Texas Tech is 100% Full Cost of Attendance scholarship for NMF. A traditional college experience. Have you/your D toured UT Dallas? A great school for sure, but very different, a great school for the right kid (all about fit there).
Given your daughter’s debate experience, I would recommend checking about possible debate scholarships at Kentucky. My son’s friend did not have great grades nor test scores but was a national champion in debate, and ended up with what I think is a full ride at Kentucky.
If she’d be willing to consider a small-town Minnesota LAC, Gustavus could be an option. It’s not guaranteed but they do offer some NMFs full-tuition, and their room & board is in the $10K range.
I don’t have more scholarship suggestions, but to qualify for some of the NMF scholarships the student must select the school as their first choice in the application documents…make sure to closely read each college’s requirements and detailed instructions. https://www.nationalmerit.org/s/1758/interior.aspx?sid=1758&gid=2&pgid=424
Yes, @Mwfan1921, it’s important to connect all the dots and name the right school as your first choice with the National Merit Scholarship Corp. However, for most of the schools, you just have to name the school by May 1 – leaving plenty of time to review scholarship offers before deciding. Again, definitely check with each school about its specific requirements and whether it’s better to name first choice earlier (in case there are scholarship fund limits, etc.).
@itsgettingreal17 While I agree that OU’s package is no longer as big as it was - though next year’s package is $5500 higher than this year’s - I offered it as school to consider as it seems to meet the criteria the student and family are looking for and they don’t need full COA. Given that “fit” has been mentioned as a priority, I still think that OU is worth at least a cursory look.
Agree … student really needs to be paying attention and communicating with the school during the admissions process. If a school does not know that you are NMSF you may not get the appropriate merit scholarship … and you can’t surprise them later and expect to get it.
For Fordham, St. Johns and Temple they have selection areas sometimes in the common app final submission area and in other cases need to add to their portal after submitting
@mamag2855 thanks for the suggestion of U of Richmond. I had originally been hesitant myself as I had wanted her to be in a bigger school, but this just might be a good fit for her …
Just to add, she got her first admittance today, UNLV, wasn’t a surprise, but only 24 hours from time she applied, also accepted into their honors program. Merit offers are not made until after 12/1 … between NMF/Presidential and the NV Millenium (which can be stacked based on her stats) we have been told scholarships will exceed billed tuition/R&B and excess is refundable to student
U KY is 10K for 1st year ONLY for NMF, last year it was for 2 years, I bet next year it will not be offered at all. Yes the tuition is covered by NMF but again only 10K towards housing for 1st year only.
Keep in mind that some scholarships can be taxable to the student. That can be a nasty surprise when on a tight budget.
@CrackintoPieces just throwing this out there. Southwest has direct flights from Vegas to Lubbock. and again Texas Tech has the nations most generous NMF scholarship at 100% full cost of attendance. and traditional college experience.
Cheap flights that are direct are a good thing!
On taxes, yeah it seems any scholarship that is for costs beyond tuition, books, fees, labs is taxable … so room and board … As if this whole endeavor isn’t complicated enough!
There are quite a few schools in the midwest that are similar to NE LACs where she would be likely to get merit aid, even if it is not labeled as NMSF scholarship. Denison, Miami of Ohio (would “public ivy” help sell her?), Univeristy of Cincinnati (I didn’t see a major listed, but their co-op program is amazing) if she is STEM, Case Western.
New College in FL would be full-ride but is small like a LAC.
To the original poster…My daughter is now a freshman at UCF. Like you, we were in a similar money situation where we had nothing saved and would not get financial aid yet really wanted her to stay in New England. She was a NM Scholar, Valedictorian, and lots of other great stuff about her. In the end, after more research than I ever imagined, she agreed that she wanted to be taking advantage of the full ride and there went all of the New England schools out the door. It was a hard pill for us to swallow at first. She wants to go on to Medical School so knew it was more practical not to go into debt for undergrad. We started narrowing down the full ride National Merit offers and fell in love with the Honors College at UCF. It did help that we have some familiarity with FL (just by vacationing) but it was a complete shock to her system this fall to get used to the weather. She went through some very tough homesick weeks at the start but I cannot say enough good things about what the Honors College and the National Merit perks have brought to her. Honestly I would not have considered UCF if it were not for the Honors College (just too big and classes too large and housing not guaranteed) but the Honors College (an automatic for any NMF) makes it seem like a small 2000 person college within a larger university. Anyway, if FL is absolutely OUT then disregard my long message, but if you are “on the fence” in any way, this might be the answer for you that it was for us…
@FrozenMaineMom , I am so in favor of UCF … I continue to hear wonderful things from many different people, including some of daughter’s friends who are now enrolled in the Honors College. Additionally, we have family in FL just a little over an hour away so that would also be nice.
Encouraged daughter to look again at the school … will see what she does.
I want the final decision to be hers, it is her education and her future, not mine, I am not one of those parents who try to live vicariously through their kid and this is one of those first major decisions of adulthood so I want her to own it.
I agree that if you can do undergrad for free doing anything else would be foolish. She is basically on board with that, but still has her fancy named school dreams that she will not let go of.
@CrackintoPieces I totally get that it is hard to let go of the fancy named schools that she has probably been thinking about for years. We had that issue too… My dad went to Yale and since she was a little girl she would say that was where she was going. We also had a level of “embarrassment” that she felt each time she asked where she was applying to. People can be so ignorant and when they would ask and she would say schools like UCF, they immediately were like “what? really?” as they expected an Ivy league or one of the big names in New England. I had to explain to her over and over that it did not matter what people thought and that if they knew she was offered a full ride due to her hard work that they would understand her choice but she couldn’t exactly answer each time with “yep, I’m going for free and in fact, they are giving me a incredible offer that I cannot pass up”… Also, I had to remind her that although classmates of hers were applying to some of the more well known schools, that in a years time nobody would remember where anyone went! It seems so important to them at the time they are seniors making these huge decisions and the peer pressure of hearing the big name schools can be hard to ignore…but I know in our case, that a year later and she cannot even remember where most of the other kids went nor does she care as she is happy where she is and thrilled and proud not to be building a penny of debt. Obviously if she felt she could NOT go to FL or the other schools offering full rides I would not have made her go. I have enough of my own debt to take on more, so it would have been our state university as choice B!
@FrozenMaineMom, did she consider any other school before finalizing UCF? Like USF, UTD etc? My DD20 from MA is on the same boat. She is little hesitant to go south but slowly warming to the idea.
@tnknes At first she really liked what she learned about UTD but then did not end up going for a tour there. We felt familiarity of Florida and a little closer to home with quick/cheap flights home was an important factor for us. She did go tour USF with my husband and liked it quite a bit until she went to UCF and then felt there was no comparison. She felt the honors college and living scenario made the choice an easy one.
A number of Texas schools also offer full COA, Texas Tech, UT Tyler, UT Arlington, UNT etc. I think Arizona State does as well. I know she doesn’t want to consider Florida schools, but my daughter loves UCF.