If you’re a family that won’t qualify for need-based aid, it’s time to start looking for colleges with merit scholarships.

Specifically, money colleges award that is not based on any financial need is called merit-based aid. These scholarships are usually awarded based on academic performance and sometimes based on special talents.

We did a quick sort of our College Insights tool to find colleges with merit scholarships and ranked them by the amount of merit aid they gave to freshmen who did not have any financial need (as determined by the college).

Our College Insights tool has information on merit awards, from compiling Common Data Set information that colleges publish on their websites and crowdsourcing actual financial aid award offers from families with high school seniors.

Unfortunately, not all colleges make this information public, so our college list may not be completely inclusive of all the appropriate schools.

But for the purpose of giving a glimpse into the top colleges with merit awards, this is a good start. The list below was put together based solely on the average amount of merit scholarships offered to freshmen.

Name	% Freshmen w/out need Receiving Merit Aid (’21 – ’22*)	Avg Merit Award for Freshmen Without Need (’21 – ’22*)
Webb Institute	100%	$52,620
University of Richmond	18%	$42,538
Beloit College	100%	$41,660
Albion College	100%	$39,697
John Hopkins University	6%	$39,328
The University of Tulsa	9%	$39,152
Susquehanna University	98%	$36,317
Clarkson University	90%	$35,794
Davidson College	7%	$35,549
DePauw University	114%	$35,510

It’s important to remember that just because a college offers a large average merit award, it doesn’t mean a lot of students receive them. Consequently, you’ll need to also research how many students actually receive the award.

The percentage of freshmen who receive merit-based awards who do not have financial need varies greatly on the list below – from a low of 6% to a high of 100%.

College Insights (CI) can help you discover schools that are generous with merit scholarships and fit the criteria most important to your student.

You’ll not only save precious time, but they’ll avoid the heartache of applying to schools they aren’t likely to get into or can’t afford to attend.

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