Semi/Finalist chances with lowish GPA?

mmom99
Fri, 13 Dec 2019 18:27:06 +0000

From what I’ve read (a lot!), “one C” is the grey zone. That said, I’d hope/guess that a C in 9th or 10th grade is likely less harmful than one later on. Also, you do have an opportunity to “explain” circumstances in the application for NMF. Be sure to look for that and help your son write up an explanation along the lines of what you shared above. Also be sure to chat with his guidance counselor (who fills out a lot of stuff in the application process) and make sure they’re on board and also understand the circumstances of the C and why he’s doing so much better now.

Also, there are plenty of great automatic scholarships for high SAT or ACT scores. Alabama offers up to nearly full tuition for high scores (along with 3.5 GPA if that can be accomplished by application time) and 15k/yr (about half tuition) for just the 3.0. Your kid should definitely be taking the ACT and SAT seriously and try to replicate that outstanding PSAT score on one or both of those exams, too.

Meanwhile, of course, hopefully he’s well focused on his grades from here on out, too, which it sounds like he’s already well on track for.

I’ve think I’ve seen some full tuition or maybe even full ride scholarships for NMSF, so that would also be a thing to check out, since NMSF doesn’t have any other qualifiers – it’ll be automatic based on just the PSAT score.