In-state here, received nothing (there’s always the possibility of getting something later but as said before, not holding my breath)
SAT: 1550 (770R 780M)
ACT: 35 (36E 35M 36R 33S)
National Merit Semifinalist
GPA: 3.9 UW / 4.6 W (on SC’s scale) < my first HS didn’t have that many honors / AP offerings
APs: 7 exams junior year - three 5s, three 4s, one 3
ECs: Don’t feel like elaborating too much here but nothing that special - a bit of leadership but a lot of more academic / independent oriented stuff. Did a research internship at UofSC which I expanded on with independent projects afterward. Comparing my profile to TS from past years I think the greatest thing I was lacking is community service oriented stuff
Recs: AP Lang teacher, research mentor (UofSC professor in the CS department), counselor < probably all pretty good
Essays: Could have put more time in but still pretty good. Why Honors was the best (my short supps are always better). My other two essays were unique in content and fairly well-written but I don’t feel like tney were as good as my Common App and they lost focus a bit. Probably could have reused my CA for prompt #3 and had a better essay and saved time
Also, my school has lots of high-stat candidates that received a first wave Honors acceptance, but no Scholar candidates this year that I know of. We had 4 TS candidates last year… Oh well, with NMSF I can get a full ride+ at UF which is objectively a better school anyway
Another disappointed in-state family here. He is NMF, 1540 SAT, 12 AP classes and a 4.0. Essays and recs were good. Lots of awards, volunteering, work, and leadership. I am not sure what there are looking for this year. Our school has at least 1 Top Scholar for the last several years, but none this year. I wonder if they have changed their selection criteria.
I applied as a statistics major and a lot of my qualitative stuff pointed towards data science (again, in-state).
I wasn’t the most outright qualified person at my school to not get TS. Actually we had at least 1, but 3-5 is more typical. I’m pretty sure someone got into UChicago early but did not get TS.
Looking at my school’s past candidates, it seems like TS only wants the super extroverted top students. Idk how the selection process really works, I was sorta trying to bank on having a rec from within UofSC
I know of at least four other people (plus myself) who were NMSF and did not receive an invite… I guess it makes sense, there are over 200 in-state NMSF but 50 TS candidates
Every scholarship is different and looks for different things. USCar was one of only 2 schools out of 16 where my D did not advance for the top scholarship and it was one of her lowest ranked options. She also got into Harvard.
Good luck to all that are advancing! Great school! To those who didn’t advance, don’t beat yourself up or try to figure out what you did wrong. The answer is usually nothing.
To be quite honest, I’m not sure how i got top scholars.
In comparison, my essays for Clemson honors (for national scholars) were better than my UofSC Honors essay. However, rereading them I realized I really drove home an angle in the sort of applicant I was. Even though I didn’t research the school as much as I should have. I feel like the saving grace was the fact that I might have been one of the few people who applied that focused in on this really “niche/specialized” topic.
But eh, any analyzing isn’t gonna shed any more light
I’m not sure if this is helpful but my daughter is an OOS McNair freshman and her class (2023) was the first to reap the benefits of a significant increase in the value of the McNair scholarship. So your math is correct, provided the amounts stay the same, $184k plus provost.
@kjg315, thanks for sharing. A small window is better than nothing! I was momentarily excited when I received an email from UofSC; then I realized it was a canned letter from the President. But hope springs eternal I guess.
I thought I read somewhere that people were notified in the past years by fed ex. I just got a notification that a fed ex package is arriving today but its private sender and it originated from PA it looks like. So I am sure it has nothing to do with UofSC but it is a big tease to get that notification …
@UpstateSCmom Socks?!? Was there a letter with it? Related to Top Scholar or Honors? My son is OOS and accepted to Honors first wave but not TS. We didn’t get any socks today but I’m intrigued…