<p>I got the scholarship letter about two weeks after the acceptance letter.</p>
<p>I’m from New Mexico, and I’m willing to bet that my essay had a hand in my receiving of the award. It’s definitely worth sending along the optional essay. I just used my common app one, which had already been through three or four rounds of revision, so it was pretty solid.</p>
<p>I also had fairly high tests scores and GPA.</p>
<p>Good luck to all!</p>
<p>LurkNessMonster, my greatest worry in relation to Pitt is that it doesn’t have a very campusy campus (if you know what I mean)… I’m afraid I’ve fallen in love with the brick and ivy of my top schools and I don’t know how I’d do in a more urban college environment. What does your daughter think of the campus?</p>