New Orleans student with $10M in college offers chooses Cornell

A 16-year-old high school senior in New Orleans who received scholarship offers from 149 colleges and universities totaling $10 million said Friday that he has chosen to attend Cornell University.

Dennis “Maliq” Barnes will graduate on May 24 from the International High School of New Orleans, where he earned a 4.98 grade point average. He also has 27 college credits through a dual enrollment program with Southern University of New Orleans.

He plans to study computer science at Cornell, an Ivy League school in Ithaca, New York. He has also said he is considering law school.

“Today is an exciting day for me and my family, and I look forward to working with Cornell’s College of Engineering over the course of my undergraduate education,” Barnes said.

In an interview las week, Barnes said that a major reason he cranked out applications to close to 200 schools was his desire to have numerous educational and financial options. He ultimately was accepted at 186 colleges and universities. The school said it believes the $10 million in scholarship offers from 149 of them to be a record for U.S. college-bound seniors.