Best Major Universities for National Merit Scholarship Funding

http://publicuniversityhonors.com/2013/04/20/best-major-universities-for-national-merit-scholarship-funding/

 

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Best Major Universities for National Merit Scholarship Funding

Posted on April 20, 2013 by Honorsadmin

About 3.5 million students take the PSAT during their junior year in high school, at the latest, and of these approximately 8,300 may be selected as winners of national merit scholarships.   Another 50,000 reach “commended” status, and about 15,000 are “semifinalists.”

But the ground rules for allocating institutional (college) funds for merit scholars have changed significantly over the last few years.  With declining state support along with concerns about providing financial support to students who may not need it, many elite pubic and private universities no longer provide support from their own funds to merit winners with College Board or corporate funding.

All of the Ivy League universities have stopped matching or funding national merit scholarships, although they continue to enroll large numbers of winners because of the prestige of the institutions.  Ivy League schools also, as a rule, provide generous financial support based on actual need, making them an excellent choice for most of the applicants they admit.

Nowadays, winners of merit scholarships whose families fall into that broad range of being moderately well to do but not comfortably well off need to know which universities still place a premium on National Merit Scholars.  The universities that continue to recruit NM scholars typically do so because (1) they want to compete with the Ivies for the best students and/or (2) they want to raise the profile of their undergrads so that national rankings will show a higher degree of selectivity.

Most of the highly-ranked private universities that continue their relationship with the National Merit Scholarship Corporation fall into category (1) above.  Foremost among these are the University of Chicago with 303 merit scholars (217 of them with university sponsorship); USC with 263 merit scholars (228 with USC support); Northwestern with 236 scholars (169 with school support); Washington University St. Louis with 206 scholars (142 with university sponsorship); Vanderbilt with 187 scholars (137 with university support); and Rice with 147 scholars (104 with Rice sponsorship).

A longer list of public universities appears below.

All of these excellent private universities are willing to take the heat for funding non- need-based students based on merit alone at a time when the inequities of scholarship funding have led to a greater emphasis on allocating funds mostly or entirely on a need-based scale.

Again, for many families, the trend is a good one; but for families with incomes in the mid six figures, for example, the ability to qualify for need-based aid may be negligible while the pinch on the family budget is still significant.

Many public elites have joined the Ivies in not providing their own funds to match or pay entirely for merit scholarships.  Among these schools are all the UC campuses, UT Austin, and the University of Washington.  Michigan and Virginia also appear to have stopped using their own funds for merit scholarships based solely on the PSAT. At these universities, merit scholars may still receive assistance but it will not be in the form of merit matching funds or totally funded merit scholarships.  These and other universities may also have non-need-based scholarships for valedictorians.

The University of Wisconsin only funds 5 merit scholars a year, and these must be need-based.

Below is a list of public universities that still match or fund National Merit Scholars, regardless of need, and that have 25 or more merit scholars in the most recent year. We will list the university, followed by the total number of merit scholars in the most recent report, followed by the number of those scholars that also received school support based on the merit scholarship.  As a general rule, the higher the number of school-supported merit scholars, the greater the recruitment is for merit scholars.

Alabama–241 total merit scholars, 208 with school funding

Oklahoma–194 merit scholars, 160 with school funding

Minnesota–143 merit scholars, 114 with school funding

Florida–136 merit scholars, 116 with school funding

North Carolina–136 merit scholars, 101 with school funding

Texas A&M–136 merit scholars, 113 with school funding

Georgia Tech–119 merit scholars, 91 with school funding

Arizona State–97 merit scholars, 75 with school funding

UC Berkeley–90 merit scholars, none with school funding

Arizona–81 merit scholars, 69 with school funding

Kentucky–70 merit scholars, 54 with school funding

Central Florida–67 merit scholars, 57 with school funding

Illinois–64 merit scholars, 40 with school funding

UT Dallas–63 merit scholars, 56 with school funding

Auburn–62 merit scholars, 50 with school funding

Maryland–61 merit scholars, 46 with school funding

Indiana–59 merit scholars, 44 with school funding

Ohio State–57 merit scholars, 41 with school funding

UT Austin–57 merit scholars, none with school funding

Georgia–51 merit scholars, 42 with school funding

Michigan–46 merit scholars, none with school funding

Nebraska–46 merit scholars, 38 with school funding

Clemson–42 merit scholars, 23 with school funding

South Carolina–41 merit scholars, 34 with school funding

Ole Miss–40 merit scholars, 28 with school funding

Michigan State–39 merit scholars, 33 with school funding

LSU–37 merit scholars, 33 with school funding

Cincinnati–37 merit scholars, 28 with school funding

Arkansas–35 merit scholars, 31 with school funding

Iowa State–35 merit scholars, 30 with school funding

Missouri–29 merit scholars, 26 with school funding

Houston–27 merit scholars, 24 with school funding