Really? Do you know the SAT scores of your co-workers, your neighbors, the people in your book club? You know, the people who surround you? how about the SAT scores of the teachers your son has at his current high school or the professors he will have?
@twoinanddone
Sorry for writing this. I would like to apologize for doing so. I don’t know the SAT scores of people around me, but what I meant is that people generally like to be with people of similar intellectual level and education. I can relate to my friends. The coworkers that I like working with the most have enough intellectual baggage so we can engage in meaningful conversations, etc.
That said, one might also want to consider the psychological impact on a teenager having to settle for a school that might not even be ranked in the top-50 when he or she is accepted in a top-10 school. I believe that going to an Honors College helps said teenager feel good about his or her achievements and decision. Our son was the only student from his school accepted to Cornell last year, and also the only student accepted to Carnegie Mellon. He had to both turn them down. We are lucky that we live in a middle-class neighborhood where everybody understands the value of money and where Honors Colleges are highly regarded, so nobody teased him about it but during the high school’s graduation ceremony the speaker stated that only one student had being accepted to an Ivy and congratulated her when in fact three students including our son had been accepted to an Ivy (one at Princeton, one at UPenn and our son at Cornell. Only the student accepted at Princeton enrolled). While our son rarely expresses his feelings to me (he mostly expresses them to his mother) he was surprisingly upset about that episode and mentioned it a few times after the ceremony.
I don’t know the dynamic of private schools such as the one that @KevinFromOC’s daughter is attending but I suspect it is not always easy to be part of the student body that is able to be there only thanks to a scholarship, and that having attended such school and achieved top 1% status, it might be difficult to tell her peers where she is headed if it is not to an Honors College?
Once your daughter has her acceptances, try to pick her top 3, maybe 4 choices, and visit then. This will help her make her final choice. I know you say she doesn’t care, but after acceptances…it would be nice for her to see the top choices to get a feel for the places, and help her with a matriculation decision.
@NJEngineerDad in engineering…al of the students are going to be smart. They have to be…or they will be switching majors.
@BingeWatcher He was a History major so totally different! I know one his closest friends was in Engineering (I can ask specialty). He had a coop or internship so graduated in 5 years and was employed immediately.
Full disclosure - my kids were good, not top students and we were not concerned with merit. I just see Alabama and South Carolina mentioned frequently for students looking for scholarships. I’ve toured both, liked them, but not more than Kentucky. I just think UK is overlooked!
@thumper1 I guess you are right. Maybe being in a Honors College does not matter that much for future engineers. Still, I’d like to remark that I have worked with engineers from schools like MIT and engineers from lesser known schools, and there is no question that the engineers from top schools like MIT have something that the lesser known school engineers do not have. Not all engineers are created equal.
@NJEngineerDad As thumper1 said, any kids getting through engineering are smart, certainly smart enough to hold a conversation with your son! It’s unfortunate that your son was accepted to Cornell and CMU and was disappointed by not being able to attend. Many kids don’t bother to apply to expensive schools not known for merit if the numbers won’t work out . It is a setup for disappointment.
Many kids in engineering at public schools had excellent SAT’s… Most students, , even top ones, end up at their state schools or at schools that give excellent need based or merit aid . Wealthy families have always had more options in regard to colleges .
Thanks @sevmom I think he was disappointed not so much because he had to turn the offers down, but mostly because his achievement had not been publicly acknowledged. In any event we had always been clear about what we could afford upfront so there was no surprise there. My main point was actually that he was able to “move on” because he felt that Barrett offered him the same environment. I am not sure he would have felt the same if he had been accepted to ASU but not Barrett.
Good luck to your son! My H went to CMU. Your son will likely have more fun at ASU! 
Hi, If compass prep is to be believed, CA national merit cutoff may be < = 222 this year. If so, then consider U Florida and Texas A M. U Florida will give full cost attendance for national merit to out of state students via Benacquisto. UF has very good engineering programs (especially chemical and materials). Texas A M (excellent engineering) gives $7k/year national merit, but if you receive any scholarship >$4k/year you get in state tuition, so may get close to your $ needs (please doublecheck this) Also additional schools like U Alabama, Oklahoma, etc which give good $ for national merit. Hoping the cutoff is indeed 222 for you. Good luck!
