College Merit Scholarships: When is it Okay to Withdraw a Prospective Student's Award Money?

My youngest daughter is a high school senior. She has the good fortune of being a member of the largest group of high school seniors vying for college acceptances in literally decades. For those of us Baby Boomers who produced these college-bound babies, many of us already knew that the Class of 2008 was in for a tough time when it came to being accepted to the college(s) of their choice. The rules changed, and in many cases, were almost completely re-written, in the three years since her older sister had graduated from high school and went on to college. According to the University of Delaware, for instance, they had a record number of high school seniors applying for admission this year: 37,500 applicants for 3,500 available freshman spots. These number were pretty similar for many other schools as well, in particular state universities and the Ivies. Getting into a college itself was becoming a small miracle; receiving a merit scholarship - a financial award offered an accepted, incoming freshman for academic achievement - was even more of an event.

We were lucky - very, very lucky. As of April 1st, my daughter has been accepted at thirteen colleges. Of those thirteen, seven acceptances came with offers of merit scholarships as well, ranging from $3,000 a year to $15,000 a year.

The purpose of this article isn't to extol my kid's achievements, academic, athletic or otherwise. (Although she was a four year varsity athlete, she did not receive or apply for any athletic scholarships.) What I do want to share is my puzzlement at the fragility of these merit scholarships, in particular by one Florida university.

There is a certain sunny city in Florida, home to the NFL's Buccaneers, which is home to a private university with which my daughter was immediately smitten upon visiting. Perhaps it was the warm weather, the palm trees, the beaches everywhere, the fact that one of her best friends lived in the city, perhaps it was any or all of these factors - but she wanted to apply to that school. Apply she did, and within six weeks, she received a very nice acceptance package and scholarship award. (It may be important to note that her friend did NOT apply for admission to this school herself. She will be attending the University of Florida in Gainesville, in their Honors program, on a fabulous scholarship herself.)

While our daughter had seen the school, we, her parents had not (except on line). We read up on it voraciously, since it was never on our combined lists of schools to which there was a strong interest. We were somewhat concerned: were we sending our baby off to 'another Florida party school', as another parent called it? We did our homework. As a family, the three of us attended the regional Accepted Students Reception one weekday evening in a dusty, run-down hotel near Philadelphia's Main Line. We returned home from that reception with fewer questions, but no definitive answer on whether this was truly the school for our daughter. The next day, we responded in the affirmative to an invitation to attend Family Day at the school's Florida campus. This, we agreed, would be the best way for all of us to really get an honest feel for this particular school - after all, it would be our daughter's new 'home' for the next four years, and it would be quite a distance away from us.

Four days after we had responded that we would be attending Family Day, and receiving the resulting confirming email, my daughter received an email from the university's bursar. Her merit scholarship had been rescinded because she had apparently not submitted her $500 nonrefundable deposit within x number of days after receiving the scholarship offer. Actually, that was pretty much the bulk of the entire email. My daughter was absolutely, beyond a doubt, totally crushed.

She forwarded the email on to me, and I studied it carefully before turning to her. Did she give us the entire acceptance package? Was there anything that she didn't go over with us? Did she misplace any papers with those from other colleges? Yes, no, and no. I called the admissions counselor at the school immediately.

I was somewhat surprised by her brusque manner, a tone which hadn't surfaced in earlier conversations or emails. Yes, my daughter's merit scholarship had been revoked and the money given elsewhere (I'm assuming to another student.) There was allegedly a separate card that we had to fill out and return with the $500 deposit - which technically wasn't and still isn't due until May 1st of this year - in order for them to keep the scholarship money allotted for her. She did say that if my daughter does chose to attend the school - which translated literally into the receipt of her deposit - she "would" be considered for another (?) merit scholarship, although it would not be as favorable as the one originally offered her.

At that point, I was becoming less confused and more angered by the minute. With my daughter, I went over all of the paperwork she had assembled neatly into piles from each school that had offered her admission at that point. No where in the paperwork regarding this Florida school was there a "separate card" that was supposed to have been in her package.

I read and re-read and read again once more her official letter of award for the merit scholarship. No where at all in the body of the letter did it allude to a "separate card" or a return date for this card, or the need for a $500 deposit to be paid in order to hold this scholarship. Nowhere. I went through envelopes (especially the "big one", in which the acceptance letters arrive) - nothing. I emailed the admissions counselor that I had, myself, gone over all of the paperwork and found no "card". What I did find, I pointed out specifically, were the terms of the award letter itself. From that point on, I have had no contact with anyone from that university.

