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Southern Connecticut State scholarships and merit aid

Two prices: the posted one, and yours.

Posted price$13,438per year · 2026-2027 · cost of attendance
Yours?depends on the rules below

The short answer

Southern Connecticut State may be worth checking, but its awards do not follow a simple grades-and-scores chart. Start with the published scholarships below.

Where does your student land?

Verified Jul 2026
5 school sources to explore

Published rules, with the school sources close at hand. Confirm the details before you count on an award.

The award collection

Published scholarships

These amounts and requirements come from the school’s own published pages. Open an award to see who qualifies and how to keep it.

Where does your student land?

  1. Southern Merit Award (automatic, at admission)$500 to $4,000 per yearNot automaticRenewable
    Published awardOther selection criteria

    Southern Merit Award (automatic, at admission)

    $500 to $4,000 per year

    Published rangeNot recorded as automatic on grades and scores. Read the selection rules. Confirm the policy year with the school.

    GPA
    Not published as a fixed cutoff; 'awarded based on academic achievement'
    RenewableCheck the conditions
    Open award details for Southern Merit Award (automatic, at admission)

    Who qualifies

    No separate application — awarded as part of the admission review to select newly admitted first-year, transfer and graduate students; subject to availability of funds

    How to keep it

    Stated as 'renewed automatically based on continued academic eligibility.' The specific renewal GPA is not published on the page.

    Worth knowing

    This is the general (non-Honors) automatic merit band. A student 'may not receive both the Merit Scholarship and the Presidential Merit Scholarship' — the $7,000 Honors award is mutually exclusive with this one, not additive. The dollar a given student receives within $500-$4,000 is not published as a stat grid.

  2. Trustee ScholarshipAmount not publishedNot automaticRenewable
    Published awardOther selection criteria

    Trustee Scholarship

    Amount not published

    Published award termsNot recorded as automatic on grades and scores. Read the selection rules. Confirm the policy year with the school.

    Start with the award’s published eligibility.

    RenewableCheck the conditions
    Open award details for Trustee Scholarship

    Who qualifies

    Automatic consideration on applying for admission; awarded on academic achievement and availability of funds. No separate application.

    How to keep it

    Renewal terms not stated on the page.

    Worth knowing

    Named automatic award. The page does not publish a dollar amount, GPA/test cutoff, or renewal rule, so the value cannot be quoted — treat the amount as unpublished rather than assuming it falls in the $500-$4,000 band.

  3. Presidential Merit Scholarship (Honors College)$7,000 per yearNot automaticRenewable
    Published awardOther selection criteria

    Presidential Merit Scholarship (Honors College)

    $7,000 per year

    Published amountNot recorded as automatic on grades and scores. Read the selection rules. Confirm the policy year with the school.

    GPA
    Honors College admission requires a minimum 3.6 weighted GPA (4.0 scale) and top 15% of class
    RenewableCheck the conditions
    Open award details for Presidential Merit Scholarship (Honors College)

    Who qualifies

    Must be accepted into the Honors College; mutually exclusive with the general Merit Scholarship

    How to keep it

    'Automatically renewed each year as long as they remain enrolled in the Honors College' — renewal is tied to continued Honors College enrollment, not a published GPA number.

    Worth knowing

    CONFLICT: the tuition-aid scholarships page describes a flat '$7,000 Presidential Merit Scholarship' that is automatically renewed while enrolled in the Honors College, while the admissions/first-year page describes a 'Presidential Merit scholarship covering full in-state tuition and fees' for the top 20% of accepted Honors applicants. These two pages do not agree on whether the Presidential Merit award is a fixed $7,000 or a full-in-state-tuition award. The $7,000 figure is quoted here because it is the only dollar amount published verbatim; the full-tuition tier is captured as a separate tier below. Confirm with the Honors College / financial aid office before relying on either value.

  4. Honors College Presidential Merit — full in-state tuition tier (top 20%)Full in-state tuition and feesNot automaticRenewable
    Published awardOther selection criteria

    Honors College Presidential Merit — full in-state tuition tier (top 20%)

    Full in-state tuition and fees

    Published coverage or packageNot recorded as automatic on grades and scores. Read the selection rules. Confirm the policy year with the school.

