Thanks. I really appreciate your educated assessment! This is my child who tries hard, doesn't always succeed, but still gets up smiling and tries again. He just had his best quarter ever in high school. I know he will be happy wherever he ends up for college, but I would so love for that school to be his first choice. Will update when he hears. Thanks again.
It wouldn't hurt to email the admissions counselor with an update on this quarter's grades and it would also give him an opportunity to reiterate that Tulane is his top choice. If his file has fallen to the bottom of a pile, an update might just pull it to the surface again.
Last edited by kreativekat; 11-14-2012 at 10:10 PM.
Reason: addition
Actually, he is one step ahead! He emailed the counselor and let her know that he is having his high school send in his first quarter grades. Great minds think alike!!!!
The Academic Achievement Award that my daughter got is $20,000 not $15,000 so your numbers may be off.
Also, my daughter's GPA was UnW 4.0, her ACT was 32, she wrote her Why Tulane Essay, submitted additional audio and video (to the music department) for consideration and has an all AP/Dual Enrollment course load, on top of being in both band and orchestra, & a lot of other extra curricular activities.
I'm not complaining about the $20K, it was nice, but I am just pointing out that we have seen kids from other states (we are in NY) get more money for lower scores/grades and she didn't get an honors college invite, which other kids with lower scores did.
So my point to the OP is, don't stress too much about the numbers. They are trying to build a college class and therefore a community and they want students from different states, with different backgrounds and different personalities.
Admissions folks are looking for all of those things too, so you might be surprised.
Thanks for that update alexmarie. I was citing last year's numbers, as best I could remember. They do adjust them from time to time. So far from what people have reported, it looks like the $27K, $25K, and $22K are correct still, while based on your helpful info the $15K is now $20K. It may have actually been $17K last year, I really am not 100% sure.
As a quick update, my daughter received her "official" letter a couple days ago. She was offered the Presidential Scholarship of $27k as well as an Honors invitation. She is very excited and my husband is thrilled!
hoopjack - If you qualify, then yes, of course. Just remember that for Tulane and Tulane only, the $27K is considered an asset and so counts towards your EFC (Expected Financial Contribution). That's because essentially these are "TulaneBucks" that can be spent only on Tulane tuition.
So let's do a couple of examples, varying only the EFC. Say the TCA (Total Cost of Attendance) is $60,000. That's tuition, room, meals, books and travel. Now let's say it is determined that your family has an EFC without the scholarship of $20,000. You would have been eligible for $40,000 in need-based aid, but since you have a $27,000 scholarship your EFC is actually $47,000, so you are eligible for $13,000 in aid. That aid might be in grants (which also do not need to be repaid but unlike the scholarship can vary form year to year), loans, or work-study, and quite possibly a combination of the three.
Now let's say instead that your EFC came out to $39,000 without the scholarship. You would have been eligible for $21,000 in financial aid, but with the scholarship your EFC is $66,000 which is more than the TCA. So instead of paying $39,000 your family "only" pays the $33,000 remaining after the scholarship.
Don't forget that if you are a NMF (National Merit Finalist) you get $2,000 a year. I believe, but I am not positive, that also counts towards your EFC. I would think it does. So in the first example your EFC with scholarship and NMF money would be $49,000 leaving $11,000 in aid. In the second example your EFC would still be over the TCA, so the better way to look at it is that you have $29,000 in non-personal assets towards tuition, leaving $31,000 for your family to pay.
My weighted was 4.19, I got 2150 on the SATs, I currently take 3 APs and 2 honors, and I'm in the top 10% of my class so that might've made up for my lowish GPA. I also go to one of the top public high schools in the nation so maybe they knew it's hard to get good grades here.
Hey there Alexmamriejp (and Tulane CCers), my D's stats were very similar to yours. She also received the 20K AA award. We're thrilled and I totally agree that award amounts/honors designations are likely not as formulaic as we may think (likewise admissions in general). Also from NJ. So Tulane may have diff thresholds for applicants from diff parts of the country for recruiting purposes. It's all good though!
