<p>On another area of this board is says that the Dean's scholarship of 20k is the largest merit award. But isn't the National Merit Finalist award of 30k a year still in place (and I hear it was once full tuition)?</p>
<p>Also, it says that NM/NA kids will be invited to the Honor's Program. Can anyone share if this offer and the money come only after you are named finalist?</p>
<p>If so, does anyone have experience getting other aid with their EA decisions and/or getting Honor's placement before finalist results come out (i.e. do they analyze Merit kids on their record for aid and honor's or wait until they see if they make finalist?)</p>
<p>The best source for factual information is always the school’s website, not CC. </p>
<p>The full tuition Northeastern Scholars scholarship is the max merit aid award. The NMF $30,000/year award is only offered to NMF finalists who designate Northeastern as their first choice. Yes, NMF used to be full tuition. </p>
<p>Based on your application you could be named a Northeastern Scholar before becoming an NMF finalist. Scholars are guaranteed Honors, NMF’s are likely to get honors. You may be invited to honors without getting into Scholars or being an NMF. The criteria vary.</p>
<p>If you are not chosen as a Scholar or NMF, the max merit aid is the dean’s scholarship of $20,000/year. You may qualify for need based grants of course in addition to merit aid.</p>
<p>Thank you TomSr…
I did read the website. I guess I should have phrased my question as this:</p>
<p>Have any of you applied EA to NE as a NA/NM Semifinalist and received scholarships and honor’s college offer with your EA acceptances OR did neither come until you and NE had the results of you being names (or not named) Finalist?</p>
<p>Nano…I ‘think’ the website said that Finalist were automatically placed in the Honor’s program.</p>
<p>Applying EA you can be admitted to honors and receive a dean’s scholarship - just based upon the strength of your application. My daughter was not NMF (only commended) and got both honors and max dean’s scholarship notification with her EA admit.</p>
<p>Then in the spring if you get NMF you contact NE after you select it as your first choice and they will upgrade the scholarship and admit to honors if you were not already in.</p>
<p>I think they will weigh your current NM semi status with the other honors etc. in your application. Don’t assume every NM semi who applies gets admitted - each year they get more selective because they get more applications.</p>
<p>In 2012, my son was offered scholarships at EA, and then when he became a finalist in NMS he got the NM full tuition scholarship. Honors program was not offered, it was mandatory.</p>
<p>Some of my daughter’s friends who are on NMF scholarships inquired last year and were told they could quit the honors program and it would not jeopardize their scholarship. They all chose to stay in the program because they wanted to live in the WVF honors dorm this year. The requirements for staying in honors are not hard (I think you need to maintain a certain GPA), you don’t have to take honors classes - although if you do you can get an honors distinction on your degree, and the housing benefits are significant (not only better housing but better opportunities to get those rooms - as the good non-honors housing rooms go very quickly during the lottery)</p>
<p>My son is a sophomore and he enjoys Honors - both the smaller, interesting classes and the Honors housing, WVF with five of his friends. As far as Honors goes, my comment was meant to indicate that if you are a NMS finalist you shouldn’t worry about being “offered” Honors.</p>
<p>Thank you all. My parents are asking that I apply to a couple of college’s I would at least consider attending (if I were accepted), that offer some solid benefits to Finalist. That way, IF I get finalist and have named a college first choice that had benefits, it will be really worth considering come decision time.
I am trying to get a full picture of what NE gives to Finalist and how those who made the choice at least in part because of that package have been doing.
Sounds like the Honor’s program guarantee is a real plus on many levels.</p>
<p>My son is a freshman at Northeastern. He got the NMF scholarship and lives in the honors dorms. So far he loves it. He turned down Penn for Northeastern. The kids in the honors college are friendly and smart and the dorm is beautiful. Most of his classes are interesting. I think freshman fall classes at any college is a bit of a mixed bag because you have some requirements which you must get out of the way. The college does a great job of getting the honors college students involved. He teaches an eighth grade class every week for his community service project. They have a lot of mentors to make sure they always have someone to talk to if there is a problem. (maybe even too many mentors) The classes are not overwhelming but they are not a walk in the park either. Not everyone understands why he chose Northeastern, but that is not his problem. He is having a great experience and meeting kids from all over the country and the world. When he graduates or goes on co-op, the NMF full tuition scholarship will be on the resume and people will know why he chose that college. It is not the name of the college that will make the experience, it is the things you choose to be involved in, and the other kids and professors in your chosen department.</p>
<p>Malm and others, can you share what the class sizes tend to be in the honors classes and in the regular freshman classes?
Thus far on visits, I have been leaning toward small liberal arts colleges. But I am wondering if the honors program within a large school like NE can give me that same feel to some degree.</p>
<p>Also, do honor’s students tend to be a close knit group and do they do activities that integrate with the university as a whole (for instance, form an intramurals team to compete in university intramurals)?</p>
<p>Finally, I wonder if there is ANY chance of getting the 30k a year finalist scholarship (since it is no longer full tuition) and the 20K Dean’s or other award so that a larger cost of attendance could be earned. One can always hope!</p>
<p>Since the 30k vs. full tuition is new this year there is no way to know, but I would think that they would not stack merit awards (they would stack merit with financial aid though).</p>
<p>The honors community is as tight knit as you want it to be. My daughter, currently a sophomore, made a large group of friends early freshman year that she continues to be close with. The group is mostly honors but not exclusively. Honors kids generally socialize with the community as a whole although they do have some honors only activities a few times a month (book group, events with professors, social events, leadership events, etc.) </p>
<p>Although they dorm together (required freshman year and optional after that), the number of honors classes that make up your schedule will be small (mostly they only have honors sections for introductory classes and then the honors seminars) so you will spend more time with everybody else than with only honors students. (My daughter has only one honors class this year, she had 3 each semester freshman year). Even the honors degree option only requires 5-6 honors classes (out of the 8 semesters of classes - probably over 32 classes).</p>
<p>The honors sections of introductory classes will be small - 20-25 and will not require an additional recitation class - compared to the regular class size of maybe 75-100 with a separate small recitation class. Honors seminars will also be this size. However, after the introductory classes, you will be in sections of classes for your major and those will be whatever size they are. Interestingly, last year as a freshman my daughter had only small classes (the largest was maybe 30) and this year many of her classes are large (closer to 50 students). For these classes there were no choices (they are required intermediate classes for her major).</p>
<p>Most of her honors friends have activities that they pursue with the entire community ranging from pep band, to ballroom dancing, to intramural ice hockey to the cooking club etc.</p>
<p>It’s definitely not a small liberal arts college, but it did feel smaller and more personal than some of the other schools I was looking at that were large research universities (state flagships in the range of 40,000 students). I liked that it was big enough to offer a lot of really great opportunities, but it didn’t feel like I would be lost and just end up being a number.
I was correct in that. I ran into the president of the university at the end of spring semester, and he remembered who I was and asked when I was leaving for Germany! There are definitely ways to make the big community smaller at Northeastern, and Honors is just one of those ways.</p>
<p>DS is a NMSF and I called Northeastern admissions to ask if he might be able to get more than 30K. They said that some will get more than that and they could combine other scholarship funds with the one for National Merit.</p>
<p>I doubt it. They have similar requirements for all of their big scholarships. My son is a sophomore and the volunteer position that he got through CEP has been one of his most enjoyable experiences. He returned to the same organization as a sophomore, even setting up his class schedule so that he could go two days a week.</p>