Definitely won’t be a semi finalist here. But maybe commended with a 208. She will probably retake the SAT to try for a higher math score for scholarships.
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I actually had my daughter skip the PSAT this year. We’re in CA so the state schools are SAT blind and she won’t be applying OOS. She gets anxious with large standardized tests and would be unlikely to qualify for NMS. What I didn’t realize was that if she didn’t sign up for the PSAT, her school would automatically sign her up for the ASVAB! She’s not enlisting in the military and making her take a different standardized test kind of negated the attempt to avoid a standardized test. So I wound up just calling her out sick that day since standardized tests of one sort or another were all any of the students did that day in school.
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Never heard of ASVAB. Surprising they auto enrolled. Yeah if the plan is to stay in California schools and Standardized testing is stressful for the kid then makes sense to not take one.
I wonder because of this if number of people taking the test in CA are going down compared to previous years.
Wow - his English must have been fantastic! My son had a 1460 and 218 index. Math higher than English…
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Yes, his English was almost perfect, i forgot the exact breakdown
Congrats to him. A 222 is absolutely incredible. Too bad you are in one of the few states where he might miss the cutoff. I’m hoping for some pandemic learning loss as well. Currently, he misses NMSF by one point (218 vs Illinois cutoff of 219). Ugh.
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It is really crazy right! Hoping for the best but it will be what it will be!
That thread is very old and USC’s dates have changed. USC started their EA application deadline of November 1 this year. Applicants applying for any merit scholarship need to apply by that deadline. Note that students applying with a portfolio/audition have until Dec. 1.
If a student is accepted to USC and they are NMF, they are guaranteed at least a half tuition Presidential Scholarship. The deadline for a student to notify NMSC that USC is their first choice is May 31. See USC Scholarships
Regarding USC’s new EA policy, some schools with SCEA (ex. Stanford) have verbiage stating that students are allowed to apply EA to another school if they need to do so in order to qualify for a scholarship. Make sure you read the small print of any school’s application to verify before applying.
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Yeah PSAT English is important. My Son has 1440 and a 213 index as his Math was almost perfect but lower of English.
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Just got home. English was 750, math 720 so that is how he got to 222
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Since many students are receiving their scores, I’ll share this here as well.
This year, University of Tulsa added a new National Merit Semi Finalist scholarship. Semi-Finalist meaning that a student wouldn’t need to be a National Merit Finalist in order to receive the scholarship.
- Full tuition (excluding summers) until an undergraduate degree is earned. Students must maintain a minimum of 15 hours of coursework per semester.
- Basic Room and Board (upgrades to the basic plans are available at your expense)
- Standard Student Fees
- Textbooks (all incoming students receive free textbooks for the entirety of their undergraduate years)
- Secured spot in the Leadership TU class led by President Brad Carson
- Guaranteed acceptance into TU’s Honors Program
- A minimum $750 scholarship for National Merit Finalists from the National Merit organization. Renewability is based on the type of National Merit funding received.
- $6,000 monetary gift per year (funded by the Oklahoma Regents or the TU Board of Trustees)
https://utulsa.edu/financial-aid/scholarships/nmsf/
Edit (12/16/22): The president of TU posted in the 2023 NM thread.
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Thanks for the info - such an amazing package! I need my son to look beyond the expensive highly rejective colleges and consider applying to places where he won’t need to walk away with a considerable amount of debt.
I am really surprised with how few kids scored in the 1400+ range compared to other years. My son will be a semifinalist so we are looking at schools that give out NMF scholarships.
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Well D24 scored a 1430, with a selection index of 211. That will certainly be Commended but not NMSF in our state. S22 is NMF. It was a long shot for us to have two in the family (well…I am a NMF, so three I guess). Still, she did excellent. As we explained to her, being an NMF is a blessing and a curse. It’s a blessing because of the scholarships that are available, but is a curse in that it is hard to walk away from them if you are debt averse. S22 is debt averse. He is at Bama and succeeding. D24 now, ironically, has more options. Had she made NMF, it would have been hard to walk away from that stack of cash offered by Bama.
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My S is not competitive and has no idea how other kids do in general, but yesterday it seems that everyone was talking and there are two kids in our school who score above 1500 and one who got the same as him. Our school of 300/class has about 3 nmfs a year so looks like things here in NJ are about the same. (there are between 20-50 who get commended)
D got 1460. 750 English and 710 Math. Based on the index, she scored 221.
Starting to narrow down college visits. She’ll apply to 1 guaranteed safety - Indiana Kelley Business School (auto admit) and then all reaches.
Texas
Rice
Amherst
Michigan
U F
Georgetown (maybe)
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S has just got his scores. Selection index of 219…which is great, but probably a couple points short for MA. 
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I dont think the PSAT is that relevant, even for NMF. My D made the cutoff for our state but it’s just 1 item among many that colleges will look at (some may not even care about NMF).
It seemed to be a much bigger deal years ago (that’s my perception). Im more worried she’ll drive into a curb than her PSAT/SAT scores.
They should make giant rubber bumpers for 16 year old drivers.
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D24 said that yesterday, everybody in her grade was talking about their PSAT scores. The rumor running around was that in order to qualify as a NMSF, you needed a 1450 on the PSAT.
Well, D24 got an 1190, NMSC selection index of 181, so she’s not in the National Merit bucket, but we didn’t expect she would be.
It’s not the end of the world.
Literally thousands and thousands of students are able to be successful at college despite not getting high standardized test scores. There are ~3000 4-year colleges & universities in the US. The odds are pretty good that there’s at least ONE of those that will be a good fit for ANY type of student out there.
To everyone who’s kid qualified for National Merit yesterday - congratulations! That’s awesome!
To everyone who’s kid did not qualify - it’s going to be just fine. Don’t sweat it. 
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I totally agree! For us, there were two reasons it would’ve been nice.
(1) S24 is homeschooled, and every outside confirmation that he has actually learned the things I say he has learned, and that he has the capability of succeeding in college that I say he has, is beneficial.
(2) We could really use the tuition benefits a NMF designation could provide. I have one child graduating this year (S23) and another next year (S24). We make too much to qualify for most financial aid (FAFSA EFC this year was over $70K 
) but there’s no way we can afford that, and definitely not that times two. But, my kids are also very much homebodies and really don’t want to go to school very far away, and we live in New England where there seems to be a lot of competition even for the “down market“ schools, so not a lot of merit aid available generally.
Anyway, I am proud of the work he has done, and he feels good about his results too so that’s great. NMF isn’t going to happen and that is okay. He will have good options, it might just be a little more challenging for us to figure out what the affordable ones are for him.
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S24 did well on the math, not on the writing section. I told him that you tried and need to move on.
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