<p>Hey all, </p>
<p>These are my general stats/info, if you have any other questions, don't hesitate to ask. I'm looking to see what kind of merit aid I might have a shot at, possibly determining if I consider MSU as a legitimate option or not.</p>
<p>General info:
-Instate
-Rising Senior
-Cumulative GPA (UW): 3.953
-School does not weight AP/Honors courses
-ACT-31 (29 English, 33 Math, 28 Reading, 33 Science)
-No SAT or SATII taken or plan to take.</p>
<p>Course load:
-3 honors courses, but only AP Chemistry so far.
-The majority of the courses I have taken are more challenging than the norm, but not necissarily AP/honors
-3 APs next year (Physics B, American Government, Calc AB).
-4 years of Spanish by the end of senior year (if that counts for anything...it does to me haha).</p>
<p>ECs:
-No sports due to underlying circumstances :\
-NHS
-About 100 total volunteer hours
-Part time job since freshman year (about 10 hours a week).
-Camp Connections, which is basically a camp with students nominated by teachers from our school (about 75 out of 1600) to come together, talk about problems the school is facing, problems in your own life, etc.
-Toys for Tots - raised money for a party for underpriveledged children, helped shop for gifts, took part in the party, about 20 hours of total work.
-In Student Leaders senior year, which is a collection of about 30 of the most prominent leaders of the school who collaborate and organize all of the schools major functions and activites.</p>
<p>Thanks for taking a gander guys!</p>
<p>Are you instate? You’re going to get into the honors college which will provide lots of scholarships. </p>
<p>Here’s a list of them:
[Scholarships</a> for Incoming Freshmen](<a href=“http://www.honorscollege.msu.edu/scholarships/incoming_freshmen.html]Scholarships”>http://www.honorscollege.msu.edu/scholarships/incoming_freshmen.html)</p>
<p>Hope that helps at least a little :).</p>
<p>It says instate in my general info, so yes. :p</p>
<p>I looked at those and none of them apply to me. I’ve also checked the MSU site and most of the scholarships are for OOS students. :</p>
<p>^Whoops. Sorry. Totally missed that :p</p>
<p>Yeah, those are the scholarships for the honors college. Those are the only automatic scholarships I know of. :)</p>
<p>From the looks of it, I can’t see myself getting that much based on their website. Is it worth my time/money to even apply at this point? I’m also applying to UMich Ann Arbor, which is my dream school. If I were to get accepted there, it would take a very generous offer from MSU to make me turn it down.</p>
<p>I would say yes. </p>
<p>I am a very biased source though as I was accepted to both schools and given identical FA/scholarship packages from both schools. </p>
<p>You will get into UMich. I wouldn’t count on too much merit aid from there though.</p>
<p>I wasn’t really expecting much, if any, merit aid from UMich anyways, lol. Were you OOS by any chance? Lastly, what compelled you to go to MSU as opposed to UMich?</p>
<p>No I am instate. </p>
<p>There were a plethora of reasons that I chose MSU. I was raised a blue baby and everyone in my family is a fan of UMich (myself included until last year). I was a good student- 33 ACT, 3.8+ GPA, ECs up the wazoo. It was expected that I would go to UMich, and it was something I planned on. However, I went and visited UMich and realized I didn’t really like the campus, didn’t really like Ann Arbor, didn’t really like the vibe. The breaking point for me was that I didn’t like their residential college at ALL, but I fell in love with the Residential College in the Arts and Humanities at MSU. </p>
<p>I sat in on classes at both. MSU classes were mainly taught my professors and UMich classes were taught by TAs. I had overall MUCH better experiences with the profs at MSU than UMich. Plus, I enjoyed the student body at MSU better. </p>
<p>Now, that being said, I have very few issues with UMich. I still have a few great friends there. Although, a good chunk of my friends transferred out after their frosh year because they hated it. I also have a few people that used to be friends with me who will no longer talk to me because I chose MSU over UMich. UMich is a good school, it’s just not the right school for me. </p>
<p>Hope that makes sense.</p>
<p>Yeah, that makes sense. I’m not really planning on doing a residential college, as that just doesn’t seem for me. Each to his own, I suppose. </p>
<p>From what I’ve heard, MSU has more TA’s than UMich, so I’m surprised to hear you say that.</p>
<p>I think it’s very juvenile that people would stop talking to you over a college choice? You’re doing what’s best for you, not for them, lol. </p>
<p>Anyways, my #1 choice is still UMich, but after admittances/deferrals/rejections, I’ll visit the colleges that I was admitted to one last time before I make my decision.</p>
<p>You have very good stats but the best merit aid at MSU comes if you are a national merit finalist/have a 33 ACT/1500+ SAT (M/V) which unfortunately your stats are not quite there (unless you participate in the Alumni distinguished scholarship weekend, which you will probably be invited to if you apply to MSU…it is a difficult test with a medley of questions that you take with about 1100 other MSU prospective students, and if you are in the top 10% or so you could potentially receive more scholarships or even a full-ride scholarship).</p>
<p>So I think you might not qualify for too much merit aid…my good friend who is also in-state and has similar stats to you received a “MSU collegiate scholarship” worth $2000/year (not specified on websites) in july after she already was intending on going, and once in a while there are some random scholarships given to in-state students but generally you won’t have too much luck. You definitely sound intent on going to UofM if accepted, so I’d stick with that plan and apply to MSU as a backup. </p>
<p>Oh and in terms of TAs (which school has less or more) I’d probably say about equal, just because they are both huge schools in which TAs are relatively unavoidable. But it also greatly depends on your major/whether you are in a residential college to say if you encounter a lot of TAs or not.</p>
<p>I didn’t take the PSAT because my school didn’t stress exactly HOW important it was, just that it could be use to get “scholarship money” if you did well. Eh, I doubt I would have made it to be a semi-finalist, much less a finalist. The thing is, I just don’t see paying 17k for tuition+room and board at MSU if I’m not accepted to UMich. It’s too much of a drop in quality (for my intended major, at least) from UMich to MSU to be paying the same tuition. Really, I’m at a loss for what to do if I’m not accepted to UMich.</p>
<p>What is your intended major? To be honest, the quality of education at MSU is not much worse than UofM (if at all). I speak this in a general sense. Trust me, there are tons of people at MSU who didn’t choose MSU as their first choice (maybe they wanted to go to UofM, or some other school) but end up loving the school anyways. And MSU has tons of opportunities for every major - even if the academic program isn’t as up-to-par, there are a lot of internship/research/extracurricular/club opportunities outside of just classes.</p>
<p>Pre-Pharmacy, depending on if something else comes to me in college. I’d have to transfer out of MSU after 2 years if I stuck with it.</p>
<p>^Why would you have to transfer out? </p>
<p>Why go to MSU at all if you’re clearly set against it? Don’t go somewhere with the mindset of “Oh, I hate this. I need to get out ASAP!” It’s a waste of time and money for you to go somewhere with that mindset.</p>
<p>I’d have to transfer out because MSU doesn’t have a pharmacy program, only a 2 year undergrad prep program. I’ve been to MSU and I like the campus, I don’t really have anything against the school except the fact that they don’t really offer my intended major. I feel that I would like it there and have a good time for the two years that I was there, if I do end up attending.</p>
<p>^My apologies. It just seemed from the other posts that you wanted to transfer out of MSU simply because it was MSU.</p>
<p>No worries. My goal is to go to UMich, but I think I would also enjoy it at MSU.</p>