What does it take to be a merit scholar?

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill
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<p>GetOuttaBuffalo, first I have to mention - I live only a few hours away from Buffalo! I'd like to get out of NY, too. Naturally.</p>

<p>Anyway, WOW, Buffalo and RLAJen, you are both monstrously impressive! Thanks very much for your information. It's just making me fall even more in love with UNC. You guys and cloying, and all of the scholars profiled on the Robertson site? I am blown away. I don't think that I can possibly compare, but I'll at least try.</p>

<p>Do you guys recommend that, if I hope for a scholarship other than Pogue or Robertson, I should still fill out a supplement? Will that potentially get me noticed for the other honors? Because I will definitely fill out the form, in that case, although I feel extremely under qualified for it all, esp. the Robertson. As for the Pogue, I'm not a minority and I don't have any issues with financial aid, so I don't think I'll be considered.</p>

<p>But I am just soo impressed by the people UNC has selected for these honors. So deserving and so amazing.</p>

<p>I know this isn't a chances post, but I'm going to give a little info of my own anyway. Basically, what I've got going for me other than grades...I'm Mock Trial team captain (county champions & regional semifinalists - this was big for us!), & photography club president. I am HOPING to become certified in wildlife rehabilitation (took the test over spring break and am waiting for results). If all goes according to plan there, I'll be able to take in some squirrels and small animals in need over the summer. I was in National Junior Honor Society 9th grade, and will probably be in it as a senior because our HS is easy to get into. :/ They just want a ninety average, and you're in. Oh, and if you're wondering, 9th grade was still junior high at my school, so when you're a senior at the high school and a freshmen in jr. high you can be in HS. So I've done community service through honor society, as well as through a local therapeutic riding program. I volunteer there and help kids with illnesses and disabilities improve their motor skills and just to feel good. I think it's safe to say that I have 100+ hours of volunteering.</p>

<p>But I am, by no means, in the same stratosphere as people who have founded their own organizations, gone overseas, etc. Do you guys think that I have solid ECs? I have a few other details, too, but I don't want them to swallow this post. In fact, I apologize for the stats aspect in general. :S Unfortunately, I'm really second guessing myself. I wonder what else I can do to measure up to UNC's applicant pool in terms of extracurriculars. </p>

<p>But again, thank you everyone for the information. I am hugely impressed, and I'm now convinced that if I should be given the opportunity to go to UNC, I will be there Fall 2008!</p>

<p>Edit: RLAJen, I just read your second post! Great tips at the bottom, thank you. I know of all the places that you lived in while in NY! I'm not far away from those places, either. And Cornell is another reach of mine! But UNC is better than Cornell, in my book. C:</p>

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<p>RLAJen,
OK, that makes sense. Although, I'm even more impressed with the school now. We thought about NCSSM for our d several years ago but she was having some medical issues at the time and we didn't want her that far away from home. My younger d is a few years away from thinking about that but I must remember that NCSSM might be an option for her! She's in a local public middle school AIG science and tech. magnet now.
Again, congrats, I'll tell my d to be on the lookout for the crew from NCSSM!</p>

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<p>I know they typically go visit Highschools in early september to talk about the application process so be on the watch!</p>

<p>AG: I know UNC is a pretty awesome school but I think I'll always miss having snow and the amazing architecture of Cornell. I figure UNC gives me a good background to get into a Top notch grad school which is something really great about it to begin with.</p>

<p>Also, you don't have to be a minority or in any great financial need in order to get the Pogue. One of the OOSers that got it (Andreas) Is from LA county in Cali and he's definitely pretty well off. He is a minority but he's also an Eagle scout and an amazing person to talk to so I would say you have a good chance of getting to the final round of the scholarship if you can catch the application reader's attention with your essays. Also, pick a faculty member that you can sit down with to discuss your recommendation before you have it sent in. I was going have the same person that did my rec for UNC do my Pogue one but thought better of it and chose my counselor who I get along with wonderfully and I think that really helped because she helped me do a mock interview and consider the many facets of formal scholarship interviews!</p>

<p>That's a good thing to remember too, if you get to an interview round of any scholarship, look up the kinds of questions they may ask and make sure you have a formal outfit for the occasion and that you will be able to attend any required interview weekends. Senior year will be a busy one!</p>

