National Merit Scholarship Puns

When are we notified? Do we get to go to Explore USC? Just kinda confused.

I'm trying to decide how hard to try to be a national merit semifinalist. Is it hard to become a finalist after qualifying?

Hi everyone!! I was hoping someone could give clarification about USCs scholarship policies for National Merit scholars

USC gives guaranteed half tuition to any National Merit Finalist who declares USC their first choice, but they also say to everyone that you must have your application submitted by Dec 1 to be considered for merit scholarships

So my question is: if I submit my app after Dec 1 but declare USC my first choice on National Merit app, could I still receive the half tuition??

Thanks so much!!

I was under the impression that the national merit semifinalist is given based off of top 1 percent but I might be wrong. Please inform me. Thanks :)

If I get Finalist but don't win one of the scholarships from the National Merit Scholarship Corporation do I still count as a "national merit scholar" at UTD? Also can anyone tell me when they received an official offer from UTD for finalist?

PSAT scores come out soon and I have been thinking about the National Merit scholarship; I know that 15,000 semifinalists out of 16,000 go on to become finalists, so that part can't be too hard. It seems that only 7,000 or so finalists actually get the scholarship however. How do you get from being a finalist to being a scholar and why is this process seemingly so difficult?

Hi, I'm a national merit semifinalist from Texas, and I'm really interested in going to WSU if ever I don't advance to finalist. I was wondering if there are other people here on the full tuition scholarship. How much do you guys pay out of pocket?

Or will this look bad?

Hey All,

Please comment your index and whether or not you make the National Merit Scholarship cutoff. Also included your state. This way we can figure out the cutoffs for each state.

For example, I have a friend who lives in Iowa and made the cutoff at 211, so we now we know that the Iowa cutoff is 211- 207. (The reason 207 is the minimum is because the commended cutoff is 207 and the reason the max is 211 is because if the cutoff was higher than 211 he would not have made it.)

As you guys comment, I will continue to update this throughout the day.

Also, please share this with your friends so we can get collect as much info as possible.

Iowa: 207-211

North Carolina: 220 - 227

Tennessee: 207-219

Nevada: 207 -214

Connecticut : 207 (probably higher) -223

Oklahoma: 207 - 210

Illinois: 207 - 221

New York: 218 (Rumored, but probably higher)

Texas: 219 (leaked)

Utah: 207 - 216

Ohio - 216 (leaked)

Michigan: 218 (leaked)

California: 220 (leaked)

Florida 216 or 217

Virginia 221-227

Mississippi : 207 - 214

Indiana: 207-215

Missouri: 207 - 215

West Virginia: 207 - 210

Georgia: 207 - 221

Kentucky: 207 - 213

Pennsylvania: 219 (likely)

Alabama: 207-214

Territories: 207

Source for Leaked States: https://mcelroytutoring.com/blog-post.php?id=5157

Hi, I'm a national merit semifinalist and have been considering if I should change my top college choice.

I'm in Indiana and have Purdue currently selected as my top choice in the National Merit Scholarship. This is my top instate choice but I'm considering changing my national merit selection to a different college because it seems Purdue only offers $500 a year for national merit as far as I can tell. Purdue doesn't seem to be very giving for scholarships and worse is I have a relatively high EFC even though my parents don't plan to contribute anything more than maybe 2,000.

My other realistic choice for instate that I could pick would be IU. This isn't strictly ideal as I'm aiming for tech but I have been direct admitted to Luddy and Hutton Honors College at IU, been invited to complete the SSA, and been given a preliminary merit scholarship so I have a good chance at more scholarships there. IU seems to offer 1,000 to 2,000 a year for the national merit college scholarships so it seems better but is not my top choice for sure.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated and I will answer any questions. Thanks!

Class of 2023 students who took the qualifying PSAT/NMSQT this fall might find the following links helpful:

• National Merit Scholarship Corporation Student Guide — The NMSC's official guide includes information about competition steps/timeline, entry requirements, alternate entry, and much more.
• National Merit Scholarship Corporation Guide to the National Merit Scholarship Program — The guide linked here (for the class of 2022) will not be updated for the class of 2023 until later in the year, but in the meantime, students who are likely Semifinalists might find answers to their questions about what the application process involves.
• Compass Prep's National Merit Semifinalist Cutoffs Class of 2023 blog post — Art Sawyer estimates the cutoff ranges and most likely cutoff scores for each state and provides analysis and insights into this year's scholarship program. He updates this post periodically as new information becomes available.
• Compass Prep's Historical National Merit Cutoffs 2008 to Present blog post — Art Sawyer compiles each state's National Merit cutoffs since 2008 in a searchable table.

National Merit semi-finalist applying to be finalist.

On the application under the section of College and Career Readiness, there's a question whether I plan to attend a regionally accredited college in the United States (which I do) and what college. I haven't received any acceptances so I obviously don't know so would I just put in my ED school here or what?

title

Hi everyone,

Here are links to a list of colleges that offer scholarships to National Merit semi finalists and finalists along with a link to each college website to help 2022 National Merit students -

The Extra Mile College Blog

https://www.extramilecac.com/post/national-merit-scholarship

College Transition Blog

https://www.collegetransitions.com/dataverse/national-merit-scholarships/

This posting is to consolidate the NMSF list by state. If you come across full lists, please post in the comments section.

