Interesting and good for WPI! Although I am delighted that my 2 oldest children have been recipients of merit scholarships from WPI, I found it odd that a test optional school that boasts such a strong philosophy for being test optional would then offer a NM scholarship. Seemed a little hypocritical. The good news is that WPI is fairly generous with merit scholarships to top students, so if your child becomes a NM finalist and has the rest of the package (grades, class rank, ECs, experiences, etc), they will likely be offered decent merit. As for the disagreement of some regarding automatic merit for val / sal, keep in mind that, at least in my experience, here in New England, schools that rank typically have 1 Val (student ranked #1) and 1 Sal (student ranked #2). As stated in the linked article, WPI’s message is pretty clear:
“… our intent was to send a clear message to students, their families, and our colleagues in college counseling: Admissions decisions at Worcester Polytechnic Institute are based on how students perform academically in four years of high school; they are not based on how they scored one Saturday morning on a four-hour test.”
As a lifelong New Englander, I couldn’t disagree more with Hebegebe’s assessment in post #1. All of the schools s/he mentions are very good but comparing WPI to Northeastern and BU is comparing apples to oranges. Northeastern and BU are large, urban research universities with embedded engineering schools. WPI, on the other hand, is a medium sized engineering school that also offers some other programs. So much of which school is “better” comes down to fit. In my household, WPI has been the superior choice compared to Northeastern or BU. Child # 1 chose WPI over Northeastern, RPI, and other selective schools. Child #2 wrote off Northeastern early in the process (after being accepted as a NM finalist) but kept WPI in the top 3. He ended up at UChicago when he decided to study math and physics as opposed to engineering. We’re going through the process with child #3 now who plans to study engineering. WPI and Northeastern are both on her list. She tends to gravitate toward larger, more urban schools, so it will be interesting to see where she ends up (and where she gets accepted!).
As far as national name recognition, my recent WPI grad was delighted to see that the Wall Street Journal recently ranked WPI as the #1 school combining research and teaching. http://webreprints.djreprints.com/3958800474422.html
Although the average person on the street in Ohio or Oregon may not be familiar with the school, hiring managers and grad school admissions committees from across the country sure seem to be so I’m fine with the average person being clueless. Having another kiddo at U Chicago, we’re used to it!