Advice on D college list

<p>We would appreciate any advice on creating D list of colleges to apply to. She’s interested in Math and theatre is a plus. Should be National Merit w 222, WGPA 4.3, Top 3% of class, SAT 2150 (CR 740, M 760, W 650), She will re-take SAT & take ACT, should have 10 AP at graduation. Has some leadership and 4 years of honors theatre.</p>

<p>She’s looking all over the country. Prefers school far away & around 5000students in or near a city. We should be able to cover $21K annually that college board IM calculator predicts. We think she needs some schools in the middle but we’re having trouble identifying them.</p>

<p>University of Texas (safety, she’s guaranteed admission)
University that gives $ to NM (Alabama, Auburn, OSU, OU- we need to visit & pick 1)
Northeastern (tuition $ for NM & she loves the idea of Boston)
??
Rice (meets need with only $10000 loan)<br>
Washington University- aide unclear
Pomona (meets full need with no loans)
Harvey Mudd - aide unclear
One Ivy (probably Yale)</p>

<p>Well any time that you can go through college without loans, it’s an excellent thing. Pomona is a phenomenal school and should be moved somewhere to the top of her list.</p>

<p>I’m sure she will go on to be very successful, so I’m not implying money would be a problem :)</p>

<p>…but a penny saved is a penny earned.</p>

<p>To reiterate, Pomona is a phenomenal school. Don’t think any less of them because they’re giving her such a sweet deal. I’d take it and run.</p>

<p>She would be thrilled with Pomona. She loved the Claremont Colleges. I need to clarify that she’s only a junior in HS. Admissions are very tough at Pomona so this is a dream school but thankfully an affordable dream since they meet full need.</p>

<p>University of Rochester? UG enrollment around 5500.
Carnegie-Mellon? UG enrollment ~ 6000. I understand Pittsburgh is an extremely livable city. Carnegie Mellon has strong math/science programs and a strong theatre program.
Emory? UG enrollment ~ 7000.
Northwestern, of course.</p>

<p>Harvard and Stanford are rather generous with non-loan need-based aid. Both are highly regarded in math. Harvard and MIT (also good in math) are also near Boston.</p>

<p>University of Texas at Austin is a top notch school (including in math); the other state schools in your list are not generally considered as good academically. It may not meet the “far away” criterion, though. If she is willing to go there and it is affordable, that is a pretty good “safety” if she is certain to be admitted.</p>

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<p>I just went through the admission cycle with my D. It worth to say that your definition of need could very different than the school’s definition of need. Beware of that. Otherwise, your list looks decent.</p>

<p>See this thread, and search for similar ones on CC, <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/148852-what-ive-learned-about-full-ride-scholarships.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/148852-what-ive-learned-about-full-ride-scholarships.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>I would take off the state schools except UT. Your daughter seems very intelligent, and these schools are a little below her level. Higher tier schools like Rice and WUSTL tend to be very generous with both need and merit aid, so I’d look at more schools like those.</p>

<p>^ couldn’t be more wrong. Alabama gives full ride to NMF and their honors program sounds great. And speaking of state schools, the OP doesn’t list, but UNC Chapel Hill could be a good candidate with some scholarships (Carolina Scholar and Pogue Scholar or something like that). Really, not many privates can match UT or UNC (or UVA or Mich)! In order to get merit scholarships, you must be in the top tier of the entering class. Of course, if the OP can pay for it, then sure, Rice and WashU could be a great choice.</p>

<p>your list doesn’t include too many city schools with 5000ish students with good aide, but if that’s your criteria look at tulane, emory, umiami, usc, smu.</p>

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<p>About 20 private national universities, and as many LACs, can compete easily with OOS public universities based on many criteria (including out-of-pocket costs after aid in some cases). The college rankings (especially US News) reflect this. If you decompose the rankings metric by metric, you’ll find many private schools at the top. For example, Berkeley has the highest average SATs of any public university … but the averages at about 40 private schools are even higher. At about 30 private universities, and about 45 LACs, the average need-based aid package ranges from $25K to nearly $40K. Among students who take out loans, average debt at graduation for the Ivies typically is $10K - $20K ; for LACs it’s as low as ~$8K (at Williams); at Michigan, it is over $25K. See the Kiplinger’s college site for details. </p>

