS scholar or even a UHC Full tuition student during undergrad. However, I did take a good number of UHC classes, lived in the dorms for all 3 years, helped run some clubs, and did a bunch of other activities/research/internships on top of that.</p>