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National Merit Scholarship

lowtech redneck

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So, apparently, this program doesn't give scholarships to otherwise qualified applicants if they haven't taken the PSAT, even if they've already taken their SATs. And now my eldest niece, whose High School councilors failed to inform her of this requirement, is ineligible.

I don't know which group I'm more angry with right now, I'm pretty sure I would violate forum rules if I tried to express it.

Anyway, just in case anyone on this forum knows someone whom this type of information may help, be sure to inform them they need to take the PSATs, even though its an otherwise pointless waste of time. :dry:
 

miss fortune

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we all HAD to take the PSAT... it was a requirement at my school

otherwise I'd have never taken them because I'd already taken the SAT

but yeah, the national merit scholarship is exclusively done through the PSAT... if you score high enough then you have to submit an essay and some recommendations from teachers and things like that for the whole process so that they can weed out everyone until they get the right number :shrug:
 

Coriolis

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So, apparently, this program doesn't give scholarships to otherwise qualified applicants if they haven't taken the PSAT, even if they've already taken their SATs. And now my eldest niece, whose High School councilors failed to inform her of this requirement, is ineligible.

I don't know which group I'm more angry with right now, I'm pretty sure I would violate forum rules if I tried to express it.

Anyway, just in case anyone on this forum knows someone whom this type of information may help, be sure to inform them they need to take the PSATs, even though its an otherwise pointless waste of time. :dry:
At the risk of being discouraging, it probably wouldn't have made any difference. It is hard to become a "national merit finalist", we had 2 in my class of 510 in a well-performing suburban HS, but only a small fraction of those actually get any money from it. Assuming your niece is a good enough student even for this, most universities will deduct the value of any external scholarships from their own financial aid package, so if she would be eligible for any need-based aid, it wouldn't impact her net costs.

PSAT not only serves as the first wicket for National Merit, but also introduces prospective students to the higher ed community. Based on your performance and expressed interests, you will then get mail (often LOTS of it) from schools who think you would be a good fit. Two of us in the aforementioned class of ~510 received invitations to apply to West Point - both of us female. A Jewish classmate was contacted by the local Catholic Seminary. Fortunately he found it humorous rather than insulting.
 

Ursa

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Does your niece's high school have a career center? If so, I urge her to frequent it. The career center at my high school had loads of information both on computers and in print on all sorts of scholarships. There were more scholarship opportunities than I could shake a stick at. Some of them simply required writing a really excellent essay on a prescribed topic. Not qualifying for the National Merit Scholarship is not really that terrible; there are so many other ways to acquire scholarship money.

If she's looking for something great to put on her application forms, then extra-curricular activities are the way to go. Volunteer for the needy, start or join a club, etc. Don't worry; your niece still has lots of options to help her move forward.
 

highlander

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So, apparently, this program doesn't give scholarships to otherwise qualified applicants if they haven't taken the PSAT, even if they've already taken their SATs. And now my eldest niece, whose High School councilors failed to inform her of this requirement, is ineligible.

I don't know which group I'm more angry with right now, I'm pretty sure I would violate forum rules if I tried to express it.

Anyway, just in case anyone on this forum knows someone whom this type of information may help, be sure to inform them they need to take the PSATs, even though its an otherwise pointless waste of time. :dry:

There was this guy and myself who got the highest scores on the PSAT in our high school. It meant something but I don't remember exactly what. All I remember is we got called into the counselor's office and I never told my mom, which she seemed offended about. I was supposed to take the SAT later but overslept.
 

SearchingforPeace

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There was this guy and myself who got the highest scores on the PSAT in our high school. It meant something but I don't remember exactly what. All I remember is we got called into the counselor's office and I never told my mom, which she seemed offended about. I was supposed to take the SAT later but overslept.

I almost missed the ACT. I arrived seconds before it would have been too late.... I might have done that for another of these tests as well....
 

ceecee

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At the risk of being discouraging, it probably wouldn't have made any difference. It is hard to become a "national merit finalist", we had 2 in my class of 510 in a well-performing suburban HS, but only a small fraction of those actually get any money from it. Assuming your niece is a good enough student even for this, most universities will deduct the value of any external scholarships from their own financial aid package, so if she would be eligible for any need-based aid, it wouldn't impact her net costs.

Yep. We went through all this with our daughter. She had three finalist universities with the program she wanted and they all told us the same thing. She never would have seen any money as a merit finalist and I think there was 1 in her graduating class (she was third in her class). She ended up with a very decent scholarship. Not to sound cold about the OP but as a parent, it's on you to find out what's required, not them to inform you.
 

thepink-cloakedninja

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My sister got to take the SAT twice, instead. :/ but it was a weird situation because she was home schooled.
 

