<p>According to the UNC Scholarships FAQ, "If you apply by November 1, you should hear by early-January if you are being considered for a merit scholarship."</p>
<p>Well, my son (an in-state student and National Merit Semifinalist) did apply by Nov. 1. Here it is, mid-January, and we have not heard Word One as to whether he is being considered for a merit scholarship.</p>
<p>Is this a bad sign, given the FAQ excerpt above?</p>
<p>We definitely cannot afford the full COA at Chapel Hill, and we are just middle-income enough so that we do not qualify for need-based aid.</p>
<p>Sounds as if DS is up a creek. Even if he does get admitted to Chapel Hill, we won't be able to afford to send him there.</p>
<p>Waaaah.</p>
<p>Has anyone here heard yet whether he or she is being considered for merit scholarships?</p>
<p>oops, answered my own question. Went to UNC Admissions Blog, where someone else had also asked about merit-aid notifications. It seems notifications will go out within the next few weeks, after UNC has finalized first-deadline admissions. Then they will notify those who are being considered for scholarships and Honors.</p>
<p>So, the FAQ I found online is not accurate – leastwise, it does not apply to this year’s app process.</p>
<p>Thanks for posting! I’ve been reading the Carolina threads lately to see whether others have received notifications, and wondering the same thing for my D (in-state, also NM).</p>
<p>The Carolina FAQ also say:
</p>
<p>As students who applied early action will be notified “on or around January 21” according to the admissions blog, practical considerations would seem to necessitate notifying students at about the same time if the plan is for scholarship candidates to go to Scholar Day within the following 10 days.</p>
<p>Cool, BUandBC82! That’s a very impressive list. :)</p>
<p>BTW, are you in the Boston area? I’m originally from Boston, but we’ve lived in NC for 21 years now (and we love it). Still have relatives in Mass., NH, and Vermont, though.</p>
<p>Schokolade–I agree! If admissions notices go out 1/21, and Scholars Days are held in late January–well, there’s clearly not a whole lot of time between the first notification and the second!</p>
<p>I’m thinking the FAQ must be out of date (based on what BUandBC tells us :)).</p>
<p>Do keep in mind that you can still get scholarship money without being invited to Scholar’s day. I thought all hope was lost when I didn’t get the invite, but I was pleasantly surprised in March with a fat envelope.</p>
<p>Hello all,
This is Julie Tucker, an admissions counselor at Carolina. We’re very sorry for the confusion. I’m afraid you all did find an outdated FAQ, which we’ll be sure to correct right away. </p>
<p>Notification of consideration for merit scholarships is sent out within two weeks after decision notification, so our first-deadline applicants will receive notification by the end of January. </p>
<p>Students who are being considered for a merit scholarship will receive an invitation to Scholarship Day, which is an event held in late March. (In previous years, we held two Scholarship Days–one for first deadline and one for second deadline. This year we’re holding just one event in late March for all students, though first-deadline applicants will still receive their invitation in late January). At Scholarship Day, students join other students and Carolina faculty in small discussion groups. Following the event, the scholarship selection committee makes its final decisions about scholarships, and students are then notified of their merit scholarship offer.</p>
<p>The Morehead-Cain and Robertson Scholarships have their own timelines, so please visit their websites to learn more about how and when they notify their finalists. </p>
<p>I notice that 140 out of 166 recipients were in-state. Too bad - I’d like to recommend UNC to my OOS son and we’re in the same financial situation as the OP. Do any of you have a general idea of the stats that UNC merit scholarship recipients generally have?</p>
<p>gadad - I’ve never seen any average stats for merit recipients. Here’s the 2010 student stats - [First-Year</a> Full-Time Undergraduate Student Profile, Fall 2010 - Office of Institutional Research and Assessment](<a href=“http://oira.unc.edu/first-time-freshman-class-profile-fall.html]First-Year”>http://oira.unc.edu/first-time-freshman-class-profile-fall.html) . I’m sure most of the merit recipients are the top students. My son was a very good high school student, but there are classmates from his high school at UNC who had a higher GPAs and didn’t get any merit money. He did have a 34 ACT which I would guess helped him get looked at, but I believe UNC when they say they look at everything.</p>
<p>Julie, thanks for the information. Can you please post the date for the March Scholarship Day? </p>
<p>My kid already has a scholarship weekend scheduled in March, and a couple of other “Honor’s Day” type visits that month from several colleges that have already made scholarship awards. If there might be a conflict, it would be good to know. What percent of OOS invitees receive a scholarship award, and what amount, or range of scholarship amounts are offered to OOS recipients? Unfortunately, the only way this kid could become a Tar Heel would be with a merit award.</p>
<p>Thanks BU - With 724 OOS freshmen and 26 of them earning merit aid, the merit aid appears to have gone to the top 3.6% of OOS students. With 9.1% of OOS students scoring at or above 1500 on the SAT, that would suggest that had merit awards been given out solely on the basis of SAT (they weren’t, but just to use that as a rule of thumb), it would have required about a 1540 for an OOS student to make it into the top 3.6%.</p>
<p>gadad – have you looked into the Robert C. Byrd Scholarship? It doesn’t offer much – in NC, the award is just $1,500 a year – but I figure every little bit helps. And the application is super-easy to fill out – no pesky essays. I think each participating state gives out a number of these awards. The recipient can attend whatever college he/she wants, anywhere. </p>
<p>I’ve heard that one shouldn’t even bother with those scholarships advertised at fastweb.com, but I dunno. There are so many obscure scholarships that go unclaimed – some for specific states, counties, and even high schools.</p>
<p>Even with a 1580 and everything else in line with that, another of my children got no merit from UNC-CH beyond the NMS award. It was sad to let go of Chapel Hill dreams, but…maybe it will be different this time around?</p>
Went to UNC Admissions Blog, where someone else had also asked about merit-aid notifications. It seems notifications will go out within the next few weeks, after UNC has finalized first-deadline admissions. Then they will notify those who are being considered for scholarships and Honors.</p>