Arkansas

Ohio

https://www.reddit.com/user/lil-catfish/ - has many other states

Title. Thanks for responding!

What's up! Just wanted to let you guys know that UCF recently updated their National Merit Scholarship packages.

You can find the newsletter here for more details!

Basically, the National Merit Scholarship at UCF for OOS students is no longer guaranteed, nor will it cover full COA.

The scholarship is limited to 40 OOS students. It includes the usual Burnett/LEAD, laptop, etc. benefits offered, but the package has changed to $80,000 (over 4 years, I believe) plus a waiver of non-Florida fees for tuition. This is not as much as the COA offered before, but it should still cover a lot of the cost at UCF.

I hope this helps! Have a great day y'all :D

For instance, I don't really quite understand why someone with a perfect ACT/SAT score will get a scholarship package that is worth less $$ as a National Merit Finalist the University of Alabama. Similarly, many schools that don't offer full rides for typically excellent students do offer full rides to National Merit Finalists.

For all those waiting for results from the Army October 18-22 board, I spoke with a PMS today, and learned that the entire GASP program (which as far as i’ve gathered keeps track of all the packets boarded this cycle and their corresponding scores), went down sometime between the 23rd and the 4th. Individual programs already have the number of merit scholarships allotted to each program, and the names of the applicants attached to each scholarship. If you have any admissions deadlines, perhaps consider reaching out to your schools and asking if they unofficially have something for you. Keep in mind that everything is unofficial until you get the email and your portal is updated.

Update: My scholarships were released 11/5, so go check your portals!

Got notified today that I'm a semifinalist. What does the process look like now? will there be things I need to do? any other things considered beyond my SAT score?

Hi! I am a prospective Northeastern student who was named a National Merit Semifinalist (probable finalist). I've read conflicting information online about the scholarship amount...I've seen 35k and 40k per year. Can anyone clarify how much they received as a NMF? Does this apply directly to tuition or can it be applied to room & board if I'm doing an extra co-op due to AP credits?

Any info is greatly appreciated!!

Does anyone know what Florida schools are offering for national merit now that Benacquisto scholarship is gone? Are schools like UCF still offering COA?

Hi, I'm a senior and got national merit semifinalist, could you guys tell me some good engineering schools that give decent scholarships for it?

Thank you!

So,,, I qualified as a national merit scholarship semifinalist, but I'm lowkey confused about the essay. I was gonna just use my common app essay edited down for length for my scholarship essay cause my college counselor said my essay was good. I wrote about an experience I had learning all about geography one summer. I asked my counselor if I could use that, and she said she thinks the scholarship essay should be more personal, deeper, or emotional. Problem is I only have about a week to write it, and I'm lazy, so just not really in the mood to write and edit a whole long essay with all the supplementals I also have to do. So I guess what I'm asking is could I just use my common app essay since it talked about an experience, and if I did, would I have a significantly lower chance of actually getting money (not just becoming a finalist) :)

My personal statement was 649 words with about 3.6k characters, leaving the last 5 sentences cut out. I delete 300 characters and the entirety of one plot point in my essay, leaving me with 3.3k, and those SAME 5 sentences were still cut out in the preview.

For reference, the website says "We estimate your essay should be about 3,500 characters." couldn't they just be normal and have a set character count, like college essays?

I'm a National Merit Semifinalist currently, with 1480 on the PSAT. I was wondering if I could reformat my CommonApp essay, make sure it still reads well and conveys my message thoroughly, and still have a shot at one of the scholarships. Do colleges see your national merit essay, and can NMSC see your CommonApp essay? Does it look bad if I reuse my CommonApp essay? Thanks in advance!

basically title, it's the 375 that's given every semester. last year it got disbursed early september so i'm wondering if anyone else has gotten it yet. thanks!

I’m a bit confused about the titles that come along with this process. Thanks.

"NOTE: In addition to NMSC's Selection Committee, your parent/guardian, high school official, potential corporate sponsors, and NMSC staff will have access to your essay."

How exactly does this work? How would my parents be able to access my personal statement? I want to re-work my personal statement to fit in the essay, but I don't want to out myself to my parents.

Hello all!

I have the Benacquisto Scholarship for NMS and was wondering what the credit limit was that it covered. I know it says up to 5 years and I'd been considering adding a 5th year so I can get a double major, but I didn't know if the scholarship would run dry before I could do that due to excess credits.

Any info/past experiences would be helpful as finaid seems to not have a direct answer.

Thanks!

Hello! I made a free tool to help National Merit & National Recognition Program scholars find merit scholarships: [Student Money Match] www.studentmoneymatch.com

Let me know if you have any feedback or comments on improvement! Thank you:)

Is it alright if you just reuse your common app essay?