what's most important for merit scholarships?

[Columbia_Student]

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@alamemom

So you are saying these students are extrememely well qualified for the scholarships on merit. And you are saying that some students who get merit scholarships qualify for need-based financial aid. The conclusion you come up with is that the main reason those particular students were awarded the scholarships was because they qualify for financial aid.</p>

<p>A conlusion this is called “simple logic” and any high schooler knows it is faulty. Your “argument” is not supported and it makes no sense. USC has clearly said these are merit scholarships. Your suggestion - from your own post - that students who were also accepted at HYP needed “help” of qualifying for financial aid to get a scholarship at USC can’t even be addressed with a straight face.

10 characters</p>

<p>What I’m saying despite what USC claims, a lot of colleges claim a lot of things and not just USC, the pool for merit aid seems to overlap the pool of financial aid. Given 2 equal candicates(if there are such thing), when it comes down to candidate one(super stats, billionaire’s son) versus candidate two(super stats, dirtpoor’s son), candidate two will win the trustree scholarship.</p>

<p>You seem to take the word “help” out of context. This is what I mean.
From your previous post you wrote

It is high-achieving students who don’t qualify for financial aid that would be attracted by the scholarships.

I think it’s rather

It is high-achieving students who also qualify for financial aid that would be attracted by the scholarships.

Because they don’t have to file for financial aid every year and financial aid varies from year to year while merit aid doesn’t, you can always count on it provides that you keep up with a B average. Unless we get to examine USC records on these it’s hard to tell that it’s not doing that.</p>