Just to give you an idea of how hard it is
; my son was #1 in his HS w/ a 99.7 UW average, 35 ACT, SAT: 800 V, 760M, 730W, 800 on Bio SAT II and wasn’t able to score significant Merit aid at UMD or UVA. He was also unsuccessful at Richmond and Villanova. If you want Merit aid you have to look at much less selective schools.
U of South Carolina has OOS merit scholarships that could give you tuition, room and board for less than $20,000/yr if you can raise the ACT a bit and if they recalculate your GPA in a way that favors you (they have their own formula). Scholarships are not automatic and the Honors College application has about 6-8 essays; but it may be worth a look. Urban campus (although Columbia isn’t that big) and very pretty. Check out the OOS scholarship section on their website.
LuckyCharm is talking about the McNair Scholarship at University of South Carolina. The application is a doozie…and is due pretty early. And you also need to apply for admissions by an early certain date.
The school also has the Cooper and McKissick Scholarships which reduce the tuition to the instate rate and add a stipend as well. They are based on the strength of your application for admission.
Well, not to be discouraging, but the McNair is super competitive. However, the other two (plus the Flinn which is pretty new), while getting more competitive each year, might be attainable. The McNair app IS the Honors College app; so even if it looks like a long shot, it may be well worth the time if you might be interested in the Honors College (SCHC has an excellent reputation among public university honors colleges).
What do you plan to study in college and what is your career goal?
Is the 3.75 you cite for 10th and 11th grade the weighted average? Your unweighted average is low for merit aid.
@onceuponamom 3.75 was the minimum cut off for the award, however they accepted weighted GPA as a mentioned before weighted GPA is what our high school focuses on for the most part. And like it says in my Op, my unw is currently 3.48 (planning on getting it to at least a 3.5 by senior yr) and my cumulative weight is 4.2 (this will go up because IB weight is starting this year). Thanks for the response
And for other asking about my intended major, I am interested in biology. I know this is a popular and competitive major at many schools but it’s what I’m decided on and I don’t think it’ll change.
As for those of you discussing AU and UA, I have visited both (sister attended AU) and I am pretty on the fence about both schools. I qualify for full tuition for both (sister with similar stats got full ride @ AU) so if it comes down to those schools in Alabama, at least I will have a choice between the two.