<p>Not quite, OP. You and your family are responsible for the full cost of attendance (COA). If you are admitted, the school takes a look at your family’s financial aid statement(s). If they have any questions, they’ll ask for xeroxes, confirmation, etc. Then they’ll take your family’s numbers and apply an algorithm which cranks out an amount that they will provide to help your family pay the COA. This figure will include a Pell grant from the feds if you qualify for it, grants from the school (which don’t have to be re-paid), work study perhaps, a student loan no greater than $5500 the first year, and perhaps a federally-subsidized “extra” loan that your family might want to take out. They may also offer your family a certain amount of merit aid (which doesn’t have to be re-paid) based on their desire to have you attend the university or your automatic qualification for such aid, each based on your stats, hooks, ECs, etc. This financial aid package usually comes 2-3 weeks after the offer of admission.</p>
<p>The package is usually less than the COA. The difference between the package and the COA is the amount your family will have to pay over and above any loans offered in the package. If the family cannot meet the gap between COA and package, the student will not be able to attend the college. One can appeal the package, but that usually doesn’t come to anything unless the family has some reason to believe the school has missed some important information.</p>
<p>Hopefully, someone will correct me if I’ve made an error.</p>
<p>With an EFC of $14,000 you will not qualify for any federal need based grants (Pell).</p>
<p>You will also likely not get any school awarded need based grants from any of the OOS public schools on your list. They don’t have many to give anyway and they generally save them for instate students.</p>
<p>You will not get any merit based grants from any school on your list with the possible exception of Iowa and Iowa State. If you do get them there, they will be about $5,000. </p>
<p>With U Iowa at more than $38,000 per year or $33,000 after the possible scholarship, you are looking at needing loans for at least $25,000 total if your parents can kick in $25,000 per year. Ouch!!! Iowa has a substantial surcharge for College of Business students that makes tuition about $1400 - $2,000 per year more than what other students pay. Iowa State also has differential tuition but it is a lower amount and you only pay it your last 2 years rather than all 4 years like at Iowa,</p>
<p>With Iowa State at about $29,000 per year, you may need loans of about $4,000-$5,000 per year if your parents can kick in $25,000 per year. </p>
<p>These scenarios both assume that books and other basic living expenses will be paid for through school year and summer earnings.</p>
<p>Forget about these EFC sites. You need to run the net price calculators on each of your schools’ websites.</p>
<p>You are pretty stuck - Your ACT would not likely get you enough money in merit scholarship to afford to go to a top 100 school out of state and you seem unwilling to consider your local schools - Personally I love SIUC and SIUE as well as NIU and think they are GREAT institutions, but they would not be considered top 100 by any stretch. </p>
<p>Just remember that school rankings…once you get below about 25, are extremely subjective and quite frankly not something that will define your success in business once you graduate.</p>
<p>Finally - please realize that even if your EFC is 10,000…that is a lot of money to most people…Few average families have $40,000 sitting around ready for their child’s education in the next four years. </p>
<p>You’re only stuck at some schools. There are always options, OP. You just have to open your mind to them. They might not be the options you thought you had or some of your friends are taking but you can go to a 4yr business school and do very well for yourself afterwards. </p>
<p>Now run the npcs at the school sites. </p>
<p>Sorry guys i just came home and saw all of this. you guys helped me more than i could ask for and thank you so much. im loveing the feedback. thanks for teaching me about paying for college. mom2 i will run net prices on the schools i had in mind. i will get back to you all with that tomorrow. </p>
<p>Yeah i know i don’t have the best ACT score, i am still gonna try to get it up to 28 if i can in September. But currently until than i use the 26 as my score when i look at colleges and don’t assume i will do better.</p>
<p>Stan i see where your coming from but i also look at the jobs and internship opportunities the school offers.</p>
<p>Jkeil thank you! i am a very open minded person and very optimistic! my friends and a lot of teachers tell me,wherever you go and whatever you do, you will be big. i don’t know if there trying to make me feel good or what. but i just take it as there just saying the truth 
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<p>Illinois State U is well connected to the insurance industry and will admit you without hesitation. Bradley University could also be worth exploring as would the University of Nebraska Lincoln (according to the scholarship calculator you’d pay around $21,000/year). </p>