I daresay, MOST school scholarships are NOT reassigned. Of those that are, alternate lists are there, and the awards can be assigned at the tail end of the process in such cases. Sometimes, alternates are even so told.
Sometimes, it’s prudent to hold onto some awards. I know a case where the student ended up at a school that he declined early in the process along with the award, and though was able to regain admissions, not the scholarship. I am not talking about ED or other situations where the stipulations are there that you do let other schools and organizations know of such acceptances, but where it is not required, and where it could be wise to wait until the whole thing is over.
Scholarships aren’t necessarily reassigned, but if for 10 scholarships offers historically 3 students took it up then 7 are expected to turn it down for every 10 offers.
@MYOS1634: “why announce money for colleges students won’t go to?”
I suspect that it relates to marketing – explicit or implicit – by the schools involved, as in, “We do such a great job in preparing our students for college, look how much money we can save you in the future IF you pay the money now to send your kids to our school!” For public schools, it may be not quite as blatant, but if students can transfer in or out of public schools (such as magnet or charter schools), then some of those public schools might have a vested interest in publicizing how much money their students receive from colleges and universities, so as to attract better students from the available pool of public school children.
I know that our high school asks the kids to report how much scholarship $$ they were awarded…I think the school wants to say that our students were offered $800,000 in scholarships this year!
I don’t think that many students will do what the OP did because it takes too much work. The school does not announce this information on a per-student basis.
But does total scholarship amount awarded measure? Does it mean the students are more amazing? I think it strongly correlates with the volume and type of colleges being applied to. Doesn’t necessarily reflect quality. The kid who applies just to Harvard and Yale and gets in will be a big zero according to this. Also how do you know the scholarship is reassigned to the same students who would have received them if the school not had false applicants. I think it encourages the wrong behavior. If you must brag, reporting the average award amount per school instead would dissuade students from applying to a large number of schools they do not care about.
Our high school does the same thing. I asked one of the guidance counselors why this is. She told me that our school district publicizes how much scholarship money each school’s senior class is offered. The schools get competitive about it and encourage the students to report all scholarships offered, no matter how small.
As far as I can tell, students here have not started competing against one another to get the most offered money. At this point, it’s just been about getting the funds to pay for college.
wrt to Ivy league and top LACs: I imagine the schools would mix “institutional financial aid” and “scholarships”, regardless of wording (ie., money you don’t have to pay back and isn’t federal = “scholarship”)
It doesn’t sound like the school’s trying to “measure” anything, they just want to add up amounts to get a higher aggregate than the other schools in their district…
Which will prove… The students might apply to more schools, apply to more schools with high auto merit, have more financial need or be smarter and better supported in the college app process. Achievement stats are already known for each school but if it can be measured people will want to compete.
This “applying to see how much total $ you can get offered” is IMO, one of the most ridiculous (and frankly, disheartening) college trends I’ve ever heard of.
I don’t care of that’s “how it’s done in Texas”…still seems like a pointless, ego-driven exercise.
@SevenDad, just for clarification, my comment to another poster which said, “This is how it’s done in Texas” addressed his/her comment : (direct quote including spelling/typos) “Sorry but this is so strange. Don’t you have access to NPC and excel worksheets in Texas? Isn’t a lot of the money from automatic merit scholarship? And like siliconvalleymom said, Why is it important to know pakages for colleges not be attended? The most prestiguous don’t even offer merit.”
My comment was not intended to justify the original poster, or anyone else who might have applied for scholarship money just to “beat a record”. My intention was to explain that in Texas, it is a common practice for school districts and private schools to publish the total amount of scholarships offered to a graduating class.
Although I certainly can’t speak for everyone in Texas, I feel comfortable stating that in general, neither Texas schools, nor teachers/parents/students support or encourage applying for scholarships at schools you have zero intention of attending just to increase or “pad” a scholarship total.
@Monkeygirl1337, don’t waste any worry on the schools that offered free apps. They do that for their own benefit. A university’s ranking is improved by having lots of applicants and a lower acceptance rate. It’s for that same reason that UChicago, Yale, Princeton, etc., write non-stop to HS seniors. They want them to apply even if they have no chance of acceptance. Just read here on CC how many parents think their kids are being “recruited” and have a chance just because a UChicago flyer arrived in the mail, or a “free app” email showed up in the inbox. The schools wanted you to apply, you did, they of their own volition accepted you and offered you money. Now graciously advise them that you will not attend, and your scholarship money will all be used by someone. Sounds like the scholarships you were offered were merit based anyway, and did not affect the recipients of need-based scholarships.
I just want to make it clear that I would go anywhere for all tuition and a major part of living expenses. The free apps where a way to help the school and ensure I would be debt free. After hearing back from all the schools they will give the money to this class. The yield rates for these schools is really low and with only 50,000 students in the country with my scores or higher in my class they can’t expect to get a lot when better schools will get the bulk of the group.