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<p>jack - </p>

<p>I understand completely what you're saying. I agree. It's usually the kids who are very humble and laid back seeming who are changing the world. This girl is not, I assure you. For instance. She's broken the honor code a few times. The first time: A teacher returned an assignment of hers where she had failed to complete most of the journals asked of her. She then stapled journals to the returned assignment, approached the teacher, and told her the teacher had forgotten to consider the last few pages. A lot of people in the class, including myself, witnessed this happen. Luckily we didn't even have to tell the teacher because she caught on pretty quickly. Last year, everyone in my class was taking college chemistry. Every Friday we were to turn in our homework sets in a box outside of the profs office. She was notorious for 'borrowing' these homework problems. Meanwhile, she was my best friend's lab partner, and often had 'other things to do' and left my best friend to finish up all of their collaborative work at the end.</p>

<p>This girl is my friend, but she's disappointed me on several occasions. She made a C in CP Leadership, a C in AP English Language, and a C in Introduction to Personality (a basic psych course). None of these courses were difficult for anyone else in my class. She also made plenty of Bs.</p>

<p>She is incredibly charming, and I think that at heart she's a good person, even though I think she fell in with the wrong crowd in high school. I'm sure that's what helped her become a Morehead finalist. Her charm and her parents marching themselves down to the central office of my county helped her finally get into NHS (she was denied the first year she tried because of her honor code violations and because her two teacher recs were negative). She is a highly intelligent person, but, trust me, definitely not Morehead material.</p>

<p>Which is what leads me to eadad! I do not mean in any way to belittle the Robertson or Morehead selection processes, I hope that I didn't come off as doing that. I think it is important that at the end of the day, she wasn't selected for the Morehead. All I was saying was that grades will not prevent you from being at least considered for any of these scholarships - which I think is a positive thing. The kid who got the Robertson with those Cs - he was amazing. He was one of my favorite people at the weekend! When I said he had gotten a few Cs, I didn't mean it to say, "well ANYONE can get the Robertson!" I meant for it to give people hope.</p>

<p>Anyway, I don't mean to come off as defensive, I just want to make sure that my message or tone isn't being confused. jack and eadad: both of you have been so helpful to me and so many other prospective UNC tar heels this season. I would never try and belittle the advice of you all or the accomplishments of your children! I view you both as the admins of the UNC forum. :)</p>

<p>avantgarden -
Thank you so much!! I can't tell you how nice it is to hear that someone thought my college essay sounded interesting. I've been wondering if I should post it on here or not to help prospective applicants. It might come off as fishing for compliments, so maybe it'd be best if I didn't. At any rate, you sound like you've got your head on your shoulders.</p>

<p>I know that writing those essays is really intimidating. My best advice is to just be honest with yourself. At my school I helped edit people's college essays (ahah, Poet Laureate duties!) and I think the biggest problem I found was that people just weren't being honest with themselves. The essays came off as very crowd pleasing. If you're writing an essay where you're supposed to capture who or what someone said that changed who you are, then really try and think about the most important sentence you've ever heard and try and capture that. It doesn't matter if it was something in passing, or something you didn't pay attention to at first, or even a cliche. But I'm betting the most important thing you've ever heard isn't a cliche. At any rate, I'd be happy to help you edit any of your essays over the summer, I'll not have a lot to do! Sounds like GOB has a lot of credentials, too. :) I can tell you from personal experience that she's really nice and would probably be happy to help you out. (Hahah, GOB, you okay with me signing you up?)</p>

<p>Good luck everybody on finals and whatever you're facing next!</p>

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<p>cloying: Well, it's true that every school in NC can nominate students (up to 4, depending on the size of the school) for the Morehead, or a student can self-nominate. If teachers knew about all of this student's less than honest high school "career," then I blame the school for allowing this sort of behavior to continually occur. Also, whether she was nominated by the school, or she self-nominated, she had to have strong reference letters to receive even the first interview. (Even those who are school-nominated can be rejected "on paper" before they ever receive the first Morehead interview.) So for her to get that far, given all you've detailed here, then your school is doing a poor job in their honor code system, and her reference letters were less than honest, I would guess. Breaking a school honor code (if one is in place) "a few times" would, in most schools, warrant a suspension, if not expulsion.</p>

