Congratulations on your acceptance!
I am unsure about the standards for merit scholarships, as I didn't receive one. I did receive a need-based scholarship of around 10k/year, so that is also an option available to students if your GRE/GPA doesn't meet the benchmark for merit-based.
I think overall my experience was positive! There were a few gripes with administrative processes and the course load could be challenging at times, but I think I was prepared for a career in public health once I graduated, and I did find a job/started working right after graduating. I am very interested in research as a career, and was able to connect with Columbia professors working on projects I found interesting and was able to RA with one of them. I highly recommend doing that if you are interested in research as I was a) paid, b) did my practicum with them (also paid), and c) got great guidance on my thesis.
It's a big program with around 400 people getting an MPH degree, which can feel large, but it was still easy to make friends as most of your classes are smaller and there's a lot of student groups and activities. For the first semester (the CORE) they assign you to a cohort (around 100 people from all the different departments) and then from that cohort you're further broken into study groups of ~20 students. I found my group to be very kind, smart, and passionate about public health. We were a diverse group and I think we learned a lot from each other. Also, living in NYC is really fun, albeit expensive (but I wouldn't say any more expensive than any other large city in the US).
Not sure what else to write now, but please let me know if you have more specific questions or if I didn't touch on something you were curious about.
You're welcome and good luck!
