<p>Out of the 19 public-school students in the area getting college-sponsored NMF awards, 15 were going to public colleges while only 4 were going to private ones. Out of the 17 private-school students getting college-sponsored scholarships, only 3 were going to public colleges while 14 were going to private ones. Alas, the paper didn't include where the corporate-sponsored scholarship students or NMF scholarship winners were going.</p>
<p>This brings me to an interesting question: Is there a public/private "track" from high school onward? Is it financial or a matter of preference? I checked what I could find on the National Merit Corporation's website and didn't find any hard numbers. Anyone have other data? I'm particularly curious how it applies to the top students (like NMFs) who have plenty of choices. </p>
<p>At first I thought that there might be a prestige element to this, but now I'm not so sure. Finances seem to matter a good bit (note most of the public schoolers went to places known for good NMF scholarships), but I'm wondering if the more cultural/sociological explanation has legs too. </p>
<p>Since I've ended up at public schools for high school, undergrad, and graduate school, I think that I was not only more willing to apply to public schools for college but I felt like I "fit" better at public schools rather than private schools. I can easily see how it might've been the other way coming from a private school. Any one else have any thoughts?</p>
<p>Those are really interesting statistics, although too limited to have much generalizability. My son appears on track for a NMF (knock on wood), and even though he went to public school, his list of potential colleges is certainly dominated by private schools. But we come from a part of the country where private HS is simply not an option.</p>
<p>Yeah I saw that, but it doesn’t say much about what kind of high school the student went to. That’s what I’m most interested in- how many of those 266 NMF winners at Yale came from public vs. private high schools? (Also, don’t those numbers underreport the number of NMFs who didn’t “win” a scholarship?)</p>
<p>All the NMF winners that I can think of in our (public) high school have gone to private colleges. I think that’s 1. because there’s a strong tradition for good students to go private in the NE, and 2. There are no particularly attactive honors colleges or other goodies for NMF at NYS colleges.</p>
<p>I think that a student’s choice of college can be very personal, but for those NMF’s who want a relatively debt-free undergrad education public schools with large NMF scholarships make sense. The Ivy schools and other highly regarded private schools are able to attract large numbers of NMF’s without offering scholarships and some of them don’t really see being a NMF as a big deal. Plenty of NMF do not get accepted to the elite schools for whatever reasons. When it was obvious that my daughter would be a NMF I did a lot of research and learned that being a NMF can be very financially advantageous at many, but certainly not all, public schools and at some private schools but that the NMF label was not an automatic entry into elite schools. </p>
<p>I do think that being a NMF can help at elite schools because it is a national award, but it isn’t as prestigious as some other national awards out there. And lastly, schools that look beyond the numbers want to see students with a variety of attributes. What attributes, I don’t know, I guess it depends on what is wanted from each school at the time.</p>
<p>From personal experience, a lot of people told myself and my daughter that she should attend an elite private because she was a NMF and she would be better suited for an elite school verses a public one. In addition, NMF’s get flooded with expensive brochures from these schools and when received it can be hard to not feel as if you are being courted by an elite school, even though the odds of acceptance are still not great. We also found that when she choose a public school some looked at her as if she was settling for less. This can be confusing and unsettling for many high school teens. It can also be unfair. My daughter didn’t just choose her school because of the NMF award, she truly fell in love with it.</p>
<p>As a NMF you need to look at all of your options and make a decision that suits YOU best. There will be many factors that play into the equation. Be thankful that your hard work and great test taking skills have given you opportunities very few other high school students have.</p>
<p>I live in an area where the only private high schools are religious schools. The choice is: Public, Christian, or travel 40 miles to attend Catholic HS.</p>
<p>^ Same here, and while the private schools are good fits for some students they are generally considered less competitive than the better publics.</p>
<p>There are areas of the Country where private schools are all not as good as local publics. There are areas that just have parochial schools.</p>
<p>I’ve worked with sudents on the E. Coast, W.Coast and in the MW-there where 2 primary reasons top students chose publics. Money was the overwhelming number 1. Number 2 was families/students that were not in favor of going too far. There was far lessof this in recent years as people come to understand their kids want to be globally competitive.</p>
<p>Now, in my experience, most educated families will choose an ivy if it’s not about money.</p>
<p>I think that list is technically National Merit Scholars, which I think often means they can use the money wherever they go to school. So the elite privates, which don’t give other merit money, might be overrepresented on that list.</p>
<p>For the other 8000 NMFs who didn’t get a NM Scholarship, they might actually choose to go to one of the universities that offer money just for being a Finalist (or semifinalist in some cases).</p>
<p>Public (magnet) high school: 14 NMFs, an even split between public and private. Various reasons: money played a larger role in decisions than it had in classes previous.</p>
<p>The scholarship given by the NM Corporation is a one-time $2500 award. That is not enough to make a big dent in a full-pay family’s private college bill.
The biggest NM money is from universities that are trying to recruit NMFs. Most of those schools are state schools, but certainly not all.</p>
<p>Two NMFs at my daughter’s private high school went to OOS public schools. Both got NM scholarship money (one NM and one corporate) and both got additional merit money.</p>
<p>Around here there are no privates but religious schools and they are academically weaker than the better public high schools. It seems like our NMFs split about half and half for public and private colleges. Maybe a bit heavier on the public side, but close. Just how it looks to me.</p>
<p>The two at our school are both going to elite LAC’s. Both went to public school all their life and were drawn to the idea of being with similar students in a close knit community.</p>
<p>My son graduated from a small, rural Virginia high school and earned NM status. He chose one of the OOS public universities for a variety of reasons. One, he has full tuition and housing for four years. Two, the package included a stipend ($1000 a year), a laptop and money for study abroad or research. Three, he got into an outstanding honors program that will allow him to do research in his chosen field. Four, that OOS university was great abut awarding credit for all the APs he took. Five, it was the best financial offer that he got. He turned down some excellent schools, too. He just wanted to graduate debt free from his first four years so he could pursue a PhD.</p>