<p>I will also add that, in most schools (I believe), a committee acts on those Morehead nominations. They are not decided in a vacuum, nor by only one or two faculty members. So, again, I'm surprised that she received a nomination and, obviously, so much support.</p>

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<p>cloying</p>

<p>Thank you for the kind words. I know that jack and I (though we've never met) only try to relate the experiences that we and our kids have had at UNC and to share what we can about how things work from our perspectives. Is UNC perfect?...no; is any school perfect? of course not and I really hope that as biased as we may be, that everyone understands that we do try to portray things as they really are....warts included so to speak.</p>

<p>No fear, I didn't interpret your comments as criticism of the Morehead process or of me. I think I said that it may be less than perfect at the initial nomination phase (even for OOS students) and in the case of in-state students where more steps are involved simply due to the sheer number of nominees, there is certainly the chance that less than deserving people will fall through the cracks and advance...perhaps based on the charm you mentioned.</p>

<p>The good news is that the finalist weekend process is such a well oiled machine with interviewers having years of experience that the chance of winning for that type of candidate is dramatically reduced.</p>

<p>I can remember when my S came home from finalist weekend. He was awed by how much every interviewer knew about him. Each interviewer's file on him was highlighted with notes in margins and every question showed really in depth knowledge of his application and what he and his recommendations portrayed him to be. He said he felt it would be next to impossible to have misrepresented yourself in any way on the app and not have it uncovered during the interviews. They cited small details from his essays, as well as his short answers and ECs, and when he came home he said that they knew more about him than any of his friends and probably not much less than we as parents did. Being the proud parent that I am, that comment made me tell him that "after all that, if they haven't figured out how incredible a kid you are, they don't deserve you."</p>

<p>Fortunately it all worked out and he is about to embark on his final Morehead summer and his last year at UNC....and might I add, with much remorse. Talk about a 180 for a kid who 5 years ago couldn't see himself anywhere but Yale and walked away from it when given the opportunity.</p>

<p>I know the foundation has worked hard to improve the process as well. He was part of a group of current Moreheads who were invited to meet and have lunch with a group of new interviewers. They were all given the files of all the students they were having lunch with beforehand so that they could then see how the application translated into the individuals who had been winners. I thought that this was a pretty keen way of continually tweaking things.</p>

<p>For you and all the other new Tarheels I sincerely wish you the best and if your undergrad experience can be half as fulfilling and gratifying as the one we and our son have had, you will be very, very happy with your decision to enroll at UNC.</p>

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<p>RLAJen, thanks for the advice. I'm sure UNC will get you wherever you want to go!</p>

<p>And cloying, I really appreciate your offer and would love to take you up on it. Thanks so much.</p>

<p>Good luck to all the UNC merit scholars of 2011. :]</p>

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<p>do you have to be athletic to be seriously considered for the morehead?</p>

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<p>cecils15, I can only speak regarding the students from my kids' high school who have received the Morehead--several were active in sports, holding captain positions, regional or state recognition, etc. But, on the other hand, I know of two who had very minimal to no sports involvement (one had one year of JV football).</p>

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<p>cecils - There are probably exceptions, but everyone I know who has been offered the Morehead in years past have been way more athletic than the average bear. One kid comes to mind from my old neighborhood. He was nearly paralyzed from the waist down in a car accident when he was five, but then trained himself not only to walk but to play basketball and golf. He ultimately became pretty competitive in golf. I've also heard of people using Boy or Girl Scouts as their 'physical rigor' element and still getting the Morehead. I would say, if you don't play a sport or do something similar to that, you might want to consider the Robertson.</p>

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<p>that's really disappointing, i am not really athletic, the only thing that I do that comes is is that I am a goalie for Club Hockey, i love it alot but it is not at all rigorous, the people that participate in CLub Hockey are new to the game or too lazy to try out for JV or Varsity Hockey. I also played JV Field Hockey but I hated it and will not do it again next year.</p>

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<p>"Athletic Vigor" is just one of the four criteria used for evaluating Morehead candidates, the others being Leadership. Scholarship and Moral Force of Character. I honestly don't think they are necessarily looking for "hard core" athletes, though there are a number of varsity and club athletes within their ranks.</p>

