Presidential Scholarship Competition ?

My son received full tuition presidential scholarship from Mercer as a rwsult of interview in december 1st week, and recently interviewed for scp premed.

My daughter was invited to interview for the Mercer Presidential scholarship in December. There is a lot of good information in this thread, but what I would really like to know is the stats for those that actually received the scholarship? My daughter has a 3.7 GPA, with 10 AP and 15 rigor classes. She has a 32 ACT with a 33 Superscore ACT. I am just wondering what her chances are - she considers Mercer her top choice currently.

Do you recall any of the interview questions? thanks for the help.

Do you recall any other interview questions? would appreciate any help

Hello, I attended the 2017 Mercer Presidential Scholar’s weekend. First off, I want to begin saying there were certainly not 400-500 STUDENTS. If, anything there were 400-500 people there including parents, siblings, and friends of students and whatnot. There were approximately 250-300 students there, although I still find it hard to believe this is still the top 10% of the applicants for one year, considering Mercer’s entire undergrad enrollment is 4,700. Mercer invests largely into this program, a nice dinner before the president’s day, a stylish, black, leather folder, and a breakfast for all who attended. Overall, the entire weekend is more of a sales pitch though. My stats were not particularly strong with only a 30 on the ACT and a 3.548 unweighted GPA with 7 AP’s, but my resume was quite hefty, being the captain of the varsity soccer team for two years, captain of the archery team for four years, being a Paralympic soccer player, president of several clubs, a decent amount of service hours (about 120 hours for all four years), and more. Also, my interview went over about 20 minutes more than it was supposed to -I figured this would be a positive thing, but most interviews already go over their allotted times- and I figured I did well. There was a large emphasis on speaking about what you were passionate for, and I can speak well on many things I am passionate about. All of that being said, I was only rewarded with the Adiel Sherwood scholarship, a $4,000 raise on my merit money. I say all of this to show that much of this weekend is a very nice, well-invested weekend, but merely a sales pitch to try to get you to go to their school. I recommend, if you want a good sum of money, work on your statistics (i.e. raising or ACT/SAT, raising your GPA). Also, I was invited to apply for the Stamps Scholarship, and went to some panel type thing and they say the top 6% of applicants are invited to that. Also, they interview for that on the interview day along with everyone else, not some separate day. I am not sure if you know if you’re being interviewed as a Stamps scholar or not. I do know that if you’re interviewing on Saturday at 1:00, then a Stamps Scholar might also be interviewing on Saturday at 1:00. I had come from Kentucky, so going to dinner on Friday was necessary for me to make it on Saturday, if you live within 3 hours though, I suggest not coming. It holds no bearing on the money you receive or the interest you show. All in all, Mercer did a great job with the weekend, it was nice to see the town on a pretty day, and the campus is beautiful. The school care about their prospective students and do their best to make them come their school. Everyone was very hospitable and never hesitated to answer a question as honestly as they could. It just isn’t a special, honorable day for the top students in the class.

c_alvey04-- Congratulations on the Adiel Sherwood scholarship— how did you find out about it? My daughter attended the weekend as well, but has not heard back yet. Also, it is my understanding that the Stamps interviews will be on Skype some time in January or February, but not everyone will be chosen to interview. Frankly, with about 200 people invited to apply to Stamps, and only five awards, Stamps is a long shot for anyone. However, we are hoping to up my daughter’s merit offer by attending the weekend.

I was not surprised by the number of students at the event-- Mercer says that the top 10% of applicants (not actual enrollees) are invited to attend. Most students I know – especially those interested in private universities-- applied to at least five or ten universities (my daughter applied to four privates, three publics), so Mercer undoubtedly gets thousands of applications every year. Mercer must know then that most kids who apply to Mercer will not attend, so they strenuously recruit all of their top applicants, and they do a very good job of it. My daughter went from lukewarm to pretty enthusiastic about the school after the weekend.

My daughter attended the competition this month. She interviewed at 1:00. It was confusing but she must have been interviewing for STAMPS because she received a separate invite to the STAMPS presentation in her leather portfolio. Not everyone received that, only those who were being considered. @c_alvey04 - thank
you for sharing. Congratulations on receiving additional scholarship money! Did you receive a box from FedEx with your offer? What day did you find out? Did you also receive a phone call? We haven’t heard anything yet and the waiting is stressful!

Hi @msmallwood,
My daughter got a phone call this afternoon with a full tuition offer. She is over the moon delighted (as am I). Her interview was not at 1:00, but she did get the separate invite for Stamps. She has not received anything in the mail or from Fed Ex yet, but the admissions counselor said that she will get something in the mail soon.

Hello c_alvey04. Did you get presedential scholarship worth 20k ?

That’s just a regular merit scholarship and 20k is the max you can get for a merit scholarship from Mercer. @achal

Has anyone heard anything from tne 2018 scholars day yet?

Hopefully someone will post here. It looks like last year kids got calls on Tuesday 12/19, so that would be today this year.

Nothing as of 5pm today (no call or fedex like in previous years). We did get a card yesterday with the Presidential Scholars logo and a printed inside and signatures from the two interviewers. Still hoping and waiting here!

My daughter interviewed for stamps and presidential and nothing so far. 4.0 and 34 ACT so hoping for something.

Saw another year where it wa received on 12/22.

Similar stats, also interviewed for stamps. No call or box here either.

Am going to think positive then that they are just not out yet. We would be thrilled with presidential.

Our box arrived today. We did not receive a phone call prior to its arrival.

Awesome! Hope you got a great offer!

Yes, good luck!