<p>Hey guys,</p>
<p>I'm oos interested in this full ride. On their website it lists several methods to get recommended for it however, the Problem is my school is not one of the listed high schools on the affiliated/qualified to recommend students. What should I do?? Also can someone tell me how competitive/what the stats are of the ppl awarded???</p>
<p>Thank you!</p>
<p>I’m sure you can contact them (or they have a procedure) if your high-school isn’t on the list. Speak with your guidance counselor and I’m sure they’ll figure it out.</p>
<p>The Morehead scholarship is VERYYYYY competitive. If the stats aren’t on the website, then I don’t know where you’d get them. However, I know that the Morehead winners could’ve easily gone to Ivy Leagues, and they are extremely bright and have done outstanding things.</p>
<p>I’m pretty sure they give the name of the person you’re supposed to contact on their website if your school isn’t a nominating school…</p>
<p>The Morehead-Cain is the single most competitive academic scholarship in the country. Each year over 17,000 students from North Carolina, the US, Canada and Great Britain are nominated or apply. Somewhere around 150 finalists are selected and around 70 win the award.</p>
<p>If you are OOS and do not attend a nominating school, the only way you can be nominated is via a referral from the UNC admissions office.</p>
<p>Here is what the Morehead-Cain website says:</p>
<p>[The</a> Admissions Referral Program The Morehead-Cain Scholars Program UNC Chapel Hill](<a href=“http://www.moreheadcain.org/apply/the_admissions_referral_program]The”>http://www.moreheadcain.org/apply/the_admissions_referral_program)</p>
<p>OOS candidates tend to be not only exceptional students but also exceptional individuals and, as others have said, often turn down HYPS to accept the award.</p>
<p>Yeah, the girl I know who got it this year was our valedictorian and she turned down Duke and Johns Hopkins for it (didn’t apply to any ivys). And a girl I know who was a finalist but didn’t get it got into all the ivys, Stanford, and basically all the top schools. She was only rejected by Yale and will be at Harvard this year. So yeah, it’s tough.</p>
<p>The Morehead does not really take SAT scores or other similar ‘stats’ into consideration very much, I have heard, because the majority of nominated students can be assumed to be in the top percentiles in the country solely because they have been nominated. On the application they do ask for scores (I am an oos nominee), but I feel certain that any SAT score could be overshadowed by outstanding character and ecs. No SAT score or GPA could make up for those things, though. </p>
<p>Two of three nominees from my school from the past three years have won the Morehead. The first had one of the highest GPAs, took the hardest classes, etc., and has an intelligence and passion for sociology and international social issues that I have never seen in anyone, even adults… AND she turned down Princeton for the scholarship. The other is also extremely intelligent, has the sweetest and most outgoing and loving personality, and was not only our school president but also started a very successful non-profit/ service group at our school.</p>
<p>Basically, Moreheads are smart and have impressive academic records, but their personality, passion, and promise make their grades almost inconsequential. I would say that academic success is a given in any Morehead, and most nominees, but is not going to be what determines the winners. When they say that they are looking for scholars ‘for whom learning is an appetite rather than a means to an end,’ they mean it.</p>
<p>I’ve known 6 personally. One was personable, intelligent, attractive and was eventually selected as Rhodes Scholar. Another one (similar WASPish type) partied their way through UNC effortlessly, making As/taking accolades, and ended up at a strong, but not top graduate school. Another was a burgeoning political activist having traveled extensively (arab spring countries). One is probably going to be a noble prize winner in bio-chem (probably one of the smartest people I’ve met). Of the final two, one lost the Morehead by their Junior year and the other, while intelligent and passionate about their neuroscience research, was very socially awkward. Though Moreheads on the whole are extremely driven, intelligent and passionate people, like any group, some don’t fit the mold. I can only wonder how they all convinced the interviewing committees. For some, I didn’t see the “passion” shown by their behavior at UNC.</p>
<p>if your school isn’t a nominating school, as people have said, you have to be put forward by the admissions office.</p>
<p>let’s be slightly more realistic here. the moreheads are smart and ambitious, and many of them will be turning town ivy leagues and other top schools. but they will not typically be turning down full rides to ivys and MIT.</p>
<p>so go ahead and try to get it, but bear in mind that it’s astonishingly competitive, but that people do get it.</p>
<p>if you’re not just oos but foreign, from one of the relevant countries, you might find it a bit easier.</p>