<p>Female from Rural Kentucky
GPA: 4.25w, 3.95uw
7 APs by graduation: 3 this year with all 5's. School has block scheduling which has made it hard to take copious amounts of APs, plus we are not allowed to take any APs independent study.
Rank: 2/350
ACT: 30 (will retake in October, hoping for a 33)
SAT IIs: Lit: 730, Math IIC: (will take in October,*700), Biology: (will take in October, *760)</p>
<p>I'm a legacy.</p>
<p>ECs:
Mock Trial (9,10,11,12): Capt., Best Witness in State, Best Witness in Tournament, State Runner-Up (2 years), Regional Champs (2 years)
School Newspaper Editor-in-Chief
Teen Columnist for local paper
County Young Democrats (10,11,12): Founding Member, Secretary, Vice-President
School Young Democrats (12): Founder, President
NHS (10,11,12): President
National Latin Honor Society
Y-Club (11, 12): Founding Member, Vice-President, School Service Chair, Organized many service projects
250+ service hours with various organizations
Various summer enrichment programs
other various award and ECs.</p>
<p>I have no idea what ACT scores are good or not but you're deffinitly in and youll probably get money (as long as that is a good ACT score). I think you should consider taking the SATs if you can...but maybe thats just because no one takes the ACT's in new jersy so SAT is all I know</p>
<p>I have a sense your ACT is high enough already but check the site m-3-s recommended. If your ACT seems high enough and you don't need the SAT for any other college, don't bother.</p>
<p>However, in terms of scholarships, higher scores are always better, although UM does have a more holistic approach than places like Tulane, which is pretty strict with the score cutoffs. Also, UM gets increasing numbers of apps every year, accepted its most qualified class in history this year, and is now scrambling to find housing for all the freshman because more came than expected. So I would expect next year's guidelines for scholarships to be a bit higher than this year's. And apply for housing as soon as you know you are going. Freshman are guaranteed housing but being put up at the Holiday Inn across from campus is not seen as ideal to some.</p>
<p>Where you are from matters too - kids from less well represented states seem to get offers that are a little higher than they might otherwise. I remember a kid from Idaho posting that he was amazed to get the offer he got, given his stats. But Idaho sends among the fewest kids proportionally, as one would expect.</p>
<p>However, in terms of scholarships, higher scores are always better,</p>
<p>I agree with this statement so much for any interested in UM. For two reasons really: Son is on scholarship there and would no way qualify for what he got if he were to be reapplying today. The scores have gone up considerably in the last 3 years! And you want to get as high a scholarship as possible for future financial aid reasons as well. Let's say that tuition goes up $2000 per year (I'm just throwing this out I don't think it went up that much) but if you are on a 1/2 scholarship only 1000 of that will be picked up by your scholarship. Consequently the other 1000 will become part of your need. If a family has a pretty consistent year to year income and have an EFC higher than total costs, this increase will hit the families pocket. Which means the families EFC will increase each year as tuition does. </p>
<p>The one thing that has impressed me with UM is how they do re-qualify each family on a year to year basis as our EFC has gone up and down accordingly. I was afraid that our EFC would stay standard according to Freshman financial status. And CaneGuy won some other scholarships which affected freshman year, but those were taken into consideration for soph & junior years accordingly.</p>
<p>1tcm is right. But one nice thing about UM is scholarships pay a proportion of the tuition, not a flat rate. Some college scholarships are flat (like $10,000 a year) and tuition increases are felt even more with them.</p>
<p>Also, individual UM schools offer scholarships. S was quite fortunate to get a scholarship from admissions and more money from the Business School. It still will cost a pretty penny, though ;) !</p>