But it’s not just the competition, it’s the obvious game playing going on with things like EA/ED2. For us, Covid made it so we couldn’t visit many schools my D22 was interested in. It’s hard to commit ED when you have only been able to do virtual tours.
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Merit should not be need based. Imho so, if what you’re saying is true, if you in their opinion on paper, you don’t need the money, they won’t give you merit?
True. Colleges are a business more than anything these days. It’s a shame and it shouldn’t be this way.
Merit aid isn’t need-based. Anyone regardless of their ability to pay should be considered for merit aid. Grant money is a completely different story. But ultimately Miami will give a combination of grant and possibly merit to meet the EFC. At least that’s what they did last year.
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Daughter admitted for biochemistry with presidential scholarship. Even with that, it seems to be a very large price tag.
Deferred from all of our targets as well. It was very surprising, as last year my other DD with almost the same stats was admitted to every single college she applied to and most were EA. They seem to be admitting only the tippity top of the best EA applicants this year.
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We never got an email notifying us of the decision, my DD even checked her spam. Very strange so we learned of the decision today. She got deferred, as we were expecting. 5 APs, A’s in 4 of them, honors level classes, highest to high honor roll every year. Excellent ECs inc. class VP, 2 varsity sports. Test optional.
It is frustrating. My daughter was deferred from her ED1. We are not doing it again. I’m hoping she at least gets spring admission in some of these schools.
I’m keeping my fingers crossed for you!
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And that my friend is the key phrase - Test optional.
Looking through a number of chats for strong schools with my daughter and the evidence says strong kids with strong tests got a normal distribution of successes and deferrals. Strong students with no tests got crushed.
Yes, I have learned the same looking through the boards of other schools she was deferred from. They at least should not lie and say it doesn’t harm your application if you don’t send.
They don’t lie. The statement is true. But the data is stark.
We all heard these schools say, and release, that 30-40% of their class last year was NO TEST. So we all said, fine. But that is not the question we should have been asking.
The issue is that these schools received 7-8x the number of NO TEST applications as compared to TEST applications so the admittance rate of that stack was much, much lower.
We may never have the data, but I assume the data would say that even if your 1200 was below the 1300-1400 range, we should have submitted because it puts you in a better bucket and avoids them thinking you had a 900. (Numbers made up for illustration).
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your friend’s daughter, is that USC in Los Angeles or U of South Carolina?
My son studied for the SAT but here in lockdown California the test centers in our region repeatedly canceled his test 3 months in a row. Very frustrating. So had no choice but to go test optional.
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We are in CA as well. We could have taken the test. We decided to use the three months of closures and cancellations as an excuse. We made a mistake. Now we pay.
In-state Accepted EA
4.0 UW GPA, 12 APs
1570/34/National Merrit SF
Offered $25000/yr scholarship
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You were deferred to the next round …happens at many many schools. They are giving you the option of RD or ED2. The choice is up t o you. Colleges are a business and most use these type of tactics.
The students who really really want to go and NPC shows it to be affordable have a better shot at ED2. You can back out if the $$$ is not there.
I think it’s a bad business model geared toward the rich. They should be throwing money at the best candidates. Not withholding it from those who truly want to be there.
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My brother applied ED1 and needed aid - they were generous. He wound up getting his EFC.
At the end of the day, unfortunately, all these colleges treat it like a business. Yield and acceptance rates are important to them.
You can’t take it personally. It’s not a fair process. You do have an “out” if they don’t meet your financial need.
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My son is accepted in EA time, but Merit $ is not enough for us to “go” yet.
anyone know can get more Merit for the school?