<p>Have twins in high school who are top students, and easily qualify based on academics, scores, and extra-curriculars. But...many merit scholarships still based on need, and our income is high. Any pure merit scholarships out there?</p>
<p>Sure!</p>
<p>I got merit aid from American University that covered tuition; it definitely was not based on need.</p>
<p>If you are referring to merit scholarships awarded by universities, yes, there are quite a few that do not consider student/family finances. Peruse the threads at the top of this forum and the Parent’s forum.</p>
<p>Some of the merit scholarships may require submission of FAFSA/PROFILE even if income is not a factor, but others (for example, the one my son has) do not.</p>
<p>As for outside scholarships, my impression is that a lot of those do consider need along with academic and/or community service considerations. Not all–organizations such as FFA, for example, offer some that do not specify that need is a factor, but by and large, it seems that outside groups tend to include need.</p>
<p>Some colleges will give you a break for twins as well. If they can agree!</p>
<p>There are many schools that offer merit-based scholarships that do not consider need. As OP said check existing threads on top schools that offer the best merit scholarships. However, these are usually very competitive – i.e. top 1%-- so make sure your children are applying to some schools where they are at the very top of the applicant pool - Just being in the top quartile won’t do it…</p>
<p>There are also a number of merit-based scholarships that look at academics, leadership and community service – Coca Cola, Toyota, Best Buy, Comcast, Family Dollar, TD Bank for example. For some (toyota, comast) you need to be nominated by your school and others have geography requirements (td bank, family dollar). Check the various scholarship websites (like fastweb, etc - there are also lots of threads on these) Again very competitive but someone needs to win!! And then national merit based on psat scores…</p>
<p>To sfj711: Without a doubt. The hardest part is finding them. If you check on [MoreThanGrades</a> - Home](<a href=“http://www.morethangrades.com%5DMoreThanGrades”>http://www.morethangrades.com), you can find school based merit scholarships by entering the word scholarship in the general information search area. I recommend narrowing down the search to the states you are interested in. Once it returns a search, links are present for all schools offering scholarship money with links also to those with merit aid. Good Luck C.Rios</p>