<p>@originalthought: No one knows how they choose the merit award winners any more. The most information that can be found is the simple description from their site: “the award will be offered to the top students in the admitted pool who demonstrate superior academic achievement and ability to contribute to the college community”.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re using it as a recruitment tool for minorities these days. Not an entirely bad objective since Mudd is rather lacking in diversity (still a million times better than my hometown though!), but you have much better scores than I do, so it’s kind of sad that I have the scholarship and you won’t.</p>