Early Decision College App & AROTC

I'm very new to the AROTC process and am trying to find my way throught all the "what ifs" that come to mind. This one just occured to me:

Under the "rules" of college apps, a student must enroll at his ED school if accepted and withdraw all other apps. Under that scenario, would an AROTC scholarship be paid to the ED school? (Assume it's preference #1 on the ROTC app.)

Thank you.

correct me if wrong....
I understand that you will receive a letter from AROTC (after your scholarship application has been reviewed by the board) with up to 5 schools listed to which they have approved AROTC scholarships. If that ED school is on the list, then they will pay the tuition to that school.

Contact the ED school and ask if they let you out of the ED contract due to lack of funding, or lack of AROTC scholarship. Get that in witing.

Oooh. I didn't realize an AROTC scholarship could be "portable" to up to 5 schools. (Bad word choice, probably. But, like I said, I'm in the remedial phase of ROTC parenting.)

Hmmm. Interesting. Flexible. I thought it was a one-shot deal in which scholarship and college acceptance don't necessarily match up.

In that case, perhaps it's better to cast a wide net rather than attempt a pinpoint award through ED.

Thank you.

DougBetsy said:

Oooh. I didn't realize an AROTC scholarship could be "portable" to up to 5 schools. (Bad word choice, probably. But, like I said, I'm in the remedial phase of ROTC parenting.)

Hmmm. Interesting. Flexible. I thought it was a one-shot deal in which scholarship and college acceptance don't necessarily match up.

In that case, perhaps it's better to cast a wide net rather than attempt a pinpoint award through ED.

Thank you.

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If your applicant is academically competitive to the degree that s/he is a legit ED candidate at a highly competitive school, s/he is very likely to get an AROTC scholarship.

That being said, you could try to delay the timing of the boarding of the application (by withholding one required piece of documentation) to correspond with the ED notification from the school. Given that the ED school is his #1 choice, you might try to get the application in front of the board that meets less than 30 days before your ED notification from the school.

With this strategy, you should be in the 30 day window for AROTC decisions when you receive the notification on the ED application to the school. In the best scenario (accepted) you've got the whole package put together. If you get rejected, you know which school on your AROTC list you won't be using. If you are deferred however, you will have to weigh off your chances of RD acceptance vs. the ability to transfer the scholarship later in the process.

Of course, just because the application is presented in X month doesn't guarantee a scholarship offer even to a top academic candidate as the AROTC scoring system is awards a lot of points to the interview, ECs, and the other items on the application.

I think your question on another thread about whether or when a unit fills to capacity is a good one to help you figuring this out.


I wish the answers were simpler.

goaliedad said:

That being said, you could try to delay the timing of the boarding of the application (by withholding one required piece of documentation) to correspond with the ED notification from the school. Given that the ED school is his #1 choice, you might try to get the application in front of the board that meets less than 30 days before your ED notification from the school.

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Nice idea, but sounds like a moving target. And since #1 ED school (WFU) is his biggest reach and rolling ED, I think I feel myself getting scared away.

goaliedad said:

I think your question on another thread about whether or when a unit fills to capacity is a good one to help you figuring this out.

I wish the answers were simpler.

Click to expand...

Thanks, me too.

DougBetsy said:

Nice idea, but sounds like a moving target. And since #1 ED school (WFU) is his biggest reach and rolling ED, I think I feel myself getting scared away.

Click to expand...

Never heard of "rolling ED" before. How does it work? You put your ED application in and they give you a response in a fixed amount of time?

You could try to get the rolling ED admission now if you know that WFU won't run out of scholarships until February and try to get in early with the ROTC scholarship. The ROO I talked to said the high water mark for AROTC applications is generally December boards. September boards are full of SA candidates getting their safety schools lined up and the number of scholarships awarded is relatively small. October is where the volume of scholarship awards starts to rise, but the total number of applications on file is still relatively small.

Still I understand your reluctance to commit to a school without the scholarship...

I also share your nervousness regarding the timing issues.

We are holding back until at least the October board as goaliegirl won't even see some of the schools on her list until the end of October and we might change our 6th and/or 7th choices with higher choices depending upon the outcomes of those visits. And at least one coach wants to watch her play during the season (starts in late November at her school), so that may delay our boarding decision further, especially if other coaches make the same request. We don't want an early indication of preference forced upon her before she sees all the schools and can make up her mind.

goaliedad said:

Never heard of "rolling ED" before. How does it work? You put your ED application in and they give you a response in a fixed amount of time?

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Yeah, I think so. http://www.wfu.edu/admissions/earlydecision.html A poster on collegeconfidential reports it took about 4 weeks.

Thanks for the info. You've been very helpful.

You get to put 7 schools on the 'wish list', AROTC will give approval for up to 5. From what I understand after talking to scholarship officers, Cadet Command communicates with the battalion to see if student will be a good fit, then scholarship officer communicates with school to see if the student has a chance of getting in. They are not going to commit to you if you are in no way geting into the school. My son put 7 schools on the list and next week his file will be complete. Then we wait.....

Thanks for the info, singaporemom. And good luck to your son.

It's nice to know that the army is in touch with the schools' admissions people.

singaporemom said:

You get to put 7 schools on the 'wish list', AROTC will give approval for up to 5. From what I understand after talking to scholarship officers, Cadet Command communicates with the battalion to see if student will be a good fit, then scholarship officer communicates with school to see if the student has a chance of getting in. They are not going to commit to you if you are in no way geting into the school. My son put 7 schools on the list and next week his file will be complete. Then we wait.....

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This was told to me by 2 Scholarship Officers, so I'm assuming that highly selective schools would proceed this way....but I cannot guarantee that from every school. But, this is a great question to ask WFU's scholarship officer.