I’m currently a junior in high school who would like to earn a degree in Mech E and Math as a double major, or major in Mech E and minor in math. I live in Louisiana, which isn’t among the best states for a college degree in engineering. Not that there’s anything wrong with the universities here, but I feel as if I’m a higher caliber student than what the colleges here can offer me.
My first choice for a college as of now is the University of Texas at Austin, which is relatively close to my hometown, and is ranked highly on both engineering and mathematics lists. I know that admissions for out of state students is competitive there, but I feel that I have what it takes to get in.
It’s paying for out-of-state tuition that is the issue. I can’t afford the cost of out-of-state tuition, and I’ll undoubtedly have to apply for scholarships. So my first question is, what are my chances of earning a scholarship given my credentials (which will come later in the post)?
I was doing more research on the Cockrell School of Engineering webpage and found another site about getting your out-of-state tuition waived and instead paying in-state tuition. This is what they said verbatim:
“To be eligible for an out-of-state tuition waiver, a student must receive an academically competitive scholarship or fellowship of $1,000 or more during an academic year. This means that the scholarship must be awarded competitively, considering both in-state and out-of-state students equally. The award must come from Cockrell School or university resources, not an external source such as a student’s high school or home country.Undergraduate students meeting the eligibility requirements RARELY receive a tuition waiver. Out-of-state tuition waivers are extremely difficult to obtain because the Cockrell School is allotted very few waivers for undergraduates each year.There is no application process for waivers. We award waivers automatically to eligible students with the highest academics. Recipients are notified in their scholarship award letter if they are selected to receive a waiver.”
Given this information, here are my basic credentials:
I’m in the top 10% of my class (not sure of actual rank) with a 4.0 GPA unweighted and a GPA over 4.0 weighted (once again not sure of an exact number). I’ve taken one AP class so far and made a 5 on the exam. This year I’m in three AP courses which I plan on making either 4’s or 5’s on, and next year I’ll take 3-4 more AP courses with the same intentions. I took the ACT my sophomore year and made a 33, I have yet to take it during my junior year. I also plan on taking the SAT this year as well, and I made a 1480 out of 1520 on the PSAT, qualifying for the National Merit Scholar competition.
So will a 4.0+ GPA student with a 33 (as of now) ACT score and (probably) a comparatively high SAT score and 7 AP classes under his belt be considered prime material for the waiver? If not, I can fit up to two more AP classes into my senior schedule but beyond that I don’t know what else to do. More than anything I’d just like to know mu chances of attaining a scholarship or ideally even a tuition waiver.
Thanks for reading all that, by the way. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.