<p>I don’t know if anybody has checked out the AU website lately, but there have been some big changes in the scholarship programs. There are NO MORE full tuition scholarships for out-of-state students, even NMFs. These have been scaled down to 2/3 tuition. The laptop stipend has been cut as well, and the internship/study abroad/special program allowance has been trimmed from $4000 to $2500. All I can say is “yikes”!</p>
<p>I am assuming that since my D signed a contract that included the previous award, (as well as all the other kids who signed the line for the same thing) we will be grandfathered in for the duration (providing of course, that D meets her scholastic obligations). Boy, talk about sliding in under the wire! What a bummer though, for OOS folks who were considering AU for next year and thought that full tuition was part of the package. The scholarship standards have also gotten a bit stiffer, with ACT test score requirements going up a couple points for the presidential award. This move I can certainly understand, but upping the ante and cutting money at the same time will undoubtedly cut into the numbers of applicants.</p>
<p>Anyone privy to what’s going on with funding? Is AL really cutting back on Auburn educational resources? All states are really hurting right now, but UA’s scholarships don’t seem to have taken the same sort of hits yet – at least they’re not listed on the UA website as of today. Is Auburn wanting to possibly discourage OOS? Are too many OOS students getting funds over in-state students? Are the honors college programs getting stretched too thin? It appears that one positive change for in-state students is the addition of full tuition for in-state NMSF’s – an award that matches UA’s NMSF offer. My husband says that he ran across some story several months ago about certain states being sued by residents for university charter violations by not providing priority resources for in-state students … I can’t verify this incident though.</p>
<p>Whatever is going on, I suppose only those who are truly interested in AU and have the funds available to make up the differences will apply. It remains to be seen how this affects the ranking, ACT score avgs. and admit rates of Auburn going into the future.</p>
<p>Or maybe they want to go from automatically giving everyone a scholarship that meets requirements to giving money to people that really need it.</p>
<p>I think it is probably is a combination of things resulting in the changes to scholarships. They have been very successful in recruiting high stat students. The number of students with ACT scores between 30 - 36 has gone from 10% for the fall 2006 class to 29.6% for the Fall 2010 class. They are going to have a limited amount of scholarship money, and with the increase in the number of students receiving those scholarships, it became time to make changes. They made changes last year with the presidential for OOS students, it went from full tuition to 2/3 tuition. For this coming year, they changed the requirement to get it from needing at least a 33 ACT score to needing at least a 34. The money change is going from 2/3 tuition to $15,000/year(which is slightly more than 2/3 OOS tuition now). What we don’t know is if the change last year to OOS presidential had much effect in their recruitment of those students for the Fall 2011 class. If it did not, they may believe they can continue to attract high stat OOS while reducing the scholarship amounts.</p>
<pre><code> The changes for instate students are minor, as it should be. Being a state school, they should first be trying to attract all the high stat instate students. There was not a change to the NMSF scholarship for instate students, it was full tuition for those applying for Fall 2011.
Auburn has been successful in recruiting OOS. It had been around 41% for freshmen class, til jumping to 43% for Fall 2008 and then 45% for Fall 2010. They may want to get it back to around 41%.
I think the ACT score averages will continue to go up. They had been going up for both instate and out of state students. For the Fall 2010 class, instate avg. was 26.6 ( up from 26.0 in 2009) and OOS was 27.6( up from 26.6 in 2009). Prior to 2009 they had been the same for both instate and out of state students and was on an upward trend.
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<p>Wow… I knew they would be making changes and figured the scholarships wouldn’t be as generous 4 years from now when my second daughter goes to college, but that is a significant change in one year.</p>
<p>For this year, timing is everything for my eldest daughter. Next year she may not have been able to go to Auburn with only 2/3’s OOS for national merit. </p>
<p>Apparently the changes they made this year were not enough to cut back on the number of accepting applicants. Auburn is now one of the top public universities for National Merit Scholars, the average ACT’s have been going up every year for the last 5, the honors department is stretched thin, and then we have the Dorm situation with the Village. Now that the Honor’s college is demanding people can return to Village housing, the University has to limit some of the incoming demand. In a couple of years if the stats start dropping they’ll probably make some additional adjustments.</p>
<p>Without the full tuition perk, I would venture to guess that OOS NMF numbers will fall by more than half. I doubt in-state numbers will change. This will be the last year they can tout one of the highest NMF rates. UA’s yield, however, will go way up.</p>
<p>I’ve noticed the same trend at University of Georgia. A few years ago the students from our school received full instate tuition scholarships from UGA with a 30 ACT. Today a 33 ACT will only receive half instate tuition.</p>
<p>UGA never gave full rides to National Merit Scholars. UGA never gave even 2/3rds tuition to OOS or even in-state students based on ACT or SAT scores. There is virtually no correlation. UGA and other public Georgia educational institutions are/were designed around the Hope scholarship. They consider that enough Merit stuff is given out via the state governement and as a college they do not need to try due to the the demand outstrips the supply. The only full rides to UGA (for academics) are 15-20 elite scholarships. That is the one thing Auburn may have in common shortly.</p>
<p>We were registered for War Eagle Days in June. Found out about the cut in scholarship for National Achievement Scholars so my DS decided that financially it just wont worked. I have cancelled the trip as of today. It is a bummer.</p>
<p>I’m really sorry that Auburn is no longer an option for you. This scholarship situation is a total bummer for upcoming NM, Natl. Achievement, and Natl. Hispanic Scholars.</p>
<p>Best of luck however, in your search process. Thankfully, there are good possibilities out there for those seeking Natl. Merit-related awards.</p>
<p>The Heritage OOS scholly also took a hit. The cut-off used to be ACT scores from 30-32 with a 2/3 scholarship. This amounted to about $14,000 per year which would rise as tuition increases. It now requires a 31-33 ACT score with an award of $10,00 per year. This is a significant cut in money.</p>
<p>The OOS award just below Heritage (Charter) was also cut. I’m not sure about the ACT avg. changing on that one. There were 3 girls from my D’s high school that decided on Auburn – they are the first to decide to attend AU in over 10 years; all were awarded scholarships. I guess this will be a short-lived trend.</p>
<p>They’re not exactly rolling out the welcome mat for next year.</p>
<p>Is it indicated on the scholarship page that the scholarship increases as tuition increases now? Our child will be a 2nd year and there is no increase reflected in her scholarship although tuition has increased</p>
<pre><code>I am assuming you are talking about the award amount listed in tiger i. My D has the National Scholars scholarship and on her account the award amount reflect the increases in tuition & housing for Fall 2011. It maybe that they have not updated it yet for returning students. They may make the change once they verify the GPA requirements have been met to continue scholarship. I would check with the Scholarship Dept.
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<p>Actually, if I am not mistaken, the OOS Charter Scholarship actually INCREASED – it had been $3500 a year and is now increased to $5000 per year. Think the ACT etc stayed the same.</p>