Thank you @“aunt bea” I did not realize that Presidential has a need component. Half tuition will work for us since DD will just commute.
“but was only offered half tuition as a (URM NM winner).
Our guess was that they had FAFSA info and there was probably someone with less resources that was given the Presidential”.
You are mixing up the amount of tuition$ in various scholarships that USC offers…
BOTH NMF scholarships AND the Presidential Scholarships are 1/2 Tuition.
The Trustee scholarship is a full tuition scholarship, is allocated among the various colleges and who it is offered to is determined by the interview . It is extremely difficult to win - as competitive as Stanford admissions is- and has nothing to do with who recieves NMF scholarships awards.
There is NO need element in determining who is awarded the NMF 1/2 tuition award. The only prerequisites are the acceptance of the student by USC and the students notification in early May that USC is their first choice.
NO one is offered BOTH NMF and Presidential or Trustee scholarships- i.e USC doers not stack Scholarships
@SOSConcern “I saw you mentioned varsity golf. How good is she?”
She is an average golf player. Not sure if she is good enough to get a scholarship for golf. In addition, she doesn’t want to play golf for a college team.
“What does your DD want to study, and what state are you from?”
We are from Colorado. Undecided now, but she loves writing and enjoys biology. So, she might major in biology (premed) and minor in creative writing/screenplay writing (USC has this program).
Thanks for the information regarding UA. We will definitely check it out.
@auntbea Our COA based on the NPC is almost $40K too. As @menloparkmom mentioned, USC does not stack scholarships, so a student with the same financial situation but not a NMF will end up getting the same amount of scholarship as DD. That is half a tuition which is about $23K.
If a student wants to name USC as first choice soon, and then change it later if necessary, then fine.
@lonetreegrad <<< We are from Colorado. Undecided now, but she loves writing and enjoys biology. So, she might major in biology (premed) and minor in creative writing/screenplay writing (USC has this program).>>>
No OOS student should choose a Calif school for premed.
@mom2collegekids Why not? I know CA public schools are too expensive for OOS students, but USC is not one of them. She will definitely NOT go to USC for $40K/year (based on NPC). She will be applying for the Trustee scholarship. If she gets it, then she only needs to pay for room, board, and misc expenses. That would be less than COA in Colorado. As I mentioned earlier, she would like to go to USC because of their screenplay writing program (a minor).
@lonetreegrad >>> why not >>>
It has NOTHING to do with cost.
The problem with being premed in Calif is that the state already has way toooooo many students applying to med school. Being OOS and premed in Calif is just a big negative. There’s almost no benefit to being OOS and premed in Calif. You might as well throw yourself into a lion’s den.
The weeding will be intense. The gunners will be intense. It will be harder to “stand out” to get the great LORs, internships, and research positions when you’re one of a million premeds (ok, there won’t be a million premeds, but you get the drift).
As for the screenplay minor…see if anyone else has that in another state. If your DD is serious about med school, then the screenplay writing seems more like a hobby. I’m also not sure if she realizes how much TIME it takes to be premed.
Then…after all of the intense weeding that goes on in Calif undergrads, 6000 emerge as med school applicants (there are only 50,000 applicants in the entire country, yet 12% are from ONE STATE!) And less than half of those 6,000 Calif applicants actually get admitted to at least one MD med school.
It is safe to say that there will be over 24,000 freshman premed in Calif in the fall, yet “only” 6,000 will remain premed when it comes time to apply to med school. And, of that 6,000, less than half will get one acceptance.
You may say, “but Calif is the most populated state, so 6,000 applicants sounds ok.” Texas is #2 in population, yet it has about 3,700 applicants. And more to the point, there are only about 1100 MS1 seats in Calif med schools. Texas has about 1600 MS1 seats.
The med school app process is one that takes about 18-24 months…from MCAT prep/exams to applying to doing secondaries, to (hopefully) interviewing, to (hopefully) getting accepted/acceptances, to “second looks,” to deciding.
It is an expensive and very time-consuming process.
NO ONE WANTS TO HAVE TO DO THIS TWICE.
@auntbea may want to chime in…
mom2collegekids
Calif has 12 % of the US population so it should not be surprising that 12% of med school applicants come from Calif. students.
Overall, the % of applicants in the US who actually matriculate in Med school somewhere in the US is % 40, so there is no disadvantage to applying to med school from a Calif school over any other state.
And overall, the % of students who enroll instate for med school is only 40%.
Most med students go to med school in a different state other than the one where they attended UG school. Being OOS is not a factor for 60% of med school acceptances.
https://www.aamc.org/data/facts/
so I’m not understanding your recommendation NOT to go to UG college in Calif. for students who want to eventually go to Med school, as long as they understand that being instate is not necessarily an advantage or tip for med school applicants. Especially for the OP, who has stated that her DD will go to USC ONLY if she wins a full tuition scholarship there. Those kind of cost savings DO matter if Med school is a possibility
What you’re not considering is that most med schools in the US do have an instate bias. So, if you’re from a state that has a lot of med school applicants, and that state does not have a proportionate number of med school seats, those students are going to be at a disadvantage. And the competition to have the stats to get one of those instate seats, particularly the much cheaper public ones, is going to be intense.
Calif may have 12% of the population, but it does not have 12% of the med school seats. There are about 20,340 MS1 seats. Calif has about 1,100 MS1 seats (including the Calif private SOMs). It only has 5.4% of the MS1 seats. That makes Calif undesirable. If it only had 10% of the seats, the situation wouldn’t be so bad. But with only 5.4% of the seats, it is an issue. BTW…UCR’s students were included.
