Florida Senate Bill 190, dealing with higher education, became effective on July 1 of this year and makes several changes to the Bright Futures Scholarship program. Among the most important of them are:

Initial Eligibility Test Score Requirements were changed so that SAT and ACT scores would align with SAT national percentile ranks. Here’s what that means for you:   

• High school students graduating in the 2018-19 and the 2019-20 academic years must achieve a SAT combined score of 1290 or an ACT composite score of 29 to qualify for a Florida Academic Scholars (FAS) award, or a SAT combined score of 1170 or an ACT® composite score of 26 to qualify for a Florida Medallion Scholars (FMS) award.
• High school students graduating in the 2018-19 and the 2019-20 academic years must achieve a SAT combined score of 1290 or an ACT composite score of 29 to qualify for a Florida Academic Scholars (FAS) award, or a SAT combined score of 1170 or an ACT® composite score of 26 to qualify for a Florida Medallion Scholars (FMS) award.
• High school students graduating in the 2020-21 academic year must score no lower than the 89^th national percentile on the SAT in order to be eligible for an FAS award and no lower than the 75^th national percentile on the SAT in order to be eligible for an FMS award, with the required examination scores needed to achieve those percentiles to be published by the Florida Department of Education before each school year.

Midyear Graduate Application Deadline: The change extends from August 31 to December 31 the annual deadline by when a student who graduates from high school midyear and must apply for a Bright Futures award.

Bright Futures Scholarship Length: The change extends from two years to five years the time frame for eligibility to receive an initial award, so that a student who earns the award may accept funding at any time during the five-year eligibility period after high school graduation.

Other provisions of Florida Senate Bill 190 can be found here.  

The Bright Futures Scholarship perfectly demonstrates why test prep is an investment, not an expense, choose your test prep provider wisely!