I appreciate the report – I was also wondering about this. My gut is that it’s a gimmick, and the merit awarded through this program would almost certainly be some fraction of the money the school would already award the student when he or she applied. But I could see the benefit in knowing a minimum in some cases, and in essentially exposing some of the factors that go into their merit money decisions. I’ll get my son to do it. Can they enter achievements retroactively (from a prior year of school), and how are the entered achievements validated by the schools?
All of the information that the student posts on there is confirmed by the school counselor.
My daughter has a lot of money offered to her. The highest amount is $90,000. Several schools offered her $80,000. These schools, of course, are not schools she wants to attend. They are all small LAC that we haven’t heard of. To get a $90,000 award a student has to have a very high GPA, high test scores, leadership positions, etc. those high achieving kids are most likely looking at different schools.
If a student needs to find a more affordable school, this would be a good start.
@mary879800 would you be willing to share the names of the schools that offered your daughter 80-90K? Was this all money offered through raise.me?
@mary879800 are you willing to share the names of the schools offering such big money via raise.me?
To answer my own questions, yes they can enter achievements from prior years, and there is an option for the schools to request validation from the HS counselor.
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I’m sorry to be dense but is the consensus that this would be in addition to the merit aid package a school would have offered or more likely a way to determine what that school would have offered anyway? Last year my daughter was offered the max $17000 academic scholarship number from butler and my son is considering it this year with better merit numbers. I’m curious if they would go over that max number.
I think that would depend on how much flexibility the school allows in their offers and how badly they want a student. Neither D applied to Butler so I have no idea.
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@bulldog25, this program was introduced at my kids’ HS this year by one of the GCs at the beginning of the school year. I asked him exactly your question and his response was that it was an “either/or” thing, whichever was greater. So if you run the NPC for a school and get a quote of $10,000 in merit but your raise.me amount for that school is $13,000, you’d get the $13,000. Conversely, if the merit aid you qualify for is higher than the raise.me amount, you’d get the merit aid.
Thanks klinska - I appreciate the answer!
For the person asking which schools offered her the most:
$90,000 College of Wooster
$80,000 Hartwick College, Gustavus Aldolphus College, Presbyterian College, Bloomfield College, Cornell College, Wingate University, Susquehanna University
There are around 8 schools offering in the $70,000-$76,000 range. Then more in the $60,000’s.
By comparison, here are a couple of offerings of schools my child would be interested in attending:
Michigan State $26,000 (remember this is total not per year)
Tulane $9445
This seems a little hinky to me. Raise.me has a lot of colleges profiled on their site that do not participate in the micro-scholarship program, only they do not tell you they do not participate until you sign up.
I found this on the FAQ on their web site:
That’s fine, if they disclose up front that a profiled institution does not participate.
My D’s GC had her sign up on Raise.me and give her personal information only to find the schools she is applying to, all profiled on the Raise.me site, do not participate in the program.
It looks like you have to sign up in order to even see which colleges participate. I wonder why it is so opaque. Do they make you run thru all sorts of private information during sign up before they even indicate which schools participate. I hate sites like that. They get all your info as you click and fill out then get to the end and find out it is of no use. They of course still have your data to sell and profit from.
Hmm. Came across this.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-nelson/raiseme—too-good-to-be_b_9301572.html
It does seem to synch up with the new coalition app goals. I don’t know. Too much uneven power.
Found the Huffington Post article asinine for the most part.
Basically kids should be “exploring” instead of concerning themselves with finances. Wish we DID live in a world like that! Too good to be true or misleading on the awards? Why? If awards were never given, I could see the skepticism, but there is no evidence of that.
Biggest problem I have w/ raise.me is it seems geared for upper income/privileged students. Nice awards for AP classes: our HS offers very few, and they are often scheduled at the same time, so DD loses a LOT of potential awards there.
Also, EC’s need to be at be 2-3 hours per week. Other than sports, there are very few EC’s even at her school, and most only meet for an hour a week, if that. So she loses there as well.
I am thinking she probably won’t come out any better than what the schools would have given her anyway. That was probably the best point made in the Huffington article.
We will continue entering data, just to see the final numbers. Curiosity at this point more so than any real expectations of significant scholarships, which is what she needs.
Could this program increase my chances of a denial? I’m worried that I might be denied.
It shouldn’t have any bearing on admission at all, and if it does, it should be in a positive way as it will count as displaying interest.
I agree that schools shouldn’t hold the award against you. The school agreed to the program to encourage students to be involved in high school activities and get good grades. It seems that the schools participating often give even more in merit than the students involved in this program get, but this program might be a way for lower stats students to get the merit awards for EC participation, service hours, less traditional classes.
My daughter is in her first year of university. She received a merit scholarship that covered most of her classes. Raise me covered the rest PLUS books, lab fees, etc. Just have to find schools that accept it.
Second daughter not going to school that has raise me available. 
@2collegeboundkid So for your older daughter, the Raise.me award stacked with the merit scholarship?