Michigan had 1900 applicants and the state has about 900 MS1 seats.
California had 6000 applicants and the state has about 1100 MS1 seats.
Alabama had 450 applicants and the state has about 250 MS1 seats.
I could go on…
And you don’t see an issue with California?
Why do you think that being OOS is not a factor for 60% of the acceptances? Are you thinking that 60% of MS1 seats are in private SOMs? I doubt that’s true. And Baylor SOM may be private, but it gets money from Texas to bias towards Tx residents. Public univs typically have either a strong instate bias or a bias to include a few states that don’t have a med school - and those states pay for that privilege. That said, even if OOS isn’t a factor in 60% of the acceptances, in the med school acceptance game, any negatives should be avoided.
The fact that attending an instate public SOM typically means a LOT less med school debt. My son’s first med school acceptance was to a private SOM. We breathed a sigh of relief, but dreaded the cost. But when his second acceptance was to an instate public, the private “lost him,” even after throwing in some merit to soften the blow. When his third acceptance came from our top instate med school, we knew where he’d be going. Why would he choose an $80k+ per year private SOM over a $45k per year public?
@mom2collegekids Thank you so much for responding to my question. I would definitely read through your posts with my DD. Just trying to find a good UG college is hard enough. I didn’t realize that we have to consider now what happens after graduating, but I guess these are the things we have to think about! Anyway, I appreciate all your help.
The OP’s D lives in Colorado, which has ONE medical school.
So she is VERY likely to be OOS for ANY medical school in the country. RIGHT?
If she is accepted at USC AND establishes residency there, which she can do after a few years, she will have many more medical schools in Calif. to apply to than ONE.
^ ? People do not go to medical school during undergraduate education. Is there only one school in Colorado that offers pre-med courses?
Albert – please read previous discussion. The OPs daughter is from Colorado. There is only one medical school in Colorado. Mom2college kids is saying that she should not come to California for undergraduate education because she will be at a disadvantage as an OOS student
When applying to medical schools here in California.
Given that rationale,she’s going to be at a disadvantage As an OOS student if she applies to ANY public medical school in ANY other state besides Colorado .
I’m disputing her assumption given that there are 13 medical schools in California AND she can become a California resident if she chooses to, after living here for a couple of years.
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AND she can become a California resident if she chooses to, after living here for a couple of years.
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How is she supposed to become a Calif resident? Do you mean AFTER she graduates from undergrad, she should work in Calif for a year or two and establish residency, and THEN apply to med school? And, of course, she’d be giving up her Colo residency.
If the OP’s DD is fine with not going to med school for a few years after graduating, then maybe she could become a resident. However, it’s probably more likely that she’s going to be applying to med school between junior and senior year, the traditional time, and she would not be a Calif resident then.
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she will have many more medical schools in Calif. to apply to than ONE.
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Who said that she should only apply to one med school. She wouldn’t be OOS for any of the privates.
Of course she wouldn’t be out of state for privates but you were the one who was implying that coming to Calif for her undergraduate education would be a huge Financial mistake as she would be OOS for any Calif public med schools .
And as I pointed out there is only one medical school( in her home state of Colorado )where she would NOT be considered out of state.
In every other state she would be considered OOS by public med schools .
So the likelihood is that she would be a full pay for med school no matter where she goes.
That is why I feel your advise that she not come to California for her undergraduate education , even if she were to receive a full tuition scholarship at USC, because she will be out-of-state here, does not take into account the fact that there is only ONE medical school in the U.S. where she will not be considered OOS.
I think you’re misunderstanding my points.
Anyway, as noted, for her to become a CA resident for tuition purposes, she wouldn’t be able to transition from undergrad to med school. She’d have to sit-out for probably two years.
And, this may all be for naught. The OP says that her DD has to get the full tuition award from USC to be viable. Not sure if an unhooked student with a 2290 would get that…may depend on what her M+CR is and other attributes.
I don’t know how USC handles its awards when someone already qualifies for NMF. USC may want to “spread the wealth” by limiting the full tuition awards to mostly those who didn’t get the NMF award…or maybe not. Depends on their agenda and funds. I think that there are only 100 Trustee Awards.
So, I’m still a little bit confused about the timing of identifying your first-choice school on the NMSC app. You will have already been accepted by one or more schools by May 1. If you only ‘qualify’ for a scholarship based on NMF status…then you still don’t know your COA at any of the schools at the time you are accepted. What do you do in the event you have 2 or more schools in the running, both with possible NMF-related scholarships, and minus the scholarship one or more of them would be too expensive?
"both with possible NMF-related scholarships’???
Colleges state long in advance how much they give for NMF scholarships.There is no mystery.
you will have received your college FA packages [ if applicable] in early April.
Do the math in April. Figure out where you can afford to go.
Then let NMSC, and the colleges know your of decision by May 1.
.
Any NMF scholarship $ will be deducted by the pursors office from the tuition charge just before the school year starts.
@menloparkmom: So, apparently I am misunderstanding the use of the term ‘qualify’ in the phrase: “To qualify for either of these [NMF Scholarships], applicants must list X School as their first-choice college by the National Merit Scholarship Corporation deadline.” They really mean in order to “receive” these…??? Qualify, to me, doesn’t mean “absolutely receive”. But I guess that’s what’s meant here. If that’s the case then this makes perfect sense.
“But I guess that’s what’s meant here”
CORRECT!