The B/K is possible…yes. But highly unlikely.
@Hippobirdy stated it clearly and succinctly: scholar-athlete is not a match for most competitive scholarships. When you read scholarship criteria, if the description states community service, impact on community, leader, etc, it is going to require a higher hurdle than sports, grades, test scores. It means they are looking for students have demonstrated commitment and involvement in positively changing their community on a significant/tangible level. (Not just volunteer hrs, either.)
This is what @WayOutWestMom wrote. Those odds aren’t that bad for University of New Mexico.
Here is an example of a student who I am familiar with and who I see truly competitive for top elite scholarships:
She has the given (very accelerated academics (started dual enrolling in college level classes at age 12), high test scores.)
What is the “elusive” she has?
She has worked with profs on research;
she has attended numerous conferences in her field of interest and has been invited on excursions with top professionals in the field;
she has taught classes on this topic online to middle schoolers;
She has an active non-profit connected to her field of interest that she started at age 9 or 10 (so not for colleges)
She has published papers and was just invited to present one of her papers at an international conference.
That is the type of competition out there for these scholarships. You can’t think in terms of your high school or locally. There are amazing kids out there with incredible levels of achievement.
@thumper1 I suspect the Regents may have become increasingly competitive in recent years. I did a deep dive into WUE schools when my D17 applied to college. I know a number of very accomplished, high stats kids with profiles similar to the OP’s daughter that did NOT get the Regents, but got generous merit offers from schools in AZ and TX (UT Dallas and Tech). By all means @kevinfromOC’s daughter should apply, but with appropriate expectations. Even without Regents, UNM remains a great low cost option that fits the OP’s budget.
COA can be inflated by estimates for books, personal expenses, travel.
You should look at tuition, fees, room, board. You said travel costs are going to be minimal, plus she would have to fly to most OOS schools anyway.
So I still would think that UA, in addition to UAH, UAZ, UNM, University of Pittsburgh, Ohio State would work with the $15-20 k budget, if she got a full tuition scholarship (plus extra engineering scholarship at UA and tOSU).
I thought the Morrill scholarship at tOSU was a diversity scholarship.
“(NO) Tulane : They have an unspecified number of full tuition scholarships, but it looks like most people are saying the best they got is $30K, which still leaves a huge difference.”
I may have given you bad info on Tulane. They’ve been dialing back their half tuition auto awards (which my kids got). But they still do a good number of full tuition competitive schollies as best I can tell. They make 100 DHS full tuition offers per year for 75 actual awards. Maybe 50 PTA full tuition offers. And about 5 Stamps full rides per year. TU does have ChemE.
So unlike a lot of the other competitive merit schollies at high end schools (like UNC Morehead) mere mortal outstanding kids do get them.
Maybe Tulane and Vandy are your two stretch apps for full tuition merit. And maybe Rice too, since there’s no separate essays to write.
QUOTE Alabama : OK, I gotta ask about this… I see 8 academic elite scholarships (full tuition or full ride) out of 1000 applicants. The Presidential scholarship (based on grades) is the next best which would be $26K plus the NHRP ($1K) = $27K. COA = $45K, so it seems the best possible you could do is a $18K COA, which is in the ballpark and definitely worth considering.
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Don’t forget the engineering scholarship which is another $2,500 per year. https://eng.ua.edu/admissions/scholarships/
The cost of attendance is also based on the most expensive options for room and board. You could choose cheaper options. Participating in an engineering co-op would reduce the cost further.
University of Alabama Tuscaloosa application is easy and fast to complete. Bama often shows a lot of love in terms of money and opportunities for students like your daughter. I’d throw in an application and see if they come up with additional merit money above and beyond the automatic awards.
One of our kids made National Hispanic Scholar, and took advantage of University of Kentucky’s automatic Patterson Scholarship.
She knows quite a few very happy students in engineering — seniors and already graduated.
I don’t think UK has updated the scholarship page yet for the incoming class of 2020. Perhaps in September.
There are early deadlines to watch! December 1??
I would not get hung up by Honors. Lots of super smart kids NOT in Honors, with plenty to do (especially engineering!).
Lastly, our kid went to UK “against her will”. Due to financial restraints, she had the choice of several full tuition or full tuition plus scholarships at not-very-sexy OOS Public flagships. She didn’t want to go to any of them! Not good enough!
It took her about a full year, but she loves the school and her life in Lexington. She lives there year-round.
Do not fail to consider the value of engineering summer or co-op employment. My DS16 has made $10-20/hour and has friends that have made even more. Not only will it put her in a good position to obtain employment after graduation, but it will help her get to graduation. University of Cincinnati has mandatory co-op as a part of their 5 year program.
However, this type of summer and co-op employment is common at many universities for engineering students, and is not necessarily a particular advantage for one university versus another.
But note that getting such employment and the level of pay it makes does depend on economic and industry cycles, so depending on such income to make a university affordable carries some risk if the jobs are not there due to a recession (general or industry-specific) during the students time in school.
I want to say this thread has been the most helpful and informative thing I have read on here in a very long time. my hs jr Introverted D and I decided in 8th grade that AUTO merit was our plan given her personalty and strength in standardized testing and made a goal of NMF. However, lately I have been second guessing myself. Worried that I shoulda/woulda/coulda had D do more (leadership, etc. which she has not done so far, in the hopes she could compete for competitive scholarships. But boy seeing what the reality is, with incredible total package students out there, this has confirm that the AUTO merit path is the right path for us.
“That is the type of competition out there for these scholarships. You can’t think in terms of your high school or locally. There are amazing kids out there with incredible levels of achievement.”
