Tulane University Merit Scholarships 2027

What are Tulane University Merit Scholarships?

Tulane University Merit Scholarships are not a competition you enter separately. They are decided from the file you already submit for admission, and Tulane has removed the standalone scholarship application that used to sit alongside it. Every first-year applicant is considered for partial merit awards running from $1,000 up to full tuition, with the partial tuition scholarships reaching $32,000 per year. Four steps put you in the running for all of it: the Common Application, the CSS Profile by your round's financial aid deadline, the FAFSA if you are a US citizen or eligible non-citizen, and whatever supporting documents Tulane asks for, with test scores as an optional fourth ingredient. That is the whole mechanism, and it means the lever you control most is timing rather than paperwork.

The awards above the automatic tier are where the numbers get serious. The Dean's Honor Scholarship covers full tuition, and recent recipients carried an ACT of 33+, an SAT of 1500+, and/or a core unweighted GPA of 3.7+. The Grossman & Cohen Scholarship, funded by Dr. Elisabeth Cohen and Dr. Robert Grossman, covers tuition, mandatory fees, housing and meals, renews for up to eight semesters and is expected to be worth roughly $400,000 in total. Around five Stamps Scholarships are awarded each year, covering the full cost of attendance and adding an enrichment fund that pays for study abroad, undergraduate research, conferences and unpaid internships. Then come the targeted awards: the FIRST Scholarship at $15,000 to $30,000 a year for FIRST Robotics and FIRST Tech Challenge alumni heading into the School of Science and Engineering, Artistic Scholarships between $1,000 and $10,000 across architecture portfolios, studio art, musicianship, performing arts and marching band, and the Community Service Fellowship, where selected fellows are considered for full-tuition awards in exchange for monthly meetings and 100 service and leadership hours a year.

Set all of that against the bill and the word to keep in mind is partial. For 2026-2027 Tulane publishes tuition of $70,622, mandatory fees of $4,514, housing of $11,758 and meals of $8,780, which with books, miscellaneous costs and loan fees comes to a total cost of attendance of $98,710. A strong partial award of $32,000 still leaves around $66,000 for the year. Even full tuition leaves roughly $25,000 in fees, housing and meals. Only the Stamps and Grossman & Cohen awards genuinely close the gap, and between them they go to a handful of students. Plan for the difference rather than hoping a second Tulane award will cover it, because the Dean's Honor Scholarship cannot be stacked with other Tulane merit scholarships, ROTC scholarships, faculty-staff waivers or tuition exchange awards. A partial athletic scholarship is the one exception allowed to sit beside it.

International applicants have a better position here than at many US private universities, and it is worth stating plainly because so many aggregator posts get it wrong in the other direction. Non-US citizens are automatically considered for partial merit through the Common Application and may compete for every merit award, including Global Scholarships that may cover full tuition and fees or, at the top end, the full cost of attendance. Students in the top 20 percent academically are the most competitive for those, and the awards renew for four years, or five for Architecture, on a 3.000 GPA. You do not file the FAFSA. You file Tulane's Declaration & Certification of Finances, which can also replace the CSS Profile for merit consideration. Qualifying international students can receive up to $30,000 in need-based aid as well, though only where that money has not already arrived as merit, and it has to be reapplied for every year. Tulane recommends applying Early Decision or Early Action to be competitive for a Global Scholarship, and video interview invitations go out by 31 March.

So act on the calendar. For Fall 2027 entry, Early Decision I closes 1 November 2026 with aid documents due 15 November, Early Action closes 10 November 2026 with aid documents due 15 December, and Early Decision II and Regular Decision both close 15 January 2027. Early Action is the round most applicants should target: it is not binding, and it lands before the December supplements for the Community Service Fellowship and the artistic awards, which Tulane warns may be out of reach for Regular Decision applicants. Stamps semifinalists are asked for supplements by 5 January. Once the award arrives, keeping it means full-time enrolment of 12 or more credits each Fall and Spring and a cumulative GPA of 3.000 for the named awards or 2.700 for most others, checked every June. If you are weighing similar merit ladders at other private universities, the USC Merit Scholarships guide covers a comparable automatic system, the Stamps Scholars Program guide explains the national programme behind Tulane's five annual full rides, and the University of Miami Stamps Scholarship guide shows how the same award works at another southern private school. Current terms and the four-step process live on the Tulane merit scholarships page.