<p>Hey, I'm currently a junior and just received my ACT results. I got a 35, and I feel this opens up options for me in terms of the college search. However, I don't want to miss any schools from which I may receive merit aid. I understand that everything else on my apps matter too: I have approx. a 4.4 weighted(school doesn't do unweighted), am taking 4 APs, and my rank is probably top 5%. So if you guys could suggest schools where I would have a good shot at significant merit aid, that would be great. Thanks.</p>
<p>Hawk,
First of all, have you read the sticky threads on this and the Parents forums? That's the place to start and will give you all of the "likely suspects" for top scoring students like yourself. Once you do that and find merit schools that have some qualities in common with your need only schools, go to their websites and you will get good information on how many scholarships are given, for how much money, minimum stats, etc. </p>
<p>As a rule of thumb, I'd say that to be in the running for competitive (ie. not guaranteed) merit aid, you should be in the top 5% of the applicants. </p>
<p>Also, you will find that "a good shot" and "significant merit aid" mean different things to different people, so it would help to know your definitions.</p>
<p>hp, you would probably get some more responses if you layed out some criteria besides merit aid. Geography, size, setting, academic offerings, atmosphere, culture, etc. Narrow it down a bit and I bet you get some specific suggestions.</p>
<p>Tulane sent my daughter with 4.3 weighted GPA, 2040 SAT 30 ACt $24,000 a year...your good for even more if you want to persue a "deans scholarship" (full ride...not too hard)</p>
<p>best of Luck</p>
<p>Need more information. We could all list all kinds of schools that have given someone somewhere merit aid. How about you follow bluejay's advice. What are you looking for?</p>
<p>I would prefer to stay in the Northeast or Midwest. I would prefer LACs, so the schools would have to be relatively small(max of 5000 students). And I plan to major in economics, a major available at almost every college I think. But the main reason I left it open is because my decision will most likely be based on how much money each college offers, if it does offer any.</p>
<p>In another thread, I posted a list of colleges that give an average merit aid award of at least $10k per year to a significant proportion of their students. Try searching for that thread using the search term "pretty good merit aid". The last posting in the thread is the most up-to-date list. Some of these colleges give merit aid to as many as half of their entering students. Many are in the Midwest or Northeast. </p>
<p>There are other lists on College Confidential of colleges that give terrific merit scholarships to a fairly limited number of students. You might be a candidate for those kinds of awards too, since you have good grades and test scores.</p>
<p>You're very smart to look into this as a junior. Good luck in your search!</p>