<p>We applied to over a dozen schools and not one of them took away any academic money just because she was going into MT. Now, some schools will “stack” any talent scholarships on top of merit money, (most of ours did) but once in a while, they don’t stack - at one school, they told her she’d get X amount based on all her stats, and then she auditioned and got talent money too, but the financial aid office said they’d use that talent money to make up part of that number. 
They said that after the fafsas and other awards that they might possibly be able to give her X PLUS her talent money, but I figured the way things are currently it won’t happen. It ended up not being her first choice school anyway.</p>
<p>But most of the time I think they do stack. All our other ones did. And being in MT, if anything, helped, because often she got both merit AND talent money.</p>
<p>I am glad your grades are so good. Keep those up. In almost every case, her merit money for grades far eclipsed the talent money. Not because she didn’t do well, but because most programs don’t really give big talent awards. At the one school she auditioned at that did not have low cap for talent, she did get a much bigger award, which was very nice. But that school gave her a smaller merit. Arg. The merit was awarded long before the talent, so one had nothing to do with the other. Had her scores been just a leeeetle bit higher, it would have pushed her into a different category at this particular school and she would have had a bigger award.</p>
<p>So - I will repeat the advice I give out - do the best you can with good grades, because they might mean you can actually afford to go to that dream school when it accepts you. Or, even to your good second choice school.</p>