Ursa

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Not to sound cold about the OP but as a parent, it's on you to find out what's required, not them to inform you.

Or maybe on the student as well. It's a good life lesson about personal responsibility.
 

ceecee

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Or maybe on the student as well. It's a good life lesson about personal responsibility.

It's called a teaching moment. Parent to child. I don't expect a 16 year old to be able to navigate that kind of bureaucracy on their own.
 

lowtech redneck

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Not to sound cold about the OP but as a parent, it's on you to find out what's required, not them to inform you.

Fair enough.

At least her younger siblings know what to expect now, and it was the money that was the biggest issue, so it seems that the news is not as bad as I initially feared.
 

Ursa

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It's called a teaching moment. Parent to child. I don't expect a 16 year old to be able to navigate that kind of bureaucracy on their own.

The bureaucracy of Googling it? Come on.
 

ceecee

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The bureaucracy of Googling it? Come on.

The bureaucracy of...

Applying for scholarships, deadlines, etc
Visiting campuses
Speaking with the schools of <whatever the major is>
And all the paperwork required. Lab fees, books and other miscellaneous not included in a scholarship.

How many children have you put into college? It's more than googling.
 

Ursa

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The bureaucracy of...

Applying for scholarships, deadlines, etc
Visiting campuses
Speaking with the schools of <whatever the major is>
And all the paperwork required. Lab fees, books and other miscellaneous not included in a scholarship.

How many children have you put into college? It's more than googling.

I put myself into college doing just that without someone to hold my hand. Personal anecdotes aren't going to help you here.

The conversation is about a specific scholarship and not college anyhow. That information is often online. Contact us sections of sites are useful too.
 

Coriolis

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I put myself into college doing just that without someone to hold my hand. Personal anecdotes aren't going to help you here.

The conversation is about a specific scholarship and not college anyhow. That information is often online. Contact us sections of sites are useful too.
We might as well get rid of school guidance counselors, then, if all relevant info is online for students to find on their own. Would save the public schools a few dollars.
 

Ursa

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We might as well get rid of school guidance counselors, then, if all relevant info is online for students to find on their own. Would save the public schools a few dollars.

No, I wouldn't advocate this measure.

My high school served around 1,000 students while I was there. The school had around five or six standard guidance counselors, and each one was charged with a certain amount of students based on alphabetical order of surnames. These counselors had a lot of very basic information and training. Mine helped me cope with my parents' divorce. This is the upside to counselors.

The problem was that these counselors, on account of their basic training, really did not have a lot of specific information. They were trained to help students with personal problems and to give them very basic information on what scholarships are and on how to apply to colleges. I asked my counselor about admission requirements to a local university, and her response was to Google it. Some of my friends had a different counselor, and she gave them misinformation.

I suspect this is the same for most high school counselors, not only due to my experience and the OP, but because a lot of my friends whom I did not meet in high school had similar experiences. My counselor at my university is not much help either beyond the basics. Students are left to take responsibility for their own futures by showing initiative by contacting the actual people who can help them, whether these people are at a career fair or whether these people are across an ocean at another university's graduate or post-graduate admissions office.

High school guidance counselors can be very helpful in helping students solve or cope with personal problems. I just wouldn't trust them to be experts at scholarships and admissions - at least public schools. And it really isn't that difficult to e-mail admissions at the college you are thinking about attending.

I realize that it sounds as though I am being harsh on high school students. I think that is the unfortunate result of a socio-political climate - perhaps in reaction to the self-centered and emotionally absent parenting style of the Baby Boomers (e.g. Hippies, Vietnam veterans with PTSD) - in which minors are often supervised and protected to a fault, whether through completing some of a child's responsibilities for them, insisting they have a limited capacity for exercising their rational autonomy when it comes to certain responsibilities (e.g. "High school upperclassmen cannot handle applying for a scholarship or for college," sounds like a put-down and a misinformed remark) or telling a minor that their legitimate failure to take responsibility was mostly the fault of some other party.

I think that upperclassmen, when they want something, can get it done, though they may stumble. My parents had faith that I could use my head, and they refused to help me with anything unless I truly, deeply needed it. I had to make a case, and I had to show that I tried to the very best of my ability first. Everything turned out fine, and I was made a better person on account of having those responsibilities and expectations placed on me. High school students are not that stupid, and it doesn't serve them well to tell them that they need help when they actually do not. That contributes to learned helplessness.

I once trusted my guidance counselors on factual things, and they let me down. It was a hard life lesson that even authority figures can be unreliable, and it was a hard life lesson that when you want something, you often have to learn to be resourceful and to take as much responsibility for getting it as possible, because when you are an adult, most times no one will hold your hand and help you. Hard lessons make people, and I appreciate them.
 
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