@joecollege44 S19 had no hook for his merit from Kenyon. He’s a white kid from the suburbs of Chicago. Not a legacy either. I don’t think you need a hook to get merit at Kenyon (or at Oberlin for that matter).
A kid from my daughter’s graduating class is attending Kenyon with $15,000 a year, and she is white, upper middle class, and also from Chicago suburb. Excellent GPA, but I don’t know what her SAT scores were.
I didn’t mean every kid needs a hook- just the kid with the stats of the OP, which are good but not outstanding for these schools.
It’s actually LESS likely an athlete without the grades and scores would get merit money at a D3 school. D3 schools have to prove they aren’t giving favoritism to athletes so can only award merit money to athletes in line with other students. If all 3.0/ 30 ACT students get merit, then the athlete can too.
If the school doesn’t officially give athletic scholarships, they don’t unofficially give them either.
Agree. @twoinanddone. The two specific examples that I was thinking of really were wiggling, not out of range. The boundaries are a little gray (on purpose).
One was a URM athlete with grades/SAT that would have typically put the student at the 2nd level of merit (b/c that’s what was on the offer, and was consistent with the other applicants we knew that cycle). Student appealed, and was given top level. Dk which was the part that tipped it- athlete? urm? AO really liked the student? (was genuinely a super kid) good negotiating skills? Just know there was some wiggling, the student got the top level & attended.
@bklynkids --I just got a parent email from Clark with a Jerry Maguire-esque subject: “Show me the money!” They are definitely trying to send a strong “We give scholarships” kind of message!
(It was also doubly funny as I just looked up that movie yesterday, but that has to be a coincidence, right?)