This student attends a prep school in Massachusetts. Doesn’t NMF status for this student depend on Massachusetts cutoff! Any idea what the prediction for that state is.
@STEMFocus NMF get 10,500 at A&M a year and O/P has stated his daughter is not NMF. She is National Hispanic Scholar.
Original post said: “Scored a 1490/1520 (Perfect 760 Math, 730 RW), for a selection index of 222. 98% of the time, this score would qualify her as a NMF. But in her case, she lives in California which has a cutoff of 223.” I missed the part about being at MA prep school. I assume it would be MA cutoff then as you say. Compass has that at <= 223 for moment
Texas A M Award Annual Amount Years Total Amount
National Merit
Recognition Award $7,000 4 $28,000 I saw this, did I miss another part? Is it additional to the $3k per year for being semifinalist, getting to $10.5k/yr?
OP stated did not think would get national merit because of 222 score, and needing 223 in CA. See earlier post, did not realize school was in MA even though live in CA
@STEMFocus , it is sad she missed the cut off so extremely close.
@NJEngineerDad My daughter’s roommate from freshman year was in the honors college (she chose to live in a regular freshman dorm). Nice kid, I liked her a lot, but didn’t swoon at her intellectual discussions. The only class my daughter really wanted to take in the honors program (but wasn’t allowed to) was a course on Disney something-or-other. My daughter knows everything about Disney. Do I think the others in the honors program could have benefited from my D being a classmate in that course? Absolutely. Why should a class on Disney need to be restricted to the honors college so that students are only with their intellectual peers when discussing Goofy and Cinderella?
Not all honors courses are fluff, but not all are astrophysics either.
https://www.uky.edu/financialaid/scholarship-incoming-freshmen
UK has updated the scholarship page for incoming freshmen for fall of 2020.
Looks like the Patterson (automatic for NMF & NHRS) is the same as last year.
Go CATS!
@KevinFromOC I think you need to read some of the scholarship details at USC more closely. The NHRP award is 6000/ yr and can stack on top of other scholarships. They offer 5 Stamps, 20 McNair, and 20 Horseshoe. The awards vary accordingly: Stamps Scholars annual value: Up to $20,750 + tuition reduction + $10,000 enrichment fund
McNair Scholars annual value: $15,000 + tuition reduction
Horseshoe Scholars annual value: $11,000
Only Stamps adds up to full ride. Honors dorm, food, books will be around 5k-10k+ depending.
There was a study I heard of a long, long time ago that people tend to marry those who are within 10 IQ points. I believe men were more willing to ‘marry down’ than women. Ahem…
My high stats kid is an intellectual snob in school. He rarely speaks, so it has nothing to do with having brilliant conversations all day long. It has to do with extreme impatience with anything which slows down the classes. He hates the first few weeks of school when ‘all of the kids who shouldn’t be there’ weed themselves out. The first exam usually ends that phase and he is happier.
He became much more enamored with our state flagship when he learned of the schools the top kids in our HS are attending this fall. That lineup headed to our flagship sealed the deal for him. Once he returned to school and also learned of the intent of most of his classmates, he started packing his bags for the flagship (tOSU). A 75th SAT percentile of 1450 didn’t sway him. Knowing the types of students who would be in HIS classes did. A bit irrational given here are 2000+ engineering majors in each cohort, but knowing that kids he had deep respect for, academically, were heading to tOSU convinced him. He doesn’t need every kid he interacts with to be Einstein. He just needs those in his classes to be majority Einstein-like. (I am not pleased with this characteristic of his and we routinely remind him of his many weaknesses, for the record).
@midwest67. Sadly if you read carefully the Patterson at UK is not the same as last year. Last year it came with two years of $10K housing stipend. As of this year it looks like only one year of $10K housing stipend is offered.
Yes, I see UK has cut Patterson down, officially off our list. Sad face here.