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100% scholarships at Caltech for INTERNATIONAL students

California Institute of Technology scholarship

Caltech Scholarships for International students are not a fairy tale. So far, I’ve discussed various universities and colleges on this website that offer full financial support to international students.

` Now I’m going to add one more College to that list. The California Institute of Technology consistently ranks among the top five institutions in the world according to various rankings.

Firstly, I will discuss if international students can study at Celtic without tuition fees, whether at the undergraduate or graduate level. If yes then

  • What’s the process
  • How easy or difficult it is to get into Caltech to get scholarship

I’ll talk about a caveat in the Caltech admission process that can jeopardize your chances of admission big time. Finally, I will simplify the admission process, required documents, eligibility criteria, and common mistakes students often make on their applications into easy-to-understand language. Let’s get started by asking those who are visiting this website for the first time to subscribe to the newsletter I advise students on how to get admission into you know top universities in the US over the last few years. I’ve helped many students to get into their dream college.

Now getting back to the point, Caltech provides full Financial support to all its domestic and International students. Caltech commits to meeting the full demonstrated financial need of all admitted students. However, there’s a caveat, there’s a catch. Caltech provides need-based financial aid. It’s not Merit and it is a need for international students. We need to be mindful of international students because limited financial aid funds are available for them.

Now let’s first understand what this need-based financial aid is. It provides financial aid to students based on their financial needs. Students needing financial aid must submit financial documents if admitted to colleges or universities offering need-based assistance. This is essential for those who are not financially secure. Your university will determine your eligibility for need-based financial aid based on your tax documents or any financial assets you or your parents have from the last two years.

Don’t worry too much there bar is quite High. Caltech bar is also quite high. So that is how the need-based financial aid college works. Need aware simply means if you ask for financial aid the college is going to factor that in while making a decision on your application on your admission application. And that since Caltech is Need aware for international students which simply means if you ask for financial aid you will diminish your chances of admission. But I don’t want to discourage you. Caltech admits approximately 50% of international students each year and provides them with financial aid.

Another very important point is if you are an international applicant and plan to apply for financial aid at any time during your undergraduate career, Here you must apply for it at the time that you apply for admission. If Caltech offers you financial aid for the first year, you may reapply for the aid in the subsequent years. If you do not apply or receive financial aid for the first year you may not apply the financial aid for any other Academic Year or academic period.

Let me simplify it for you what they are saying is if you do not apply for financial aid in the first year at the time of admission or your financial aid gets rejected then you will never get financial aid from Caltech in the coming future years at undergraduate level. Now the process of applying the financial aid is through the CSS profile.

In the class of 2027, colleges admitted only 236 of the 13,134 students who applied. Out of these 236 students that were admitted 18% were International students which comes out to be 47 students out of the world. And if you do the math 1 student out of 279 students was admitted at Caltech from the rest of the world. That is an insanely low acceptance rate of 0.36% for international students. You can see it is not an easy college to get in but don’t be discouraged. I’ll share some of the tips you know on how to improve your profile in the later part of the article for the application process.

Caltech accepts applications through the Common App or the Quest Bridge for undergraduate programs. As an application requirement, you would need an online application Common App or Quest Bridge. $75 application fees or a fee Waiver, School report this is a document that your high school. The college counselor will send to Caltech that provides context about your school you can request your counselor to complete it through either of the application platforms. Additionally, your counselor will submit a letter of recommendation on your behalf. The more you need are the teacher’s valuation and official transcripts from your secondary high school grade 9 to 11 for international curriculum equivalent. If you have taken college classes while you were in school please provide the college transcripts as well.

“Additionally, English proficiency examination scores would also be required from international students. It is important. You must take the English proficiency exam before the deadline, which can be your TOEFL score, your IELTS score, or your Duolingo. International Financial Aid statement of intent Caltech needs to be aware of international students as I told earlier translation of the documents.

In case your documents are in the local language you need to send the original documents and an English translation. You can send supplemental material that may be important for your application. This can include a research paper abstract, publication citation (if published), letter of evaluation, and required research description. If you are submitting a research paper, Caltech requires an additional recommendation from someone who can comment on your research experience that produced a paper. This letter can come from a supervisor, a mentor, an adult collaborator, or an administrator.

Guidelines to send these applications are restrictive early action is November 1. Caltech’s restrictive early action is binding, and the regular decision deadline is January 3. Students applying for fall 2025 for undergraduate admission would not require any SAT or ACT score. Caltech provides clear guidelines for teacher recommendations, which many students applying tend to overlook. Caltech requires letters of evaluation from two Secondary School teachers.

One from the math or the science teacher and one from the humanity or social science teacher. Request letters from teachers in grades 10, 11, or 12 who know you well and can discuss your skills. Ask your Humanity or social science teacher to comment on your writing skills, focusing on classes with a strong writing component.

All of this that I have talked about so far was about undergraduate students or undergraduate admission. Now let’s talk about Graduate students and whether they can study free of Cost at Caltech or not. Caltech provides financial support for PhD students covering full tuition, fees, and living expenses. This is available for full-time students making satisfactory progress toward their degree.

PhD students receive 100% tuition coverage and a monthly stipend to cover most expenses. Now let’s take a look at the master students. In many graduate schools, there are opportunities to obtain teaching assistantships and research assistantships. Graduate students in full-time master’s programs may qualify for loans, but these opportunities have limited availability. They cover 100% of PhD candidates but find it difficult to support Master’s students financially. After getting a scholarship some people finds a job for their financial stability. There are many highly-paid part-time jobs in the USA.
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