<p>Hi TRHowar - Is the 3.7 weighted or unweighted? If unweighted, that helps you. It is true that your SAT is a bit low for significant merit money such as the amounts you say you need. Perhaps if you really focus on some practice books and hint guides, you can take again and get it over 2050. That way, even if Tulane has already made you a merit offer, they often will adjust it based on higher scores. They are pretty fair that way.</p>
<p>To get into some detail, Tulane has 5 levels of automatic consideration merit money (or did this past admissions cycle): $7,500; $15,000; $20,000; $22,000 and $25,000. The last is what mom2collegekids was saying her kids got, it was $1,000 less then. And she is right, those amounts don’t increase over the 4 years you are there, even if (when) they raise tuition and other costs. Given you stats and EC’s as they stand, my guess would be you have a shot at the $15,000 right now. Hard to say, of course. It also depends on what Tulane is seeing regarding the trends in other applications, and this has been steadily rising the last few years both in quantity and quality. It is hard to say why her friend did not get any merit offer at 2100 SAT. Could have been something else on the app like low GPA (relatively speaking), weak EC’s, or just a mistake by Tulane. It happens from time to time. There have been a couple of cases where I have suggested people go back to admissions and inquire, and they got merit offers. Also I saw a number of kids that reported getting the $7,500 or $15,000 with SAT’s about the same as yours. Anyway, I digress a bit.</p>
<p>If you have already done all the prep stuff and 1990 is the best you think you can do, then all you can do now is apply and see what happens. Certainly apply EA, you might even consider SCEA if you are that sure Tulane is your #1. I usually don’t like SCEA, but I know Tulane considers it a strong signal that it is your #1 choice, and in the past I would have said it would make them more predisposed to award you merit money. However, given that they have a huge (for them) freshman class coming in, I have no idea what their thinking will be for this year’s cycle. Tulane’s popularity is up, and it appears that a lot of this popularity is among academically higher achieving students than in the past. Their average SAT score and number in top 10% of high school class has been the strongest in history the last three years, with this incoming class being the best ever from what I understand. So not to be a downer, but realistically it is harder to get the money you seek, most likely, than it would have been a few years ago.</p>
<p>There is a Community Service Scholarship that can be worth up to $15,000 per year, and that is added on to any merit money you may receive. While there is an academic component to their awarding of these scholarships, given your passion for community service it is worth a shot. Of course, hundreds of kids that are attracted to Tulane for the very same reasons as you, including the service aspect, will be in competition for these 30 scholarships. Again, not trying to be a pessimist, just trying to keep reality in focus for you.</p>
<p>In the end, as I am sure you are already doing, you need to have some financial safeties on your list in case Tulane just doesn’t come up with the cash. Best of luck, and feel free to hit me with any questions you may have.</p>
<p>Just to give you an idea and some hope for at least some money, here are a couple of examples I saved from kids last year:</p>
<p>Student #1: 3.9 UW GPA, SAT 1920, $15,000
Student #2: 3.55 UW GPA, SAT 2030, $15,000
Student #3: 3.8 UW GPA, SAT 2070, $22,000</p>
<p>So you can see why I think that if your 3.7 is UW and you can get your score up another “notch”, you have a shot at decent money, and a shot at $15,000 now (not that $15,000 isn’t decent, but apparently not quite enough for your situation). The other factor you don’t mention is how many AP’s you will have by the time you graduate. You say rigorous high school and I am sure it is, but lots of people have that. The key is how much you challenged yourself.</p>