2015collegemom I read that also and called the admisssions office. The admissions officer was also confused when I called. She said the person who could answer the question was not in the office.
Thank you. Just so weird. Might ask about it on the Fb page or I’ll call tomorrow.
@ufalumn1997 Thank you!
@mountainmomof3 Have you confirmed with someone at UF that a student who receives the Gator Nation scholarship can still (if they decline the GN scholarship first) obtain the OOS Benacquisto? Obviously this is for a student that is a National Merit Finalist and chooses UF as their first choice via the NMSC before the required deadline.
@garprules - I emailed back/forth with Jessica Elaine Roth (Assistant Director for Scholarships & Regional Recruitment
Office of Admissions) to discuss the OOS Benacquisto and at no time did she indicate that receiving the Gator Nation award would negate the OOS Benacquisto. Also, this specific situation is addressed in the “Scholarship FAQ” page:
- Can I "stack" scholarships offered by UF with my other financial aid awards or other scholarships I've been offered?
It depends. The type of award will determine whether your scholarship will “stack” or will adjust that particular award.
UF’s merit-based scholarships may impact how much in loans you are eligible for, but it will not change the amount of Pell grant you are eligible for.
UF’s Presidential scholarships will “stack” on top of Bright Futures and the Benacquisto Scholarship offered by the Florida Department of Education.
UF’s out-of-state scholarships cannot be stacked with another scholarship (offered by the School of Music, for example) since both scholarships waive the same portion of non-resident tuition.
The Gator Nation award is actually an OOS tuition waiver so it won’t stack with the Benacquisto since the that already includes an OOS tuition for OOS NMFs.
I strongly suggest you reach out to Jessica in admissions to clarify your concerns - I think it will put you at ease.
@GarpRules
If your student received need based financial aid, wouldn’t that affect the amount of aid given by Benecquisto? So that the COA is covered in the end but doesn’t go over the COA?
@2015collegemom - The honors agreement information has been corrected
@Melissa96 Thank you! I’ve been out all morning and was just going to call. I pulled it up and it was fixed.
@slk1000, the same happened with my daughter. She received an email that there was an update to her application and she had a merit scholarship however the link shows last update on 2/8 and only the 2K honors scholarship she had already been told about. @melissa96 are they just notifying about the honors scholarship again for some reason or should there have been another update?
@girlsrule I believe they renotified because the scholarship agreement can be accepted now.
@girlsrule Thanks for letting me know.
So have presidential scholarships been rolled out??
For those of you who are curious on the breakdown of the 300 or so UF merit-based scholarships, you can find the details for 2017 awardees (see Page 13 of the report) http://cloud.flipb.com/university-of-florida/admissions-2018annual-report/mobile/index.html?doc=ABFBBDB8F98F74C7E5934595BFA4CBA7
@worriedcat - that is eye opening.
@mountainmomof3 You should be proud as your son belongs to the very small and elite group assuming this year’s stats will be similar.
@worriedcat - thanks. Yes, definitely proud. Since it can’t be stacked with Benacquisto, kind of wish we could hand it off to another student.
@mountainmomof3 In case the State stops funding Benacquisto, I wonder this could be used as a fall-back option as it is offered by UF. Btw, I saw another post on the budget proposal for 2020 that includes Benacquisto under Bright Futures Scholarship umbrella for a total of 582.8M https://www.watchdog.org/florida/heath-care-education-consume-billion-in-desantis-billion-budget-request/article_d0f7a4b4-27b7-11e9-859f-33f7e8af23a9.html. I hope it will be approved in Mar/Apr to relieve some of the worries.
@worriedcat - I had a very reassuring email exchange with UF admissions and any concerns we had are definitely alleviated. 
I spoke with admissions this morning and they said that Presidential Scholarship notifications were sent out and would be in the admissions portal. I believe emails were sent out earlier this week for students to check their portals.
@mountainmomof3 Thank you, I have emailed and called, but have not heard back from her. I feel better though after reading your replies. So thank you very much! I’m sure she will respond soon, she must be super busy with so many of us asking all sorts of questions.