<p>I believe that one criteria is there in an effort to find truly well-rounded candidates who haven't spent all of high school doing nothing but studying and resume building. Taking part in a sport, be it team or individual, requires setting aside and managing time, balancing academics with outside interests etc. My S was a four year varsity rower and was also very involved in his school's wilderness program which involved taking part and then mentoring/acting as a Sherpa (guide) for younger students on two day camp outs and ultimately building to a 10 day wilderness trip for freshman that was pretty hard core. He did the 10 day three times while in high school; once as a participant and twice as a Sherpa. He would love to do it again but the start of the school year at UNC has always conflicted with the dates of the trip.</p>

<p>It is true that there are also a number of scouts (especially Eagle Scouts) among their ranks and that too can be both leadership and to a lesser degree, athletic vigor because many active scouts take part in the wilderness aspect of scouting as well.</p>

<p>Don't be dismayed, I know several of his Morehead classmates who don't have what would be considered traditional athletic resumes but who run and are serious about exercise and conditioning, do yoga etc. The key is to have PASSION about SOMETHING outside of ECs and academics.</p>

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<p>It's that time of year... :P</p>

<p>bumping this up. GREAT posts in here from myself and some other merit scholars at UNC. the applications for these are gonna be due in a month or so so read through this thread with a fine tooth comb, grab some inspiration and start writing those essays!!</p>

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<p>GetouttaBuffalo,
Indeed your posts and cloying's have been inspirational previously.</p>

<p>Can we clarify on deadlines?</p>

<p>Morehead deadline is past.
Robertson deadline is Dec. 1. That's "priority deadline" and recommenders will get an email connecting them with an online form.
Pogue deadline is Dec. 5. Applicants must have applied EA and have another recommendation received by UNC by Dec. 5 as well specifically for the Pogue.
Carolina Scholars and others are not separate applications beyond the regular school application, correct?</p>

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<p>sounds about right. get on that robertson app! too good of an opportunity to not even apply for and the app is easier than the pogue. its worth it!!</p>

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<p>I wanted to finally post in this thread because I have a feeling I may be the person cloying was referring to in the discussion about getting C grades.</p>

<p>I’m a first-year UNC Robertson and indeed, I’ve told people before that I got two Cs in high school. This is factually true, and I say it to make the point that the Robertson and similar programs (as well as colleges in general) are looking for more than perfect grades and to encourage people without them to still consider applying if they are otherwise qualified.</p>

<p>But also I fear that with this whole “I got two Cs” thing I may have given off the impression that I’m not academically or intellectually engaged, and that’s not at all the case. I took an extremely challenging course load at an extremely competitive high school and did exceptionally well academically. The Cs were flukes: one was in 9th grade, and the other was junior year when I was mistakenly enrolled in the second-half of a year-long math course without having taken the first half (long story). I love school, love learning, and am the type to curl up with a Sunday New York Times or a recent Atlantic Monthly, Harper’s, or Economist and be distracted all day reading and thinking about it.</p>

<p>The profiles on the Robertson website can be somewhat misleading, especially for the Class of 2011 because they had us write our own and some of us (myself included) were rather modest because we weren’t given much direction on what to write about (whether to focus on why we accepted the scholarship, what we hope to do with it, or what we did in high school). I talk about working with the media, for example, but don’t specifically mention having my work featured in Entertainment Weekly or being interviewed by The New York Times and the Chicago Tribune. In a similar vein, I mention lobbying politicians but don’t specifically mention being asked to advise a sitting U.S. Senator on higher education policy, etc. </p>

<p>Some of us can at times be modest and downplay our accomplishments, but don’t be fooled – all of us work extremely hard and have done some extremely cool things with the opportunities we have been given thus far in life.</p>

<p>All that said, as with the others in this thread I’m happy to answer questions about the Robertson or UNC/Duke, as well as the other major scholarships at both UNC (Morehead, Carolina, Pogue, Johnston) and Duke (A.B., B.N., Trinity, University). See this</a> post for my observations on the differences between the Robertson and Morehead programs, for example.</p>

<p>Another thought: If you fill out the Robertson supplement and are selected as a semi-finalist, they may let you revise it before the phone interview if you feel the past few months have given you better or deeper perspective. In any case, I agree with the others here that waiting to fill it out is not at all worth the risk.</p>