To start off, I applied to USC Viterbi for engineering before December 1st.
Today, I received a packet from Viterbi that included a letter and the Fall 2017 issue of the Viterbi magazine. The letter stated that I had submitted before Dec 1st and that I’m qualified for merit scholarships. The letter then transitions into recommending me to complete the need-based financial aid application process providing a link to their financial aid website. 1) Has anyone else received this mail? 2)If you have, how do you start the Financial Aid application because I don’t really understand the website at all? 3)What are the pros and cons of completing this application, if there are any? (I’m kind of thinking that they might use this in application decisions) Thank you for your help!
My D received the letter from Viterbi, its documented earlier in this thread. We aren’t eligible for need-based FA so we did not complete an application for it.
@mreus You should know if your family requires, needs, and qualifies (or not) for need based aid at any school you are applying to. That is how you know if you should fill it out the FA application. Can you afford USC without merit or need money? Is your family’s income at a level where need based aid can come into play? Do you want to take out loans? Just you or you and your parents? All of these should have been discussed with your parents/family/guardians before you put out the $80. But if you haven’t had that talk, have it now. Viterbi mails that magazine and letter to everybody eventually. Filling out the financial app will not influence your admission.
@SCMHAALUM My daughter’s scholarship was based on her academic merits. She had UW GPA of 4.0 and 34 ACT. We were hoping for presidential. Her intended teacher played a major role in getting her the trustee. Two of her music friends got packages equal or close to full tuition. One is all merit scholarships from Thornton, the other is a combination of FA and music merit. They were also admitted to other very good schools with equally good packages and chose to go to USC in the end. In these cases, they are talented musicians that the school really wants. Another student is a double major of philosophy and music, with $10000 academy scholarship and $15000 music scholarship. She also got into Columbia and chose USC instead.
Notification is Jan or early Feb, although for the last several years it has always been late January. Last year, packages started arriving Jan 24 (mailed 23rd). Portal was updated for everyone on Jan 26th at 12:30AM.
So mailed on a Monday, started receiving Tuesday, and everyone notified if they got scholarship or waiting till March (no soup for you!) via their portal just after midnight on Thursday morning (so late Wed night). Takes portals awhile to all update so it goes on for a few hours.
So it could be the week of Jan 22, but maybe it will be the next week, they are in charge, we will know for sure as it gets closer. The best us veterans of this process can do is make an educated guess on the process. We went though it four times at our house, it is exhausting and exciting and exhausting again.
This would be my first son potentially going to USC. He applied very early…I believe in August. He’s been in touch with his admission rep. from USC but does anyone know from experience when decisions start coming out? Thanks and hope to say “Fight On” for real one of these days.
@SgtFriar2015 I’ve been told that if you get a merit scholarship or are in the running for one, you usually get the package in the mail in late January. If not, you won’t hear until later. I believe those that received them last year heard on or around January 24th.
Does USC Viterbi require midyear grades from community college? I’m taking a couple dual enrollment classes so the grades already show up on the midyear transcript from my high school, but since I am enrolled in community college as well should I send something from them?
Checking in here. My D applied to Dornsife in November. She’s hoping to study Computational Linguistics. She’s NMSF from an underrepresented state, and USC is one of her top choices.