Merit Scholarships At T20 Schools

@Dolemite I was not talking about athletes at all. Ivies will reconsider your aid if you get a more generous package from another Ivy in most cases.

@thumper1 I know. I’m saying they do that for non athletes because they do it for athletes to level the playing field and since they do it for athletes maybe they have to do it for non-athletes due to NCAA rules.

Can’t squeeze blood from a turnip. In this case you can’t squeeze merit awards from those colleges that don’t offer them! Eliminate the no merit colleges/universities from your list. Look for those who actually will provide what you need.

@CateCAParent the bait that HYP use to lure the handful of top kids is a SCEA offer of admission; * in the regular decision pool * the bait offered are phone calls from professors with personal invitations to tour labs and likely letters in January and February, and things like the Yale YES weekend. Then the follow-up is matching need-based financial aid from the other HYP if requested, once the rockstar students have all their acceptances in hand.

From the students I know who fell into this category, the outreach from H and Y started about 3 weeks after their regular decision applications were submitted - so, about the 3rd week of January - and they already had their Princeton early action acceptances in their pockets. The schools know that these “early” signals and overtures are well-received and go a long way towards making kids feel wanted.

For HYP, the bait is not merit money being offered to this very small group, many of whom would be full-pay/did not apply for aid, and some of whom have go-anywhere awards such as the Bryan Cameron (full tuition to any school).

I don’t think so. The Ivies opted out of NCAA scholarship rules so they can pretty much do whatever they want, within the agreement they’ve made with the League. It’s sort of a chicken/egg thing, but I think they are matching all students over just matching athletes. More and more non athletes are getting likely letters too.