<p>I have been named a National Merit Finalist and told NMSC of my first choice college in October. I believe that NMSC announces to my 1st choice that I have been named a finalist, but do all colleges find out? Would the other schools which I applied to know that I made finalist? Should I tell them myself?</p>
<p>smcsmc-Yes, NM announces to your 1st choice on March 1st if you have already listed a 1st choice, which it seems you did a long time ago. There has been discussion on other threads regarding if other colleges a person has applied to would get notification of your NMF status. I would recommend notifying them yourself as it seems to be the consensus that these colleges are not notified by NM. What could it hurt? Send them a letter or if you have a specific contact person at the college maybe just send them an email. Are you still considering going to one of the colleges that is not your first choice? If so, and these other colleges offer money to NMFs, remember that you cannot receive another offer from a college after receiving one from the college listed as first choice. You can change your status with NM to undecided if you are still making up your mind or waiting to compare the offers. Hope that helps.</p>
<p>The school I have listed as my "first choice" right now is my safety school, which would give me a big NMF scholarship if I attend there. (I am still waiting to hear back from some other schools I applied to before I make a final decision.)</p>
<p>Since I listed a college that gives NMF scholarships as my first choice, does that mean I am ineligible to be considered for or receive a $2500 award from NM?</p>
<p>you can still change your first choice school between now and sometime in May as many times as you want. Go online and print out the form and fax or mail it in.</p>
<p>Sorry to hijack the thread, but should I tell colleges I'm a finalist, even if those colleges do NOT give NM scholarships? (Just as like an update to my resume.)</p>
<p>with regard to aerableparable's post...yes, you can change your first choice school BUT you need to be cautious about this....for example, if beginning on March 1st, you have school "A" listed as your first choice and they offer you a NM college-sponsored scholarship, even though it is not the end of May deadline yet, you decide you'd rather go to school "B", you cannot receive a NM college-sponsored scholarship from school "B" because "A" already offered you one. The rules from NM read as follows: "If NMSC receives notice of a change in college choice from a Finalist to whom a college-sponsored Merit Scholarship offer has already been mailed, the student CANNOT be offered another college-sponsored award-even if the new choice of college is one that also sponsors Merit Scholarship awards." Obviously, this is most critical when a person is deciding between two or more schools that offer these types of college-sponsored Merit scholarships. This can be confusing and I've read the NMSC rules many times and spoken to them on the phone about this.
If you are listed as "undecided" with NM, then you can discuss your options with the schools you are considering and after you have decided which school is best for you, including comparing scholarship offers, then you can list them as your first choice with NM before the end of May and make it official.</p>
<p>hey ya-I don't think you would be ineligible for the $2,500 scholarship from NM. I think that because of timing, you could be offered the $2,500 from NM first before a school offers you a college-sponsored award or vice versa. If you are offered the $2,500 from NM it is portable and can go to any school, if you are offered the college-sponsored, it is specific to that college. If you are thinking you would be better off to possibly receive the $2,500 from NM to take to any school, you can list yourself with NM as "undecided" and then you would not get an official offer of a college-sponsored award from any college just yet. You can change your first choice from "undecided" to whatever shool AFTER you find out if you were awarded the $2,500 from NM.</p>
<p>LoPro - Thanks for the clear explanations. I have a followup question. Do you have any idea how the $2500 winners are selected? If a perfect GPA is required, for example, or major leadership positions? We're inclined to have S designate a first choice college by the March deadline if there's no realistic chance of him getting one of the portable awards.</p>
<p>Here's my question. S is an NMF and his first choice is a school that gives NMF, but I also work for a company that gives a corp scholarship. If the corp scholarship comes first, which is FAR less $$$ than the first choice NMF school, does the corp negate the college one? Will probably hear from corp before admission to first choice school.
Can somebody advise? This is what we call a good problem. Thank you.</p>
<p>rainmama-I have no idea how the $2500 winners are selected or what the criteria is. Sorry I couldn't be more helpful-see the other posts for timing of naming a first choice school and check with the school you are interested in because some of them have earlier dates (earlier than May 31)that you must name them first choice by.
Tunkertech-yes that is a good problem! Here's how I see it based on the rules of NM: The corp. would not negate the college one because at most schools that offer big NMF scholarships the award is made up of a group of awards put together. My understanding is that they would expect you to put the corp. award toward your costs at their school first and then they would give you their awards up to an amount not exceeding their maximum for tuition, room, board, books, etc. In other words, I don't think it would negate the college one, only take the place of the college-sponsored amount they would have offered. Hope that's clear-many of us, including myself find it very confusing. My best advice is to call the school that offers the big NMF money and ask them how they handle it-it has probably happened before.</p>
<p>Tunkertech,</p>
<p>We are in the same situation. Since the corporate award comes first you child would NOT be eligible for any other type of award through NM. Our corporate award is also much less than the one the school my s listed as first choice. Oh well, maybe you can work something out with the schools when you get your financial aid stuff in the mail with acceptances in April. Remember you have until May 1st to list your first choice college. You should know what financial aid you'll be receiving from your accepted school by May 1st deadline with NM</p>
<p>Please read carefully how the school offers the NMF scholarship. Many schools will clearly stated that their NMF scholarship requires you to name them the first choice school by a certain date and the scholarship will include any scholarship that you get from NM Corporation. In other words if you get $2000 from a corporation sponsor scholarship, that $2000 will because part of the school's NMF scholarship package. You do not forgo the big scholarship even you get the corp sponsored scholarship first. Just make sure you do not miss the deadline of the school.</p>
<p>On the website, it says that you must send in your "first choice college" notification letter to NM by March 1. It seems that you guys are saying that we have up until May to turn it in? It seems to make a lot more sense to actually know which colleges we have been accepted to before turning in the postcard, but I am still confused as to when the deadline is.</p>
<p>iflylikepaper-On the National Merit website it states:
"March 1 through May 31, 2008: A Finalist who has reported a sponsor colleege as first choice by March 1 will be included in the FIRST GROUP referred to that institution for scholarship consideration. Periodically NMSC will notify sponsors of the additional Finalists who have reported (by May 31)the college or university as their first choice" (see <a href="http://www.nationalmerit.org/Merit_R&I_Leaflet.pdf%5B/url%5D">http://www.nationalmerit.org/Merit_R&I_Leaflet.pdf</a>)
Make sure you check with the colleges you are interested in as they may have their own date by which they want you to list them as first choice and this date could be anytime between March 1 and May 31. Also, I'm not sure if it's been mentioned before but May 31 is a Saturday this year so you need to have your first choice received by NM by Friday May 30th as I understand it.</p>