@muffinpoptarte I spoke w/ a lady (who’s name I forgot). I made sure to ask her if my application still said “under review” twice. She seemed really nice and pleasant when she answered though. She also said to e-mail scholarships@jckf.org if I needed additional details, as there are more knowledgeable reps that answer to inquiries through that medium. Anyways, I e-mailed them a few minutes ago, I’ll post what they reply whenever they do.
Something def isn’t right here for sure. For them to flat out tell you “no” via a rep doesn’t seem even in the slightest correct. If anything, my guess, and I hope this isn’t true, is that they have cut down the application pool into two additional phases after the “semi-finalist.”
The first phase cut down a larger portion of these semi-finalist, giving them a certain status through their system (which these reps can see and tell us without knowing they can do so) and those that are still in contention. I’m sure there are some in the latter that need to clarify some financial information if it’s overly complicated or just weirdly reported, while others that are still in it are just waiting. But even then, for them to forget to tell their reps to not give out results to those that have already been cut from one of these phases? That doesn’t sound right.
@optimisticky I hate to be a bother, but I would very much appreciate if you could point one of your contacts in the direction of this forum. I know for a fact that this rep is in the wrong to be doing this, there’s no way this is okay. And if it is, we would very much appreciate if they could post a comment here clarifying what is going on. I feel like this process is being mishandled, and it is emotionally affecting a lot of people. This isn’t right.
@Jouuuu It sure does seem weird it seems like the lady you talked to seem wayyyyy pleasant than the person @muffinpoptarte and I talked too. Lets just hope for the BEST!!!
Ya’ll are killing me lol. I do not want to call and ask myself…I just don’t want the let down right now. Since one person said you’ll only be contacted if they need additional information and another said someone was out of the running, it sounds like it may in fact come down to a few new groups of people now.
This is all frantic speculation of course, but here’s my guess. People who were considered eligible for the scholarship in every area except financial need were all made semi-finalists. They told us that so we can put that on scholarship applications/school applications and it would help us. But then they used our financial information to break us into more categories. People with high incomes or whose parents have high incomes are made ineligible, and another group is still under review. Among those under review, if they already have your information and can see that you have the financial need, they won’t ask you for more financial information. If your financial information was less clear, they asked for clarification. Then they will look at the people who had enough financial need and will choose from there.
Like I said, all just speculation, but that would seem to make sense. Anyone who said they were not in the running, can you confirm by telling us if you think your income could have made you ineligible?
@anythinghere Incredibly rational and logical, I share a similar thought and would be surprised if this is incorrect. I hate this process. I wish we were all in the dark. Now I’ve worked myself up trying to fix this for them… ugh.
If you decide to join us in the dark side by calling, please let us know what happens >:)
@anythinghere the rep told me I wasn’t running but honestly I am not independent… I file in the application has dependent and my parent makes 20K a year hope it helps
I have degenerative disc disease and had spine surgery in 2013, I only stopped using a walker a year ago. So I cannot work and go to school at the same time. I am usually in a lot of pain by the end of the day. If I worked now I could not make enough to support myself. I went to college so I can get a career where I can. I make the same income via my financial aid as if I worked at minimum wage, so I thought this was the best option to make my life better. I only just turned 30, so having a broken back in my 20s made me loose everything I had worked for. My income is literally zero and my savings is gone from the almost 100,000 in hospital bills for my spine surgery and the countless spinal epidural steriod treatments I needed in order to be able to walk again. I am too old for parental claim. I could not be in more financial need, I literally have nothing except for grants and scholarships. I could not even get food stamps because california will not award them if you are a full time college student, but sometimes I cannot afford food. It is why I have worked so hard to be a stand out applicant at my college and in the community. My heart is feeling very broken to not even have a chance to advocate for myself as a semifinalist. I understand, not everyone gets the scholarship, and I am not more special than anyone else. I am just hurting from how this was handled. I wish I had not called. @ForestryGuy NYU is one of the worst for financial aid. Cost of attendance is about 80,000. I only want to attend because they are the only college in the country with a Child and Adolescent Mental Health degree in psychology. I want to offer therapy to children in psychiatric care and also conduct research that will help change policy of their treatment, which is absolutely horrendous. It is one of the few private schools who makes no exceptions for students with no income when it comes to aid. There was actually some news coverage on this recently.
@muffinpoptarte You have a very compelling story, you have overcome a lot of adversity - this is just another obstacle. But this is exactly my point. I can’t believe this is being handled as it is. I really hope this rep is just flat out incorrect and we get some clarification from JKCF themselves.
If any JKCF rep is reading this, we would very much appreciate some input here.
@muffinpoptarte You do have a very compelling story indeed, and you have a great deal of perseverance. That makes me believe the process is not what I thought it was. I’m so sorry that you had to be disappointed by this one, but I know you’ll make a way for yourself. Best of luck to you.
I would just like to throw out there that the email does say “in this next phase of selection”. I am pretty sure this means it’s the next phase. How many got that email on Friday??
Hey guys, 2015 scholar back again. This is very different from how it was handled last year, as they did not announce semi-finalists and ALL applicants waited until the week before May. Don’t fret. If there is a way to find out over the phone early and be able to make college plans, it’s very considerate of the foundation to do that. While the disappointment is tough, this way you will be able to make the best decisions as early as possible. Last year, many of us had deposits/offer deadlines to accept BEFORE the results were known. It’s an evolving process and it seems they responded to our feedback from previous years.
In terms of being being on the higher end of the financial scale, nope, that is not a disqualifier. There are plenty of scholars just under the minimum.
As I’ve said previously, there is no cookie cutter student, no particular mold, no singular type of person they look for. Each of us is so different, you’ll never figure out the rhyme or reason of their selections. Don’t compare yourself to anyone; it’s a wasted effort. There were people with a ton of accolades and national honors pursuing PhDs who won, and people with a 3.5 GPA, aspirations of fashion school, and no extra-curriculars whatsoever.
Thank @nekozuki it’s good to hear from someone who has been through this. I like the perspective of knowing beforehand so you can be prepared to take other actions instead of waiting to hear from them. I know a lot of my deadlines are coming up and this would obviously make decisions a lot easier now that we can find out beforehand. @muffinpoptarte crowdfunding… don’t give up there is always a way. You’ve come this far there’s no point in stopping now.
Hey guys, so a rep replied to my inquiry with the following:
"Thank you for contacting the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation.
We are only reaching out to students who are missing things or if we need further information from them. You will be contacted if we need for you to provide us anything further."
Take it for what it is. All I know is that I’m going to take a break from obsessing over this.
@sammyclaire23 they open at 8;30 am and close at 5 pm eastern time zone since your from California I believe we are 3 hours ahead of you since my state is also eastern time zone as well.