What angered me the most that I chose to put pen to paper, so to speak, with this article? There were more than one issue that I felt had been very poorly handled in this situation. At the Accepted Students' Reception, mention was made by the admissions director that students would have a better chance of locking in their desired housing arrangements the sooner their deposits were received - but, as my husband also pointed out, there was no mention made of students who received scholarships similarly locking in their awards. To this day, I have no idea exactly how long we had to submit her deposit before the scholarship was rescinded - we never found that elusive "separate card" to which the counselor had made note. There was not one damned thing in her letter of award that made reference to a time period, a deposit due, or anything of that nature; legally, the award letter stands as an individual document, with no mention made - not even an "Enclosure", or "See Attached", nothing - referenced therein.

I think what was, for me, the proverbial frosting on the cake was the fact that the bursar's office chose to email the student, my 17 year old daughter, with this news, rather than contacting us, her parents, first. There was NEVER an email or note or postcard or reminder that 'time was running out' on this deal - just a terse email to a kid telling her that her award money was taken away because her parents hadn't coughed up $500 to lock it in immediately.

In retrospect, this situation really was a blessing in disguise for us all. My daughter herself saw first-hand the type of administrators with whom she would have had to deal with at this particular school. She saw first-hand how insensitive and incompetent they were. She did nothing wrong, but she was the one wronged in the end. She knew that receiving this particular merit award had gone a long, long way in our having a favorable view of this school - and now that was gone. Notified by email that her life's plans had been ever so slightly altered.

As a family, we don't qualify for needs-based aid; the only financial assistance offered my daughter were merit scholarships. We're really, really lucky that we don't have to depend upon those merit awards to pay her way through school. But for an awful lot of families, offers of financial aid can make or break the decision as to where a child will attend school. Here are some things I've learned along the way during this entire college acceptance process:

Merit scholarships are nearly always awarded when a student has been accepted to a specific college. Your child receives the "big envelope", which contains not only a formal offer of admission and packets of information on housing, payment plans, etc., but also a separate letter in which (hopefully) some form of financial aid is awarded the student based on achievement, usually academic. (These awards nearly always take into account these factors: the student's GPA, their SAT (less often, ACT) scores, difficulty of classes taken, and complete high school transcript, including mid marking period grades.

As soon as your child has opened up the envelope and enjoyed the thrill of the moment, TAKE IT AWAY. Make sure that you have all of the papers and information that came in the envelope. Keep everything from that particular school - including past information, like a record of when the application was sent, any email correspondence from the school, etc. - in the envelope. And then KEEP IT YOURSELF for at least three days, if not permanently! Read over the letter of acceptance carefully. Read over the letter indicating a financial award carefully. Sometimes, these letters come in separate, smaller envelopes. Two schools had marked these smaller envelopes "Congratulations! You're a Dean's Scholar!". Read the letter of financial award over once very carefully. Wait a while, and re-read it again, this time with a pen or pencil in hand to UNDERLINE anything that's important. Is there a date specified by which your child must respond in order to claim the scholarship? (Some schools gave us dates, some schools - actually, the majority - noted that the scholarship would be officially enacted once the student had sent in their deposit money confirmation to the school.) The most recent award that my daughter received, for $13,000 a year, is valid for fourteen business days only. How did I find this out? My daughter, in her own mind, had already ruled out this school, and didn't bother to even tell us that she had received the award letter. I found it myself, opened and lying atop her desk.

You want to check for dates when the merit award would/might expire. You want to check to see if it's valid only if your child sends in their deposit within a certain time period - one month, three months. You want to check to see HOW you actually claim the award - again, it's the case of the missing "separate card". The Florida school was the only one that had a "card" to be returned. The other schools, for the most part, had a separate, 8 1/2 x 11 letter physically attached to the award letter, in which the terms of the award are not only spelled out, but which was also to be signed, dated and returned to the school.

Don't let a careless error, or an assumption, on your part cost your child the merit award money that they deserve. If you're looking for as much financial aid as possible, consider the awarding of these merit scholarships as a business proposition, and handle it accordingly in a professional manner. If you have any questions at all that aren't answered in writing, don't hesitate to pick up the phone or send out an email immediately - and don't allow yourself to be 'blown off' or treated without the courtesy that you deserve. You're not doing this for yourself, you're doing this for your child's future.

In the end, things have a way of working themselves out. Just three days ago, my daughter completed her final college tour of the schools to which she had been accepted and in which she had the most interest. She absolutely fell in love with a prestigious Virginia university that has a wonderful program in her chosen major. Her merit scholarship award from this school was nominal at best - but it's everything she's hoping for in a college education, and that's where she'll be headed come late August.

As for the Florida school by the bay? I have yet to hear back from anyone regarding why her merit award was rescinded, or even when she had been expected to send in her deposit money in order to claim it. My daughter got a look at how "shady" even institutions of higher education can sometimes be, and her perspective on the school was changed dramatically. As she said, "How can they just DO that??" I don't know. But what I do know is that for us, it was a blessing in disguise. I just hope that another family out there, one really depending upon that merit money, didn't have their son or daughter receive that terse, boiler-plate email informing them that their scholarship had vanished because they didn't return that mysterious "separate card"...