<p>I’m in state & I got 15k per year w/ honors. 32 ACT, 4.0 UW& 4.149 UW. I’ve taken all the AP courses at my school (small number) and done PSEO as well.</p>
<p>I tried to find the answer on Miami’s website and looked through a few past forums, but I’m slightly confused as to the difference between Honors/Scholars. It seems that some people with more merit $$ get Scholars but not honors or the other way around. I know most of the benefits of each program, but it is definitely hard to figure out how they choose which program for each student.</p>
<p>I’m OOS and was offered 25k in merit aid every year with an invitation to the Business Scholar Program, but haven’t heard anything about Honors.</p>
<p>@megans113 I would agree with you that it is very confusing. I guess I would rather be in honors (as I was selected) because the only scholars I’m interested in is pre-law & you have to have an A&S major for that (I’m business econ). I would just kind of like to have more information bc it sucks not knowing why 1) business majors can’t do the pre-law when there’s no explicit pre-law major & 2) what rhyme or reason there is to accepting me for honors and not say, farmer school of business scholars</p>
<p>Just a note: D was accepted (see earlier post–2240 SAT, 20K merit, honors and scholars). In the packet she received via snail mail, the acceptance letter said nothing about honors. The honors paragraph was on the online letter. Later she received the merit letter, and scholars letter but still nothing in the mail from honors.</p>
<p>Same for my D. Honors notification online, Scholars was in a snail mail letter, merit scholarship in a separate snail mail letter.</p>
<p>@megans113 & @mrice1519 You are correct it is confusing with the two different programs for high achieving students. Scholars is a relatively new program, selections are made by different faculty than Honors. There is inconsistency in the quality of programming of each Scholars cohort, which my daughter attributes to the differing degree of involvement of the faculty who lead each group. She loves her Scholars group, but says other students don’t have much involvement with their cohort but certainly appreciate the extra scholarship funds and perks. The Scholars program strikes me as a work in progress at MU, you should reach out to the contacts on the Scholars webpage to express your thoughts about being considered for Pre-Law Public Policy Scholars despite your major to see what may happen. I’ve been so impressed with MU faculty and how quickly they respond to prospective students.</p>
<p>Honors is more established and has a social component that Scholars lacks, such as dances, get-togethers, etc. However, it appears to be a program in transition. I believe it is now a 2 year commitment and you need to apply to stay in the program as an upperclassman. I view selection for Honors much like a small LAC; they have so many high-stat students to choose from it likely comes down to essays and what type of diversity you can add to the group. They are trying to build a community in Honors rather than reward students for their high school resumes. I do wonder if the selectivity of Honors actually hurts MU by turning off high achieving students who are not asked to join since those are the very students who likely have lots of other college options. Just my 2 cents with a current student in the honors dorm and a high school senior prospective student.</p>
<p>@falcon5000 thanks for your input. I’ve been meaning to contact them, but your advice gave me the extra push. I just shot them an e-mail, so we’ll see</p>
<p>@falcon5000 thanks for the input. Any thoughts on humanities scholars?</p>
<p>@isaelijohjac I would have your D reach out to the two faculty listed here: <a href=“Prodesse Scholars Program | Honors Programs | Miami University”>Prodesse Scholars Program | Honors Programs | Miami University;
<p>My guess is they will get right back to her. Most of these cohorts are fairly small and they likely didn’t fill their groups to leave room for strong Regular Decision candidates, so they will know her name right away when she emails them since they are likely the ones who chose her for their Humanities Scholars group. It goes without saying (but I’ll say it anyway) it is important she is the one who contacts them. I only deal with the financial aid office, I expect my kids to do their own communication with faculty.</p>
<p>Interesting info on the programs. I didn’t know that you could be both honors and scholars.</p>
<p>@falcon5000 Will do. Thanks. Yes, totally agree–D is in charge of all correspondence unless financial.</p>
<p>@Beaudreau I asked my daughter if she had any insight into engineering program from friends, but she hasn’t met anyone in it during her first semester. Her STEM friends from high school that went the Ohio public university route seemed to veer toward Ohio State. Back in my day, a 2.5 and a pulse got you into OSU main campus, now it is the toughest Ohio public to get into, and has become strong competition for MU. I do think MU’s aggressive merit aid program can partially be attributed to having another state school seeking the best and brightest. </p>
<p>I hope you get a beautiful day to visit, but I think you’ll be impressed with MU rain or shine. I found Make it Miami to be a little impersonal, so hopefully your son can reach out to faculty ahead of time to schedule a private Q and A and possibly a tour from a current student.</p>