    GPA
    Honors College admission: minimum 3.6 weighted GPA (4.0 scale) and top 15% of class
    RenewableCheck the conditions
    Open award details for Honors College Presidential Merit — full in-state tuition tier (top 20%)

    Who qualifies

    Top 20% of accepted Honors College applicants

    How to keep it

    Renewable for 4 years.

    Worth knowing

    No dollar amount is published for this tier on the source page; amount is expressed as 'full in-state tuition and fees' (in-state tuition & fees were $13,438 for 2026-27 per the rate schedule, but the scholarship page does not state a figure, so no clean dollar number is asserted). See the CONFLICT note on the Presidential Merit tier above — this page's framing differs from the flat-$7,000 framing on the tuition-aid page.

  5. Honors College half-tuition award (all 40 incoming Honors students)At least one-half the cost of in-state tuition and feesNot automaticRenewable
    Published awardOther selection criteria

    Honors College half-tuition award (all 40 incoming Honors students)

    At least one-half the cost of in-state tuition and fees

    Published coverage or packageNot recorded as automatic on grades and scores. Read the selection rules. Confirm the policy year with the school.

    GPA
    Honors College admission: minimum 3.6 weighted GPA (4.0 scale) and top 15% of class
    RenewableCheck the conditions
    Open award details for Honors College half-tuition award (all 40 incoming Honors students)

    Who qualifies

    All 40 incoming Honors College first-year students

    How to keep it

    Renewable for 4 years.

    Worth knowing

    No dollar figure is published for this tier; amount is stated only as 'at least one-half the cost of in-state tuition and fees.' Pegged to IN-STATE tuition, so the value to an out-of-state student is capped at the in-state figure, not their (higher) sticker price.

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What makes Southern Connecticut State different

Southern's automatic merit awards are modest — $500 to $4,000/year applied at admission with no separate application — but the Honors College stacks far bigger value: a $7,000 Presidential Merit Scholarship, and tuition-tier awards covering at least half (and, for the top applicants, all) of in-state tuition and fees.

Merit tiers5See who qualifies
Research checkedJul 2026By our research team

Selection beyond grades and scores

Start with the selection process.

These awards are not recorded as automatic on grades and scores. Read each award's selection rules, application steps and dates. Meeting a minimum is not an award offer.

  1. Read the selection rules

    Look for the school's stated criteria and whether an additional application is needed.

  2. Check the application dates

    Confirm the current admission and scholarship deadlines directly with the school.

  3. Know what happens next year

    Check renewal, credit requirements and how other aid affects the award.

The fine print / Three questions to carry forward

Before you count on it.

Does it apply to us? Confirm the entering year, residency and every eligibility condition.

Can we keep it? Check renewal GPA, credits and how long the award lasts.

Can we combine it? Ask how outside scholarships and other school awards change the offer.

Take Southern Connecticut State's decision sheet

A printable research summary, source links and room for your questions.

See what could change an award

What families often miss

  1. Southern states 'students may not receive both the Merit Scholarship and the Presidential Merit Scholarship.' They are mutually exclusive — Honors students get the Presidential award instead of, not on top of, the $500-$4,000 band.

  2. $13,438 is 2026-27 in-state tuition + fees only (the on-bill direct cost for a commuter). Living on campus pushes total billed direct costs far higher — SCSU's own cost-of-attendance page lists an on-campus total of $35,428 for 2025-26, which adds room, meals, books, transportation and personal expenses. Budget to the full COA, not tuition.

  3. The Honors Presidential Merit and half-tuition awards are pegged to IN-STATE tuition and fees. Out-of-state students (2026-27 tuition & fees $16,938/year) get the same in-state-denominated award, so a large slice of their out-of-state premium is not covered.

  4. The general merit awards require no separate application, but the Honors College (the gateway to the $7,000 / half / full-tuition awards) has its own application with an early-January deadline (December 31 / January 5 depending on the page) and a 3.6 GPA + top-15% bar.

  5. SCSU does not publish an automatic-merit stat grid. The $500-$4,000 award is 'based on academic achievement' and 'availability of funds,' so the exact amount is discretionary and not predictable from GPA/test scores alone.

