Do I need test scores for Carthage merit aid?

The automatic Academic Scholarship grid is based only on cumulative non-weighted high school GPA ($22,000 for 3.75-4.0 down to $19,000 for 2.5-2.99); no ACT/SAT is mentioned.

Can my Carthage scholarships cover room and board?

No. Combined non-need scholarships/grants cannot exceed tuition unless otherwise noted, and scholarships plus federal/state grants may not exceed full tuition. 2026-27 tuition is $21,625 per semester; standard housing ($4,575/semester) and meals ($2,650/semester) are extra.

What does Carthage cost for 2026-27?

Full-time tuition is $21,625 per semester, standard housing $4,575 per semester, and the standard meal plan $2,650 per semester (tuition is the same in-state and out-of-state). No single full cost-of-attendance total is published on the tuition page.

Carthage· Renewal Rules

Keeping Carthage’s Merit Aid for Four Years

What the financial-aid office actually requires after freshman year: minimum GPA, credit-hour pace, and the cliffs that quietly downgrade families mid-degree.

Verified Jun 20264 days ago· COWORK

At a glance

Renewable tiers: 16 of 16
One-time tiers: 0
Tiers with published renewal terms: 4
Renewal risk profile: low

Renewal risk profile

Carthage's published renewal rules cluster around a 3.0 floor with no major-GPA gating, which is survivable for the typical freshman with steady study habits. The risk is non-renewal due to enrollment status (dropping below full-time), not GPA.

Academic Scholarships: Full-time enrollment
French/Japanese/Spanish Scholarships: See notes
Spring Scholarships: See notes
Fall Transfer Scholarship Competition: See notes

Renewal terms by tier

Academic Scholarships
$19,000-$22,000
Entry requirements: 2.5-4.0 (non-weighted cumulative HS GPA) GPA
To keep it: Renewal requires an annual minimum cumulative GPA and full-time enrollment status (specific GPA not stated on this page).
Source: https://www.carthage.edu/admissions/undergraduate-students/undergraduate-scholarships/
French/Japanese/Spanish Scholarships
$33,000
To keep it: Renewable for four years.
Source: https://www.carthage.edu/admissions/undergraduate-students/undergraduate-scholarships/
Spring Scholarships
$31,000-Full tuition
To keep it: Renewable for up to three years.
Source: https://www.carthage.edu/admissions/undergraduate-students/undergraduate-scholarships/
Fall Transfer Scholarship Competition
$33,000-Full tuition
To keep it: Renewable for up to three years.
Source: https://www.carthage.edu/admissions/undergraduate-students/undergraduate-scholarships/

How families lose this aid

Missing the early competitive deadlines because the automatic award required no application.
The big-money competitions close early: November 1 (Communication/PR, Modern Languages, History/English/Creative Writing, Nursing) and December 3 (Presidential, Business, Math/Science, Kenosha/Racine, Teacher Education, Engineering/CS/Game Dev, Tarble California, Police/Fire, Alumni).
Losing renewable grants by dipping below the GPA floor or dropping to part-time.
'Renewal requires an annual minimum cumulative GPA and full-time enrollment status' for non-need awards; the smaller grants (Visit, Lutheran, Legacy, Ministerial) each require a 2.0 cumulative GPA to renew, and the Early FAFSA Filers Award is lost if the FAFSA isn't refiled by January 1 each year.

Renewal questions families ask

Do I need test scores for Carthage merit aid?: The automatic Academic Scholarship grid is based only on cumulative non-weighted high school GPA ($22,000 for 3.75-4.0 down to $19,000 for 2.5-2.99); no ACT/SAT is mentioned.
Can my Carthage scholarships cover room and board?: No. Combined non-need scholarships/grants cannot exceed tuition unless otherwise noted, and scholarships plus federal/state grants may not exceed full tuition. 2026-27 tuition is $21,625 per semester; standard housing ($4,575/semester) and meals ($2,650/semester) are extra.
What does Carthage cost for 2026-27?: Full-time tuition is $21,625 per semester, standard housing $4,575 per semester, and the standard meal plan $2,650 per semester (tuition is the same in-state and out-of-state). No single full cost-of-attendance total is published on the tuition page.

Rules that bite at Carthage

The renewal trip wires we'd flag in a custom playbook, derived from Carthage's own tier rules and not generic advice.

renewalAcademic Scholarships: renewal floor that quietly knocks awards out
Renewal requires an annual minimum cumulative GPA and full-time enrollment status (specific GPA not stated on this page). A single rough term can end a four-year award here without warning if the GPA floor isn't met cumulatively.

How Carthage compares across our verified dataset

669 of 751 verified schools publish at least one four-year renewable merit award.
Carthage is one of them. The cohort minority (82 schools) only awards one-year scholarships, which means the four-year value families assume on a brochure quote isn't guaranteed at every school.

Sources used on this page

Every renewal claim is checked against Carthage’s own published materials.

policyCarthage stacking policy