I completely agree that this is the case for the top elite scholarships (Stamps, Jefferson, etc.). However it is possible to win some other competitive merit scholarships without such a glowing resume or even much (any?) leadership if you have something unusual that a college wants to round out a cohort.
In my D’s case that was the combination of an audition based ballet BFA admit (in a highly rated program) with strong but not otherworldly academics (ie comparable to those of OP’s D). In OP’s case a comparable hook might conceivably be hockey, but I suspect it’s much more likely to be her URM status at a college that is lacking in tippy top students with that background. So in OP’s shoes I would be looking at colleges where there is a relative dearth of Hispanic students and a largish cohort to fill.
Yes the comments in this thread have been EXTREMELY helpful! So much to digest, and the clock is ticking. I’m going to have to re-read every one again to make sure there’s nothing I’ve forgotten!
My daughter and I have been grumbling (in a light-heated way) about something you touched on - it seems extroverted eloquent writers have an inherent advantage in the essay writing and interviews for full scholarships over the introverted STEM geeks. How about instead of an essay, they make the students who want the full ride solve a multi-variable calculus problem with several pages of work shown - we think that would be the fair-iest way to do it, especially for the humanities majors (If I had a smiley emoji I’d insert it here to indicate sarcasm!)
@KevinFromOC smiley emoji here for sure. Wishing your D all the best!!!
I agree wholeheartedly that guaranteed awards, early acceptances are important. Essential, in fact, if it’s important to a student to go to college the next year. It can be devastating to have no alternatives.
I would still apply to long shots as well as not so long shots. Sometimes the unexpected happens. Sometimes the odds go into your favor. Just keep well in mind that they are lottery tickets. It’s not as though picking those highly selective schools is all that difficult. The lists are everywhere. It’s when kids and parents get overly invested in the these schools and spend too much time focusing on them instead of looking for the affordable option that will accept the student and best fits the student. Pick the safety worth n’ery a thought while obsessing over the difficult admissions six ways to Sunday makes no sense.
@KevinFromOC LOL re: the calculus problem for introverted STEM people in lieu of an interview. That would have been perfect for my DS!
I second @Twoin18’s point about the competition being a little less stratospheric outside of the tippy top colleges.
As I’ve mentioned, my DS received the Eminence full COA from tOSU. Of course, I think he’s the bees knees, and he had perfect scores/grades, but he did not have amazingly outstanding leadership or community service on his resume. And he’s very introverted and probably not the best interviewee. Like you, I felt like introverts were at a disadvantage at these kinds of scholarship/interview weekends. But they saw something they wanted in him - he was able to demonstrate passion for his intented major - astrophysics, but nothing like doing research with a professor or going to professional conferences. Maybe his “geographic diversity” (Kansas) was attractive as well. Point being, your kid does not have to be unbelievably amazing to get some great $$$ from some really good colleges. And there is a bit of luck involved for sure.
Also, if you’re worried about the “introverted STEM geek disadvantage”, you might want to look at Michigan State. If you haven’t seen it already, they have a scholarship that requires the invited applicants to go to MSU and TAKE A TEST! (Which I thought was ridiculous - haven’t these kids taken enough tests already?!) But it could be good for an “introverted STEM geek”. It’s called the Alumni Distinguished Scholarship. My DS was invited, but ultimately backed out because he already had some good offers and MSU was not at the top of his list - he wanted a school in an urban area. But MSU is a really good school.
It’s a fallacy that STEM kids are introverted and others are not. Just not true. Like the idea that girls can’t do math. Nope. Not a valid statement.
Introverted kids do suffer in the scholarship pool as an extrovert is easier for interviewers to talk to and might/might not be more open about their accomplishments. Many introverts ( and extroverts) are excellent writers. The only place an introvert is at a disadvantage is face to face esp. if the interviewer isn’t trained to with with all types of people. Make sure your kid has references from a person who understands their character strengths. Sounds like OP already has this figured out by not going after SJ/community based scholarships and sticking to where his daughter already has a focus. There’s plenty there already to work with.
FWIW, I agree wholeheartedly that competitive merit at lower ranked schools is a different scenario. Talking about Stamps at an elite school like Cal Tech or the Jefferson or Robertson is on a completely different level of competition. Those level scholarships match the profile of the young lady I described. It is also why my kids pursue merit at schools like USCarolina or Bama. They are competitive for merit but they are not like the young lady I posted about. There is competitive and then there is elite competitive.
The OP’s dd might very well be competitive for RRS at Bama or Top Scholar at USColumbia. That is the level of merit where they are looking to pull kids in that would be accepted to higher ranked schools that they want to attend at their institution (but then the students actually have to be able to pay for those higher ranked schools…hence the pejorative phrasing by some on CC as “buying your student.” Only a negative if you see lower ranked schools as somehow “less than.” We don’t. If they will pay my kids to attend, we are all in b/c a quality education at low cost is nothing but a positive in our view.)
@KevinFromOC Honestly, I think every kid at Cal Tech would have zero problem with the scenario you posted. Probably most kids at MIT, too. I posted this earlier in the thread, but if your dd hasn’t been in the thick of elite math kids outside of her school, she probably has unrealistic views of what some kids are doing in math during high school. Kids at MathCamp, RSI, etc or kids focusing on the AMC/USAMO represent just some of the elite math kids out there. (Does she have AMC scores? If so, she should include them in her application b/c they do add value at elite schools.)
FWIW, some schools do have additional scholarships for certain types of competitions. Bama, for example, has a high school physics competition where the top 2 scorers are offered the equivalent of an instate tuition scholarship. https://physics.ua.edu/high-school-physics-contest/ (My ds competed in this competition as an individual not on a school team.) You could spend time searching depts and see if you can find math equivalent scholarships.