<p>I spoke with our college advisor last night. He said something very interesting, and I wanted to post it here:</p>
<p>He said that the 2011 funding for National Merit Scholarships was hit with huge cuts. That only about 1/3 of the usual funding is going to be available, and the usual awards were going to average around $1,500 per student per year.</p>
<p>Can anyone corroborate/confirm/dispute this?</p>
<p>You must be talking about the NMCorp scholarships, not the corporate-sponsored NMF scholarships or the college NMF scholarships. Any change wouldn’t affect the corporate or college scholarships.</p>
<p>You can call NMCorp and ask. The people are really nice.</p>
<p>Nat’l Merit Corp 847-866-5100 </p>
<p>Let us know what they say.</p>
<p>This is what the NMSC official publication says</p>
<p>That does not mean that NMSC cannot change the rules at anytime before they give the award. Alternatively they could reduce the number of awards. Do let us know what NMSC says</p>
<p>8,200 Merit Scholarship® winners.
Beginning in March 2011, NMSC will notify winners of the three types of National Merit Scholarships:
• National Merit® $2500 Scholarships
• Corporate-sponsored scholarships
• College-sponsored scholarships
In April, May, and July, NMSC will release names of Merit Scholar designees to news media for public announcement.</p>