Contrary to early entry schemes, placing the Bachelor of Engineering Honours (Electrical Engineering) as your highest eligible UAC preference does not seem to be a requirement in terms of being awarded The Sir William Tyree Engineering Scholarship. This would make sense given that you still need to enrol full-time in this degree to be eligible for this scholarship, which does not necessarily require you to place this degree as your highest eligible UAC preference (since you can be made an offer to your lower preferences). However, a potential problem is if you do not place USyd's Bachelor of Engineering Honours (Electrical Engineering) as your first preference and end up receiving an offer for your first preference, in which case you would not be considered for USyd's degree, making you ineligible for the scholarship based on the fact that you would not be able to enrol at USyd such a case. Because of this, it would be a good idea to check the requirements of the UNSW scholarship, including whether enrolling into a particular UNSW degree is required in order to be eligible. If not, you may be able to place USyd's degree as your highest preference and your chosen UNSW degree as a lower preference and still possibly be awarded both scholarships, giving you the opportunity to make a decision between the two universities. Otherwise, you may need to make a decision as to the university that you would prefer to attend as soon as possible.
What was the basis for the scholarship? Did you have to show your leadership skills to get the offer?
The Sir William Tyree Engineering Scholarship Program is designed to support students undertaking studies in Electrical Engineering who are considered as being in financial need or subject to financial/social disadvantage.
This brings us to
@Nedom's other question. In addition to providing supporting documentation as evidence of being in financial need, the scholarship will be awarded on the basis of academic merit according to the applicant's performance in the HSC. While USyd does not specify any particular standards, it would be reasonable to suggest that maximising your chances of being awarded this scholarship would imply the need to substantially exceed the ATAR requirement of 90 for this degree, which in turn implies the need for favourable HSC results across your subjects. From this point, the higher your results, the more likely you are to be awarded the scholarship.
Additionally, it is important to note that this expected standard of performance extends to include university performance, whereby you must maintain satisfactory academic performance (if you end up receiving the scholarship and enrolling at USyd, you should then contact the university in order to determine exactly the standard of performance that you will be required to attain and maintain) at USyd in order to keep the scholarship.
I hope this helps!