See costs and school data

Who this school may work for

In-state Connecticut students chasing a low published tuition (in-state tuition & fees are $13,438 for 2026-27) who can clear the Honors College bar (3.6 GPA, top 15% of class) to convert a small automatic award into a half- to full-in-state-tuition Honors scholarship. Out-of-state students get the same merit ranges but a much larger sticker price, and the headline Honors awards are pegged to *in-state* tuition only.

Published yearly cost: Approximately $13,438 for 2026-2027. Source

Cost and graduation facts

Federal reporting on who actually enrolls at Southern Connecticut State, what they paid after aid, and what happened next — independent of anything the school markets.

Average annual net price by family income at Southern Connecticut State, academic year 2021-22 — in-state, Title-IV aid recipients only
Family incomeAverage net price paid
$0–$30,000$17,736
$30,001–$48,000$18,729
$48,001–$75,000$19,437
$75,001–$110,000$22,532
$110,001+$27,809
All income levels (average)$20,857

Sticker price vs. what students actually pay

Published tuition & fees (in-state), AY 2022-23
$13,438
Published tuition & fees (out-of-state), AY 2022-23
$27,378
Average net price paid (all Title-IV aid), AY 2021-22
$20,857

That works out to roughly a 30% discount below the federal AY 2021-22 average cost of attendance of $29,673 (College Scorecard — a separate, federally reported figure, not the published cost of attendance shown above).

Southern Connecticut State is a public school; Scorecard's net price figure covers in-state, Title-IV-aid-recipient payers only — there is no comparable federal figure for out-of-state students.

Outcomes for students who enrolled here

Graduation rate (150% of normal time), 2016 cohort
50%
First-year retention rate, 2021 cohort
78%
Median debt at completion, 2020–2021 completers
$22,250 (~$236/mo on a 10-yr plan)
Median earnings, 10 years after entry (measured 2020-21)
$55,043
Share of students receiving a Pell grant, AY 2021-22
55%
Share of students receiving a federal loan, AY 2021-22
63%
See other scholarships and cost examples

Other Southern Connecticut State scholarships worth checking

These awards can be harder to find. Each one has its own rules.

AmountVariesEligibilityCurrent and incoming students; criteria vary by fund. One online application covers 300+ donor-funded scholarships.

Separate from automatic merit. Single Foundation application; deadlines and amounts vary by individual fund.

Source

AmountVariesEligibilityEducation majors; criteria vary by fund.

Departmental/endowed funds within the College of Education; amounts and deadlines not aggregated on a single grid.

Source

Southern Connecticut State merit aid FAQ

  • Do I have to apply separately for SCSU merit scholarships?

    No for the general merit awards — they are granted as part of the admission review with no separate application. Yes for the Honors College (and its larger Presidential Merit / tuition-tier awards), which requires a separate Honors application due at the start of January, and yes for SCSU Foundation scholarships (one online Foundation application).

  • How big are SCSU's automatic merit awards?

    General merit awards 'typically range from $500 to $4,000 per student annually.' Accepted Honors College students instead receive a $7,000 Presidential Merit Scholarship (per the tuition-aid page) — and the two cannot be combined.

  • Are the merit awards renewable?

    Yes. The general merit award is 'renewed automatically based on continued academic eligibility,' the $7,000 Presidential Merit is 'automatically renewed each year as long as they remain enrolled in the Honors College,' and the Honors tuition-tier awards are 'renewable for 4 years.' Specific renewal GPA numbers are not published.

  • What does it take to qualify for the Honors College awards?

    Honors College admission requires a minimum 3.6 weighted GPA on a 4.0 scale and ranking in the top 15% of your class. The top 20% of accepted Honors applicants get the full-in-state-tuition Presidential Merit tier; all 40 incoming Honors first-years get at least half of in-state tuition and fees.

See sources and other schools

How Southern Connecticut State compares

  • 665 of 749 verified schools publish at least one four-year renewable merit award.

    Southern Connecticut State is one of them. The cohort minority (84 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 claim is checked against Southern Connecticut State’s own published materials. Below is the full reference set.

Compare with similar schools

Keep exploring Southern Connecticut State merit aid

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