<p>@falcon5000. OSU is 8th or 9th in the Big Ten in engineering, but that’s actually very good, because the Big Ten is just outstanding in engineering. Illinois, Purdue, and Michigan are top-ten engineering schools. Northwestern, Wisconsin, and Penn State are top-20. Minnesota, Maryland, and Ohio State are top-30 (OSU #26, Cincinnati #82, Dayton, and Toledo tied at #139), Michigan State, Iowa, and Rutgers are top-60.</p>
<p>I am not that fond of Columbus (probably my Michigan prejudice) and would like to see my son at a smaller school that focuses more on undergraduate education. That’s what got us looking at Miami. US News ranks Miami tied at 29th among engineering schools that do not offer PhDs. Rose Hulman and Harvey Mudd are tied for first. My son has been accepted to Rose Hulman, but he is not as excited about it as he used to be. It’s in Terre Haute, all of the students are STEM majors, and 80% are men. I want my son to focus on his studies, but I would like that he have at least a little opportunity for fun and to broaden his horizons.</p>
<p>Rankings are not as critical for engineering as in some other fields. Engineering programs are accredited, so there are minimum standards. Further, even if you went to MIT, to practice engineering you must first pass the Fundamentals of Engineering Exam, then you must get four years of professional experience, then you must pass the Principals and Practices of Engineering exam to be certified as a Professional Engineer. Further, there is still a shortage of engineers, so there are jobs and graduate school opportunities for just about any engineering graduate who worked hard, got good grades, and passed the Fundamentals of Engineering Exam. A friend of mine here in Arizona has a son who just graduated with a mechanical engineering degree from Northern Arizona University. N.A.U. is an unranked public university and its engineering school is ranked 63rd among engineering schools that do not offer PhDs. His son is now working for Boeing!</p>
<p>So overall, I would like my son to attend a school that can give him a strong engineering education with good opportunities for internships and maybe for co-oping. But I would also like my son to get a good, well-rounded education, make some friends, maybe even meet some girls (he’s a good-looking kid, but very shy), and overall be able to eventually look back on the best four years of his life.</p>
$14,000/ year, 30 ACT, 4.0UW GPA
18K a year, OOS 33 ACT 3.98 GPA.
$11.000 a year. 3.4 GPA, 32 ACT
2 questions re:merit aid. First is did you have to file a FAFSA? and Secondly, can you resubmit semester grades if they go up to move GPA? S is on the brink of charts with lower GPA but 30 ACT and is OOS direct FSB admit. thanks!
No FAFSA is required for Miami’s merit scholarships. If you do the FAFSA, the merit aid shows up as the “Redhawk Excellence Scholarship” when your financial aid letter arrives in the spring and goes toward meeting the gap between your EFC and MU’s COA.
Great question about the senior year first semester grades bumping the GPA over 3.5. I would email the admissions officer assigned to your son to see if that could be taken into consideration. If the answer is “yes”, it would be nice to have it in writing in case the resulting merit aid offer is not consistent with the merit aid chart.
@Beaudreau – about your P.E. explanation. Not every graduating engineer becomes a PE. In fact, of my engineering class of about 50, I think less than 5 went that route. I just did a quick google search, and didn’t come up with anything definitive, but I did see one website that estimates about 20% of graduating engineers eventually become a PE (http://www.nspe.org/resources/blogs/pe-licensing-blog/80-myth-engineering-profession) – more civil engineers do versus, say, chemical or electrical engineers. There’s also plenty of web sources that talk about the myth of engineer shortages (and one really doesn’t have to look much farther than the numbers of unemployed engineers, especially older ones, to know there is some merit in calling that a myth). There was a notable gadfly, Irwin Feerst (http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-11175685.html) who was directly addressing that topic in the mid- to late-1980s. So, from firsthand experience, the profession is not what it used to be. But that’s not to say an engineering education isn’t valuable.
@guyk27 Thanks for the useful information. To be clear, my point did not concern the desirability of an engineering career, but rather that, like accounting programs, engineering curricula are pretty similar from university to university.
Your PE stats sound about right. I work as an attorney with a lot of engineers in the public utility sector. Most are not PEs and don’t need to be as long as someone in the corporation is. And I do see more civil engineering PEs, because they have to certify construction documents.
I take your point that older engineers may have employment issues. I remember the big layoffs experienced by aerospace engineers after the government cut back defense and NASA spending in the 70s. I would also be concerned if I were starting as a freshman petroleum engineering major. This year, they were the highest payed graduates. With oil below $50 per barrel, I doubt that 2015-16 graduates will be as fortunate.
Still, as I think you agree, an engineering education is extremely useful. Engineering students must be smart, disciplined, and team players, skills that highly valued by employers in all kinds of businesses. I know several medical doctors, including my wife’s brother, who first graduated with engineering degrees. Engineers also tend to do very well on the LSAT and GMAT exams and are well represented in top law school and graduate business programs. My oldest son is an aerospace engineering major and is already thinking about patent law.