<p>From what I remember, many colleges change/reduce/improve their scholarships over the summer, therefore learning NMSF status in the spring of junior year might not tell you what you need if the schools change their scholarships during the summer before your child’s senior year.</p>
<p>AzSt is a school that greatly reduced it’s NMF scholarship. And either this year or a preveious year, UT-Austin eliminated their NM scholarship.</p>
<p>BTW…Vandy only gives $5k for NMF, which is reduced to $2k if you get another Vandy scholarship. Case’s NMF scholarships are only $500-2000.</p>
<p>The BIG NMF scholarships are usually from mid-tier schools.</p>
<p>At this point, if merit money is desired, your child’s SAT and ACT scores will likely lead you to some big merit schools. Some of them might also give big NM awards, so you can “kill two birds with one stone.” :)</p>
<p>they can be pro-active and contact the admissions offices and honors departments of colleges of interest. provide the student’s psat score, act or sat scores, and also mention if they’ve been named a nm commended or nmsf. in the same correspondence, ask about merit aid and scholarship opportunities for nm commended, nmsf’s, and nmf’s. some of these schools have an early application admissions deadline and you must be an admitted student in order to receive their merit aid/scholarship offers. be sure apply for any additional scholarships that may be “stacked” on top of any nm money awarded.</p>
<p>Our first was a NM Scholar, and came away with >$600K total in merit–not need-based-- scholarships from 8 schools (including 3 top 20 Universities and one full tuition from a top LAC). I know the PSAT triggered letters because the letters usually started by congratulating kid on outstanding performance on PSAT, then went on to describe all of the college’s merit scholarships in addition to the college’s NM scholarship, which did tend to be much less by comparison. It was as if the NM scholarship was teaser money to get kids to apply. We weren’t sure whether these larger scholarships were indeed within reach (other than those from colleges with guaranteed scholarships to NMSF/F), but several colleges did deliver their biggest awards. Oddly, some equally accomplished kids from the HS (but with lower PSAT scores) did not experience the same level of recruitment. Because of distance, without these teaser letters or outright promises, my kid would not have visited or applied to some of these schools. In fact because of the letters, the kid did apply and in fact now attends one of them (turned down some Ivies). </p>
<p>What I am now wondering is what kind of money might be out there for kid#2. But if colleges don’t determine their scholarship money until the summer, then I guess the pressure will still be on senior year…</p>
<p>*What I am now wondering is what kind of money might be out there for kid#2. But if colleges don’t determine their scholarship money until the summer, then I guess the pressure will still be on senior year… *</p>
<p>You are in the same position that we were in. DS1 was NM and received similar amounts of merit offers from various schools. DS2 just missed the previous year’s cutoff, so we suspected that he wouldn’t make NMSF, and he didn’t.</p>
<p>So, we concentrated on merit scholarships that didn’t require NM status for DS2. He had an ACT 33 and a 4.5 GPA, so we knew that he’d qualify for some good money. He ended up getting several good offers. He accepted two scholarships from the same school - one was for full tuition and the other was for an extra $2500 per year (which pays for most of his meal plan). So, for him, we only have to pay for his housing and books. (He also received a $2k per year scholarship from my H’s company, which pays for the rest of his meal plan, course fees, and misc.)</p>
<p>We’ve found that the schools that give the best NM scholarships often also give the best regular merit scholarships (altho that’s not always the case, but it’s a place to start looking.) We also looked at schools that gave assured scholarships for his stats (no competition). BTW…many of those schools have Dec 1 deadlines (or earlier), so be aware of that! Many kids now are looking for scholarships and have missed the deadlines. :(</p>
<p>If your DS2 has not yet taken SAT/ACT tests, then he needs to do so. He needs to take both. Many kids score higher on one test than the other, so that can make a huge difference scholarship-wise. There are many kids on this forum that wouldn’t have qualified for big merit scholarships based on the SAT, but did qualify using their ACT (and vice versa). </p>
<p>I don’t know of any top 20s that are still giving full tuition merit scholarships to NMFs anymore. I think USC is one of the highest ranking to give big NM scholarships, and theirs is a 1/2 tuition scholarship.</p>
<p>Is there a list anywhere of schools that are generous to NMSFs? </p>
<p>I know the usual way to go about this would be to look at schools the student is interested in, and then see if they offer good aid for NM, but my son is still at the “very little clue where he wants to go” stage, and maybe checking out such a list would help him find some interesting possibilities.</p>