Merit scholarships I might get?

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill
1

Hi everyone, I’m sorry if I don’t know my way around college confidential well and mess this up, but I was wondering if anyone might help me by telling me what merit scholarships I’m competitive for at UNC Chapel Hill. I applied EA, and I didn’t do any supplementary applications for scholarships. I’m OOS (Ohio), and I’m not going to get any need-based aid, but I did fill out the FAFSA. I think I have a pretty good chance at getting in, but I won’t go if it ends up that Ohio State (where I’ve already been accepted) would be $30,000 dollars less a year. What amount of scholarships might I expect (if any)? Thanks a ton for your help! Also if you could chance me for admissions and Honors I’d appreciated that too!

My statistics:

ACT: 35

SAT (new): 1580

Class rank: 2/187 (public school in a rural impoverished area with a university, so the school isn’t that highly ranked but the top of the class is a bunch of competitive professors’ kids)

Unweighted GPA: (A+ counts as 4.33, A- as 3.66): 4.119

The way unweighted GPAs usually work. I’m probably at like 3.98 because I got an 89.3 in Algebra II :smiley:

Weighted: (out of 6.0; AP and dual enrollment classes count as 6, honors as 5, college prep as 4): 5.591

Course load: My junior year I started taking classes at Ohio University in dual enrollment, so that’s why I don’t have that many APs. My sophomore year, I took English lit and comp (5), bio (4), and APUSH (5). Last year I took a couple upper level English classes, statistics for the behavioral sciences, and first-semester chemistry for science majors at OU and my OU GPA is 4.0. To make my schedule work with OU, I had to drop AP Euro and math analysis after the first semester, and I’m not sure how that will look on my transcript. I had perfectly fine grades in both though. This year I’m in Calc I and a geology class at OU; I’ll do Calc II and calc-based physics next semester. I’m in French IV and AP US Government at the high school, and I would have taken AP Spanish this year (I took Spanish IV last year) but the teacher is in grad school and so when it didn’t work out with my schedule I didn’t rearrange my life to be able to take a class with a year-long sub. I have been studying Spanish on my own and will take the AP test at the end of the year.

EC’s: mainly marching band, really. Joined that my sophomore year, was in color guard for two years and then randomly decided to play trombone, which I got a decent short, UNC-specific essay out of. I held officer positions in two low-key clubs last year and this year am president of two clubs and vice president of two clubs. I did a lot in drama club my freshman and sophomore years. I was politically active this election cycle and probably spent 30 hours volunteering for the Ohio Democratic Party. On and off volunteering with the NHS, at the public library shelving books, and picking up litter with a religious organization. Last year second semester I was part of a graduate linguistics practicum on cross-linguistic influence; I did IRB training and was an official OU research assistant and it was pretty fun.

Ethnicity: pasty white
Sex: F

Awards: National Merit semi-finalist
The American Legion had this test on the government and I won that for the district and region my sophomore year
I got first place in behavioral sciences at the state science fair in eighth grade, haha, which doesn’t really matter except personally, but I did make my Common App essay about that because I did horribly at the school science fair that year and it was an interesting process.

Intended major: mmmmmmm… I should really figure that out… maybe biochem? Probably will minor in a language/linguistics.

Anyhow, thanks a ton for any help you can give me!

Good luck to all the seniors out there!

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Our OOS high school usually has a couple of students admitted each year to UNC-CH; and, with the exception of legacy students, our admitted students have SAT scores of 1350+, and weighted GPAs of 4.5+ on a 5.0 scale. Other kids in our city who I know were admitted to UNC-CH recently have also had similar statistics. All of these kids, however, were “unhooked” in admissions parlance (i.e., not a recruited D-1 athlete, or URM, first-generation college student, etc.).

If you have looked at the UNC-CH common data set, you will see that under Part C7 it states that standardized test scores, application essay, letter(s) of recommendation, and rigor of your high school record are “very important” academic factors considered for freshman admission, whereas GPA and class rank are “important” academic factors considered for freshman admission. Extracurricular activities, talent, and character/personal qualities are considered as “very important” non-academic factors.

Based on your objective criteria, you should be extremely competitive for admissions. Your ECs are good, I think, in terms of showing leadership and initiative. I don’t know that NMSF status is going to help you that much, as my impression is that NMSF/NMF applicants are pretty common at UNC-CH.

Also, as you may know, the UNC-CH admissions policy limits the admission of OOS students to 18% of an incoming freshman class, so there is a lot of competition to fill those OOS slots. And, as another thread discusses, the UNC-CH Admissions Office has admitted too many students the past couple of years, and the university has been hit with a financial penalty for doing so; consequently, there may be some pressure to scale back admissions of OOS students just a little. So there is that specter lurking out there. If you are admitted, you should get an invitation to Honors Carolina without too much trouble: http://honorscarolina.unc.edu/prospective-students/faq/.

In terms of money, the tariff this academic year for OOS students is around $45K. Here is a link to merit-based scholarships at UNC-CH: http://admissions.unc.edu/afford/scholarships/. I don’t know whether you have gotten any feedback about the possibility of getting a Morehead-Cain Scholarship, either by nomination or as a result of your EA application; or whether you applied timely for a Robertson Scholarship; but these are the two big scholarships at UNC-CH, as you may already know. If you get admitted, your statistics might put you in the running for UNC-CH merit scholarships, although the competition for those is – much like the competition for admission as an OOS student – quite fierce.

I suspect that your criteria and qualifications are going to get you a lot of scholarship/aid money at The Ohio State University, especially since you are in-state for that school.

3

First of all I would like to congratulate you on your accomplishments. You should know that getting in as an OOS student is very hard and has an 18% acceptance rate. Getting merit as an OOS student is even harder and from what I have seen, requires something besides academics ( which most OOS students have) and requires something that is way “outside the box.” This does not mean that you will not get merit- but merit aid for OOS students is extremely competitive and most of the merit is given to students who live in NC.

In the meantime I would make sure that you fill out the CSS profile in addition to the FAFSA because their need based aid is good. Good luck to you!!

4

Hi, thanks to both of you! I didn’t apply for the Robertson scholarship (I didn’t know about it) and for Morehead-Cain, I don’t think I have that good of a chance at that because my high school certainly isn’t eligible to nominate people for it. Does UNC ever give $10,000 or $15,000 a year merit scholarships? I’d probably be more eligible for something like that than a full-tuition covering program that only a few select students can receive.

I’ll look into the CSS too, thanks.

5

Yes UNC does give $10,000-15,000 in merit, but getting merit OOS is very very difficult. This does not mean you won’t get it… You never know.

My daughter is from OOS and had a class rank and scores way above the 75th percentile and did not make honors. My impression is that they save these spots for in state kids as a way to keep them in state. OOS students who did make honors had crazy activities- like writing a text book. If your FAFSA EFC is lower than the total cost of attendance you will get need based aid, but you have to fill out the profile.

6

Okay, thanks for the information!