<p>mini: Yes, exactly.</p>
<p>Carnegie Mellon offers very little merit aid, and only to a few students ( I am told).</p>
<p>Vassar offers no merit, but can offer substantial fin aid and is willing to work with special circumstances.</p>
<p>UCs offer nothing after the creme de la creme get the regent's & chancellors $....so great merit aid for a very few and nothing for the rest. There are alumni $$ at some of the UCs, too.</p>
<p>curmudgeon, re: Skidmore - I didn't exactly forget about those, but those are very scarce and I have to say at their information session they are VERY clear to say that they offer NO merit awards, just need-based aid.</p>
<p>"however, there are schools (like Bryn Mawr, for instance) that swear up and down they do not offer merit-based aid, yet this is exactly what my daughter received, and the letter clearly stated this. $8K renewable for 4 years, which was generous"</p>
<p>Did you apply for financila aid, and was this part of a financial aid package? If my child applied to Bryn Mawr and did not submit a financial aid request, might Bryn Mawr give her a non need-based scholarship?</p>
<p>To me merit means no financial aid application required--no tie in to financial aid at all. Compare that to financial aid that includes grants rather than loans....</p>
<p>Wow, Jack, that's very interesting! Are you saying that Bryn Mawr offered your D the eight grand per year Trustee Scholarship ABOVE your calculated EFC? If so, that would definitely qualify as pure merit. I understand that some schools offer merit awards that are also strictly tied to need (need as defined by the FAFSA calculated EFC). But as Mini has pointed out, there seems to be a lot of prevaricating involved when it comes to defining "need".</p>
<p>This is not as easy of a subject to address, as schools that do not offer only merit aid, often give merit with need awards. Even Harvard offers some of those. Basically, you can get more than your need entitles you to getting. The most striking example I have seen is at Colgate and Bucknell where I have seen seen a number of "overages" given. But you do have to qualify for some aid to get the merit awards so both Bucknell and Colgate would be on the no merit aid list.</p>
<p>"I understand that some schools offer merit awards that are also strictly tied to need (need as defined by the FAFSA calculated EFC)."</p>
<p>So what do you call a "no-merit-aid" school that, in addition, to a "needs-based" award gives (upon first-year admissions) three years all-expenses-paid to graduate school?</p>
<p>It's that old "merit within need" if you have to have some need established in order to get it. I guess they do not want to give generous awards to those who truly have a lot of money but will bend for those on the fringes of qualifying for financial aid. For those kids they really want that qualify for financial aid, they will give above and beyond. It makes my head ache all of the different ways things are done.</p>
<p>As an aside, Mini, I did not know that Smith gave merit aid. I know that your D and some other poster's daughters got some nice awards. But in my notes from when my D applied, I got the impression that they do not give merit money. It would not have made any difference personally since Smith was a reach/match for her, making it unlikely that she would have gotten any merit money, but I am curious. Are those awards at Smith, merit within need or can Rockefellow's grandchildren get on awarded on merit alone?</p>
<p>There are a very limited number (like 6) of big merit awards (where, they told me outright, they were trying to steal students from HYP, and we played along). Then they have 35-40 STRIDES - these are the paid research assistantships for the first two years, coupled with smallish 4-year merit awards. Rockefeller's grandchildren could get these. There are also a few large merit awards in support of the engineering school, and several for students from the Springfield, Mass. area. Oh, and there are 3 new big ones for community college transfers - I'm not sure these require need demonstration, though I believe they probably do, as I think the whole idea was to take in top-flight students who couldn't have dreamed about elite college admissions out of high school. The rest I think are "need-based/100% of need." </p>
<p>For us, given that we had so much "need", the main effect was to 1) eliminate the need for any loans; 2) provide the research assistantship rather than the dishwashing experience (and they created the position specifically for her - this played a very major part of the final admissions decision); and 3) to shield us a little bit from tuition, etc. increases in future years (we'll see - I'll believe it when I see it.)</p>
<p>Are all income brackets eligible for the big merit awards? Do you have to file FAFSA or some other financial info form for any of these awards or are any given just based on the application?</p>
<p>Based on application.</p>
<p>mini,</p>
<p>While what you said may be true in many cases; the schools that were listed are NOT known for awarding huge $$$ for free; people shouldn't expect to get "a lot" from them. What's "a lot"? Well, schools like WashU, USC, Emory are known to give that kind of money (50%-100% many cases) to many students cos they want to lure the kids from the Ivies.</p>
<p>What schools were "listed"? Did I miss something? And of course every April, the Ivies throw their calculations out the window and compete with each other, if you ask.</p>
<p>confusedmom & poetsheart: Sorry I just returned to this thread.. We did complete financial aid information, but we did not receive any financial aid (did not "qualify"), so need was not considered in this case. (I will add, though, that maybe Bryn Mawr--unlike other schools with comparable tuition, etc--realize that even if the numbers say you don't "qualify," they know how untrue/deceptive that is..) But the Trustee Scholarship offered from Bryn Mawr was merit-based. The letter stated, in part, "In recognition of your impressive accomplishments and your great potential to contribute to the Bryn Mawr community, you are one of only a few students selected to be a Bryn Mawr College Trustee Scholar.." Obviously, she (and we) were pleasantly surprised and very pleased. She ended up deciding not to go there, but it certainly became a serious choice after receiving the offer and the recognition.</p>
<p>Hey, Jack. Thanks for responding. It's just wonderful that you D was given such a big honor, especially since Bryn Mawr bestows so few pure merit awards! She must be a very exceptional scholar. Where did she decide to enroll in the end?</p>
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<p>you are one of only a few students selected to be a Bryn Mawr College Trustee Scholar</p>
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<p>Hm, I wonder if they draw this money from a different pool -- like it comes directly from the trustees, not from the College -- so that they don't technically consider it "financial aid." Even so, they're shamelessly lying about that. I wonder why they hide this? Maybe it has to do with not wanting students to apply just for the money?</p>
<p>I think the way Williams gets around it with the Tyng Bequest is to call the undergraduate portion "needs-based", and then the graduate school money icing on the cake ('cause it isn't to pay for Williams tuition, even though it is used "like" merit aid to lure candidates.)</p>
<p>poetsheart: Thanks so much. Yes, she felt it was a real honor and really appreciated the recognition. She felt bad about not accepting and did write them a nice letter. In the end, she chose UNC-CH. She was also given a wonderful merit scholarship there that was hard to turn down. She also really likes the school and all that it offers, the campus itself and the general atmosphere. After she spent a few days there, she was pretty much sold.</p>
<p>Hanna: We thought that, perhaps, the Trustee Scholarships originate from a different pool as well--outside the college itself and suspect it does. I honestly don't know how many they name each year either.</p>