<p>My dd wants to go to a smaller private college. She really likes Taylor and Wheaton but they are WAY out of our price range.</p>
<p>We are in the beginning of stages of just looking around at different options.</p>
<p>Can anyone suggest colleges that won't be pushing $40k a year?</p>
<p>Does she want a christian college or just private? or particular area of the country? what major(s)?
just searching on collegeboard for private, under $20k/yr pulled up over 500.</p>
<p>A few my s looked at (ultimately ended up at mid-size public) were University of the Cumberlands, Shorter, Mars Hill, KY Wesleyan.</p>
<p>I’m not sure, but PC might be within price range. I live in Providence, and it truly is an amazing school, no doubt. Run by the dominican brothers, its gorgeous too!! Good luck!</p>
<p>Her preference would be the Mid-West and also one that will accept a good B average- 3.3-3.5 range.</p>
<p>If you go to collegeboard.com you can search on a lot of different criteria. I searched for “non-denominational” colleges, and found:
Taylor University
Upland, Indiana
~$30,000</p>
<p>Oak Hills Christian College
Bemidji, Minnesota
<$20,000</p>
<p>Just as examples.</p>
<p>I use collegeboard.com all the time. You can see statistics about financial aid, SAT scores, etc.</p>
<p>Most people don’t pay the full price - look into financial aid practices at the school you are interested in. My eldest went to Colgate and never paid more than $8,000 a year.</p>
<p><em>hugs</em></p>
<p>You might also want to see how competitive your D is relative to the normative admissions stats and see if she might lock down some scholarships.</p>
<p>Don’t know much about it but Taylor is very popular choice at DS’s high school. I believe that with a >/=3.5 Taylor hands out big money. DS has a friend who is applying only there because it is the only place his family can afford–which makes no sense to me in light of all the state schools available unless it’s very affordable. The friend is likely to have decent test scores to go with the 3.5.</p>
<p>DS has gotten lots of communication from Carthage College in Wisconsin and they offer lots of merit aid to those with >/=3.0. There may be a minimum test score requirement to go with that.</p>
<p>I suggest Calvin College in Grand Rapids, MI. It has approx. 4,000 undergrads and while it’s private, it “only” costs 24,000 a year. </p>
<p>She could get in and probably pick up some merit money since anyone over a 3.0 is eligible for scholarships. They’re also very good about financial aid even though, as far as private schools go, its moderately priced. The average financial aid is 17,000 and the amount of students who get their total financial aid met is almost 90%.</p>
<p>My sister goes there now.</p>
<p>Union in Tennessee and Covenant in Georgia (just outside the Chattanooga, TN border) are both reasonably priced with financial aid opportunities. In western PA, there’s Grove City, but their stats are similar to Wheaton’s so it might be harder to get in. Geneva is also in western PA and has been recommended by parents whose students go there. (Taylor is too - just offering different suggestions than what’s already been mentioned and trying not to stray too far from the midwest, but these are farther.)</p>
<p>I grew up in midwest and had a lot of friends who attended these schools and really liked them…of course, many moons ago:
MidAmerica (KS)
Malone (OH)
Cedarville (OH)
Anderson (IN)</p>
<p>Grove City in PA, which creekland mentioned, is an amazing bargain at under $20K/yr - however, it is also highly selective to get into.</p>
<p>I recently came across Anderson (IN) - don’t know much about it but they offer a lot of merit aid, especially for students in your GPA range. Their ave SAT stats aren’t that high )if I recall middle 50% is 920 - 1140) so I believe they are using merit to try and attract higher ranked students</p>
<p>AU is one that she is interested in. She would have to get significant free money in order for us to be able to send her there.</p>
<p>While GC is amongst the most selective of Christian universities, I don’t know that I would call it (or really, any Christian college) highly selective in general. Christian education in this country is still very much coming into its own, and there just aren’t any protestant universities out there that can boast “highly selective” admissions stats. Even Wheaton College, the most selective Christian University, isn’t in the upper echelon of selectivity. For those that would count Pepperdine, the same can be said. </p>
<p>The good news is that I do think in 20 years or so that will have changed.</p>
<p>I agree with Phearme that I don’t think any Christian college is highly selective in the terms of Ivies (or similar), but for what it’s worth, Grove City came up as a more difficult school for my son to get into than Wheaton when we plugged in all the stats on the ‘fit’ boards. He was likely to get into both, but Grove City was the ‘hardest’ of the group he checked.</p>
<p>In the end, since neither had the major he wanted he didn’t apply to either. Wheaton still courts him (e-mails, mailings, occasional call). Grove City never did.</p>
<p>I can’t speak to the “fit” boards or the algorithms that they use, but here is the data:</p>
<p>Grove City
SAT: 1150-1389
Frosh Retention: 91.5% retention</p>
<p>Wheaton:
SAT - 1210-1390
Frosh Retention - 94.8%</p>
<p>Both schools have pretty impressive numbers, but Wheaton still has the edge in gaining, and keeping, top students.</p>
<p>Grove City is also a little bit larger of a school which probably makes the difference in the lower end scores. If they both had the same number of students, Grove City would undoubtedly have the higher scores - assuming they would cut the lower ones from admission. My Alma mater (not Christian) is cutting 1/4th of their freshmen admitted this coming year to improve the selectivity rating (they came out and told us this when we visited). It won’t necessarily make them a better college (esp certain majors that were already higher than their average), but it will improve their ranking in that all important magazine.</p>
<p>For us, I’m guessing diversity played a bit. We live in PA, therefore, would be more attractive to an out of state school on diversity grounds - otherwise, all should be similar.</p>
<p>Have you looked at Cornerstone in Grand Rapids, MI or Spring Arbor (also in MI)? Also, some kids from church have gone to Adrian College, good aid, very small, not sure how Christian (but the kids from church have found great small groups there)</p>
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<p>I am quoting based on Barron’s data (which is what our college guidance office utilizes in analyzes stats. HYPM and other top end schools would fall into the Most Competitive category in terms of admission. The next category down is highly competitive plus which is where Grove City falls - followed by highly competitive and several other catgeories. So Barrons puts GC in the 2nd most competitive / selective category. I assume Wheaton is there as well but I do not have data on them handy</p>
<p>Lee University is under 18k for everything…can’t say its been that great thus far there though. Its very much an “underground” party school.</p>
<p>Trinity International University. Not only are they less than 40k, they offer a lot of need and merit based aid. You do have to pick and choose as some merit aid cancels your automatic scholarships.</p>