Can someone explain endowment scholarships? Forum

[circle.the.wagons]

Like the title says... A family friend that attended the school I am looking at received a significant endowment scholarship when he attended, for which I think I am also qualified. I talked to an financial aid person at the school and they basically told me you are selected for the scholarship without any application or anything. Is this right? If you are selected, when do you find out?

[cavalier1138]

Without specifics, I have no idea what you're talking about. Different schools handle scholarships differently.

But since the school told you this is how it works, this is apparently how it works. I don't know what kind of input you expected to get here.

[A. Nony Mouse]

It will depend on the school - anywhere from when you're accepted, to some point before you show up and start attending classes.

(Do you mean endowed scholarship? Like, is it named after someone like the Dillard or Hamilton or the like? Some schools offer these based on your general application, others have you apply separately from your application. Anecdotally it seems that for a lot of the named scholarships people hear when they get their acceptance, whereas for generic un-named merit scholarships you may here on acceptance but you often hear later. But again, it totally depends on the school.)

[circle.the.wagons]

But since the school told you this is how it works, this is apparently how it works. I don't know what kind of input you expected to get here.

I was talking to a financial aid person at an admitted students cocktail reception and it was pretty loud and the I think the guy had an accent, so I had trouble hearing and didn't want to be rude by saying "what?" repeatedly. I (wrongly) assumed that most schools handled this the same way, so I wanted to check here because it seemed weird that you could possibly be awarded a big chunk of money without even doing anything.

It will depend on the school - anywhere from when you're accepted, to some point before you show up and start attending classes.

(Do you mean endowed scholarship? Like, is it named after someone like the Dillard or Hamilton or the like? Some schools offer these based on your general application, others have you apply separately from your application. Anecdotally it seems that for a lot of the named scholarships people hear when they get their acceptance, whereas for generic un-named merit scholarships you may here on acceptance but you often hear later. But again, it totally depends on the school.)

I meant endowed, thanks. The scholarship I'm thinking of is in fact named but apparently they get awarded after acceptance and without a separate application.

It also seems odd because I can't find a list of these named scholarships anywhere on the schools site.