<p>UT Austin, in-state with guaranteed admission, is an excellent admission and financial safety for a family that can afford $21K/year. It may make sense also to apply to one OOS public that grants money specifically to NM qualifiers (top private schools usually don’t do this, though they attract many NM qualifiers regardless). I do think the offer would have to come far down from the OOS sticker price to compete with Texas. If you want to go after merit aid more generally (not just NM), the following thread has numbers that may interest you:
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/696637-merit-aid-percentage-common-data-set-6.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/696637-merit-aid-percentage-common-data-set-6.html&lt;/a&gt;
Keep in mind that merit aid does not necessarily “stack” atop need-based aid. Often it merely offsets the need-based aid you’d otherwise get. So, it can be most desirable for full-pay students. NM scholarships may work differently at some schools, so investigate.</p>

<p>For a Texas resident with your daughter’s qualifications, and for your Expected Family Contribution, you may be best to focus on well-endowed, selective private schools that can afford the most generous need-based aid without loans (need-blind, full-need, no-loan schools.)
[The</a> New York Times > Education > Image > Tuition Free, Loan Free, Debt Free](<a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2008/04/20/education/edlife/20essay2.ready.html]The”>The New York Times > Education > Image > Tuition Free, Loan Free, Debt Free)
[Need-blind</a> admission - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“Need-blind admission - Wikipedia”>Need-blind admission - Wikipedia)</p>

<p>Carnegie Mellon would be great for theater and math</p>

<p>USC and Boston University are larger than 5k, but they both give 1/2 tuition all 4 years for national merit.</p>

<p>Am I correct in assuming what the OP wants is a school with a good math major and an active theatre club, or do you want to double major? At Carnegie Mellon you have to audition for the theatre major - it’s very difficult to get into. Once in, however, you can double major in math. I don’t think you can go the other way and I don’t think CMU has much of a theatre club. Rice has a good math dept and an active theatre club - the Rice Players. I think Yale is similar with the Yale Drama Coalition. Choosing a school for this student requires some in-depth investigation into the theater programs at each school.</p>

<p>^^ If no other aid is offered, you’d still be paying about $10K/year more for USC or BU than for UT at full COA for an in-state, residential student.</p>

<p>Thanks for all the info. Ideally D would minor in theatre. This makes the LAC attractive but having good math program and enough financial aide will be the most important factors. </p>

<p>Don’t think she’s a good enough actress to get scholarships. Hopefully strong female math student (that is multi talented) will attract some college interest.</p>

<p>If your D loves Pomona or another school that meets full need, why not apply ED? If admitted, you’re free to back out if you decide the finances just aren’t feasible (because, as jvt noted, what you can actually contribute and what a school thinks you can may be very different), and then you have a great in-state option and some OOS schools with NM $ to look into.</p>

<p>I guess I don’t understand ED. I thought that if she were accepted we would have to take whatever financial package they give. I didn’t know you could back out if finances didn’t work out. </p>

<p>I’ve worked hard to get as close as possible to our IM EFC but worried that a school may look at home equity or consider Roth IRA available for college.</p>

<p>Most LACs have a much smaller class size. If D is looking at Pomona, then she might want to consider Williams (although it is very isolated; you need to like a rural setting). It offers generous FA and the academics are outstanding. It is very strong in math and the arts.</p>

<p>University of Rochester. I cannot speak about the math department but my daughter is a graduate who did theater and it is a good program, although not a separate department. It is a concentration in the English Dept so you would be an English minor. The campus size is what you are looking for, she would probably qualify for some merit money. The school likes to see well-rounded students and demonstrated interest is important.</p>

<p>She might want to consider some of the women’s colleges. For a full list, see [The</a> Women’s College Coalition](<a href=“http://www.womenscolleges.org%5DThe”>http://www.womenscolleges.org) b@r!um who normally posts in the International Students Forum is a Math major at Bryn Mawr who will be graduating this year. She seems to be very tapped in to the whole math major business. You might consider sending her a PM for advice.</p>

<p>Of the Women’s Colleges, Barnard, Bryn Mawr, Mt. Holyoke, Smith, and Wellesley would be Reach/High Matches for your daughter. Agnes Scott, Mills, Scripps, etc. would be Matches to Safeties. Some of these colleges have serious merit aid for a student like your daughter.</p>