My son (Illinois) applied on time by Nov 1st deadline to U Pitt. Never heard still as of date from U Pitt except he was told they never received his transcript which was sent by his School in October beginning. He called them on 11/27/2018 and they told him they were some issues with the system and they told him to send an unofficial copy which he sent on the same day as well. Now still no response and he talked to them again on 12/12/18 and they said his application is complete and he will hear from them in January.
His stats are ACT 36/GPA - 4.63 (3.95 unweighted); 13 AP courses; Lot of community service; Shadowing, etc.
I am getting worried? He applied for Biomed Engg at U Pitt.
Anyone in the same situation as above?
I’m curious to learn what posters did to demonstrate interest as well as stats. According to hailtopitt1787’s post #113, this is taken into consideration for merit aid, if i’m reading the thread correctly.
@HCopter , campus visit and applying early are considered demonstration of interest.
@HCopter as I understand it, you are correct that demonstrated interest is considered for merit. We visited during April of junior year and S applied quite early (though not on the first day the app opened or anything). He also put a lot of thought and effort into the application questions. And he used the SRAR to avoid issues with waiting for official transcript to arrive. 36 ACT, #1 in his class of approx 250 students, offered $25K as an OOS student admitted to School of Computing and Information. (I don’t know if the school applied to impacts the scholarship decision.)
@WGSK88 I wouldn’t worry. I assume they get a glut of applications just before the November 1 deadline, and thus those decisions take longer to get out. You son will be admitted and will most likely be offered a scholarship as long as he answered the SAQs thoughtfully.
S was not able to visit so the only way he demonstrated interest was to apply in early October. I do think his essays were pretty good. He got $25K.
Has anyone received merit aid with ACT scores between 30-33? No word yet for S and his acceptance was end of October into Dietrich. S has all honors and AP classes, Top 10% of class. D had similar stats a few years ago and got $15/yr. She attends Pitt. He didn’t do formal visit because he has been on campus several times.
@mollytd Based on what I am seeing this year (fierce competition and Pitt’s dropping in scholarship offerings), I am afraid he would have a very slim chance. However, there might be other factors that we are not aware of, so he can still hope for it. Their web site does say ‘Minimum SAT score of 1480 or ACT composite score of 33, Top 5% class rank’
https://oafa.pitt.edu/financialaid/academic-scholarships/university-scholarships/
My daughter got a letter today with a small merit award - $5000/year. We are instate. This was unexpected but great to get today (when she also got a “no” from her ED application 
).
My daughter had looked at only smaller schools up until last month, and just decided to apply to Pitt last week (in state) - she got her app done in time for the 12/15 scholarship deadline. She hasn’t heard back from admissions yet but did get a letter today inviting her to apply to the honors college. I thought November 1 was a hard deadline… Anyone out there with experience in applying late to the honors college?
The only way this will work, even in-state, is if she gets some sort of aid/scholarship. She has a 34 ACT, about a 3.8 unweighted, tons of ECs, great recommendations, etc - just like most of the kids in this post, lol. She wants to study bio and French and is interested a DPT program, eventually.
@jjplus3 since they offered her to apply I would think that she’s still able to - @hailtopitt1787 has been fantastic at answering a lot of our questions so hopefully they will answer yours as well. You could call the admissions office too.
As for merit aid, my daughter had slightly higher stats than yours (35 ACT and weighted 4.27 - they don’t tell us unweighted by I would guess that it would be around 3.95) and she received a $10k scholarship from Pitt, which is less than what she received from Temple. Many people on this board have stated that Pitt used to have a cost comparison process whereby you could submit your merit information for other schools to see if Pitt could offer any additional $ but @hailtopitt1787 has confirmed that Pitt is no longer doing this as of this year. Many people have also stated that it seems that both the in-state and OOS scholarships seem lower this year than in previous years for similar stats, so perhaps the pool of applicants is more competitive this year.
As for need-based aid I’ve heard that the net price calculator is fairly accurate for predicting what Pitt will provide, so you might want to give that a try.
Good luck!
Hello @jjplus3,
She can definitely still complete the application. January 15th is the Pitt Honors Regular Consideration Deadline. November 1st was the Priority Deadline. I would encourage her to apply!
Please note that candidates will be informed of their Pitt Honors admission decision on or before March 1.
Good luck to your daughter!
-Pitt Admissions Staffer
A great incentive, to lock in the most talented students, would be to increase opportunities for merit aid and honors college for those students accepting their offer of admission before the may deadline. Pitt accepts too many students that use rolling admission as a safety mechanism. This in turn thins out merit scholarship money and takes up honors college slots. Kids with high stats that love Pitt and plan to attend have smaller opportunities. My son has a 1430 sat and just misses honors college consideration. In my mind if he were to accept now more consideration should be placed on his application because of his ultimate commitment to Pitt. Might be something to consider for next year.
My DD got mail today from Pitt’s FinAid that has no scholarship info but basically says to please consider value and quality of the school when comparing costs.
Should I interpret this letter as “she is not getting any merit aid”?
@justaparent I’m an old timer so take it with a grain of salt (i.e. things change yearly) but Pitt merit traditionally does not show up in the portal until very late. I don’t even remember seeing it until we started paying for tuition actually. If your student is competitive for merit (check their website for more details regarding the average stats of the students who are awarded merit) then I wouldn’t give up yet.
@hailtopitt1787 is there any sort of housing consideration based on how early you get in your deposit for accepted students?
@hailtopitt1787 If an accepted student has not heard about merit after 6 weeks from acceptance date does that mean that they should not expect to get any merit money as they make their decison on where to attend?
Hello @berk2023
Merit scholarships will be awarded up until March 1 so there is definitely still time left to receive an award! Good luck.
-Pitt Admissions Staffer
@berk2023 and to answer your first question, no there is no priority housing for students who pay their deposit early because of guidelines in place.
@hailtopitt1787 I received my acceptance to Pitt probably over a month ago now, and definitely applied before the November 1st priority deadline. I still haven’t heard a thing about the Honors College or merit aid. When should I expect to receive notifications ablut these things?
@sophoanne pitt has changed the Honors College admissions process this year. Originally they were communicating on this board that the decisions would all be sent at once by mid December. They received so many applications though that they had to delay it. They have said that the notifications will go out via snail mail and will be sent by Jan 12th.
They’ve also told people that merit scholarships will be sent through March. They are also sent in regular mail.
Good luck!