randomthots

My D was just notified that she's eligible to apply for the Robert Byrd scholarship in Washington State. Next, they have to fill out the application and return it by June 5. No mention of funding issues.

JrProv1

Found out on Friday that I was selected, but the AL dept. of Ed. is not yet sure of the federal funding. So, they will not send out the official notices to the recipients yet.

It is very strange that some states have already made the recipient names public, but my state is not even sure the money is going to be made available? Weird.

2009ishere

Ohio's Byrd Scholarship 2009-2010 recipients are available on the Ohio Department of Education website. It was about 400+ last year down to 108 or so this year. National Merit Finalist....4.0 GPA unweighted.....Valedictorian.....34 ACT......didn't receive one so the criteria must be quite high. Good Luck!

Mythbuster2000

a little bit upset about the ohio awards because they had the same amount of funding as last year according to the ODE website

Skyhook

In response to Swimguy's correction of my earlier post re availability of federal money:
I checked with a fed who said that, in fact, this scholarship program IS forward funded, meaning Swimguy is absolutely correct. That is, it would appear there should be no question about the federal money being there.

So, the bobbing and weaving would seem to be happening on the state level. I would certainly want to hear an answer from an official person if my state continued to say the money wasn't there.

JrProv1

Very interesting, Skyhook.

If the funding status has been determined as you say, why would the DOE website not show the amount of 2009 funding? It shows an amount for every other year, but it does not show the 2009 numbers.

I don't think the states have the leeway to use the money for anything but RCB scholarships.

sharonohio

OH scholarships were just announced (although specific money wasn't - it just says up to $1500 for four years). My daughter is a recipient. 36 ACT, valedictorian 4.0 unweighted.

Mythbuster, the way these work from what I understand is that money has to go to the existing recipients first. Each year there were more students than the year before so those rolling off this year were much fewer so the real question is how does this compare with the number who were added 5 years ago. From what I understand it also depends on how many of the prior year students are still eligible to receive. So for example a non-school based study abroad program would make you ineligible for this year while a program where you pay tuition to the US based school and then study abroad would be. I agree though that a drop from 400 to 108 is HUGE.

Mythbuster2000

thanks... i already figured out how they work due to the fact that there are about 1000 students receiving it at anytime... its just a bit unfair, wouldn't you agree?

sharonohio

Mythbuster, I completely agree. I don't understand why they would have gotten 400 students started on this last year only to have money for 108 this year. I'm sure that its partly the use it or lose it philosophy that has something to do with it. Also don't understand why the amount isn't known. Hopefully when we eventually get a letter we'll know how much the award is for. The fact that the website has the phony "up to $1500" statement just seems wrong as well.

It also seems to me that they may have created an arbitrary cutoff not to go over the funding. Namely if the next group of students was a large group, they would have cut it off before starting the group since they couldn't easily split the group in half. I'm thinking this might be true because when I called earlier and talked to the administrator he indicated that my daughter might not even qualify.

And of course, lets remember that this is the largest high school graduating class ever which obviously doesn't help anything.

bluesquaremoon

Has anyone from New York heard anything back yet?

Skyhook

Interesting discussion. So, if the state program administrators need to spend all the money each year, do they just try to figure the number of graduating seniors who will be "dropping off" and the number of students dropping out of the program, and then give only that number of new scholarships to incoming freshmen?

sharonohio

Skyhook, that's my understanding of how OH handles it. From talking to the administrator he had to figure out who from the existing scholarship recipients were going to be getting scholarships next year before he could allocate money to the class of 2009.

proteus7

JrProv1:

I am from Alabama and received my schools nomination for the Robert C. Byrd scholarship months ago. I haven't heard anything back yet. I have a 36 on my ACT and a 770 on each of my SAT II 's (mol bio and math II) as well as an unweighted 4.0 GPA. How did you find out that you were selected? (ie a letter, e-mail, phone call, etc.)

JrProv1

Proteus7:

The selections were made in April, but because the state has not yet been assured of the funding amount, they can not officially send out recipient notifications. I would like to leave it at that for now.

But I will say that you are almost assuredly going to be one of the recipients with a 36 ACT. I was one reading question from a 36, but a 35.25 isn't too bad.

Based on my discussion with some counselors, it has been very normal for the notifications not to be sent out until the month of June. I'm trying to be patient also while waiting for the OFFICIAL notification.

proteus7

Thanks for the response. I am buying a home to live in at Auburn and that money would really come in handy. It has been worrying me for a couple of months. Thanks again.