What is her intent with BioMedEng’g? That is a very limiting major and usually requires a grad degree. Most/all careers that are “BioMedE” can be achieved with a ChemE or MechE major…and that opens a LOT more merit schools. And, MechE and ChemE are also marketable with just BS degrees.
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Any of the ones on the lists known for merit scholarships?
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What do you mean? Please clarify
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None of the schools on the guaranteed merit list appeal to her.
Of course they don’t. If she gets into a financial safety, she won’t be able to go to one of her more expensive dream schools. I wouldn’t let her submit any apps until she completed apps for two financial safeties. I’d run the Net Price Calculator for every school and I wouldn’t let her apply to any that are unaffordable.
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@austinmshauri is right.
I would have her apply to at least THREE schools that give her ASSURED HUGE merit with net costs of about $15k-20k. THEN have her apply to other choices.
Alabama is a gorgeous school, with amazing NEW state of the art Engineering facilities. Over 1million sq ft of new STEM academic space.
She’d get free tuition PLUS 2500 per year. Net cost would be at or below $15k per year.
ALL of the buildings shown in the above link are part of Alabama’s Science and Eng’g Comples.
I don’t care to belong to any club that will have me as a member - Grouch Marx
In my mind she has a choice - in-state with attendant lower costs or finding something OOS that is that same range. Don’t let her think the rules will change.
Schools that give big merit awards almost always have something about them that is less attractive. That’s why they’re competing for students on price.
It is the parent’s job to set a budget, but ultimately it is the student’s job to build the college list. Give her the facts and let her research. If all she did was glance at the list of names and not dig into what the colleges have to offer, she is not doing her fair share of the work.
Be aware that bioengineering is a “trendy” major. It is one of the hardest departments to get into at UW, especially as a direct-admit freshman, and there is likely lots of competition for that major at other schools as well.
UCs wont give much to anyone out of state
<<<Schools that give big merit awards almost always have something about them that is less attractive. That’s why they’re competing for students on price.<<<
That is too simple of an explanation.
Of course, when compared to “top schools,” the schools that give large merit will seem less attractive. But it’s not simply: schools that don’t give merit are more attractive than schools that do…which is what your statement implies.
There are schools that give large merit for other reasons…maybe they’re trying to raise their middle quartile reported numbers, maybe they’re trying to bring more “top talent” to their state or region.
The way that your statement is written, it can appear that those schools are desperate because they exist on the wrong side of the tracks.
I didn’t mean “less attractive” to just mean physically beautiful campuses or whatever. A school that wants to raise its reportable numbers may have lower selectivity, which some students may confuse with quality. A school that’s located in a region not known for having “top talent” is also a negative attribute to some people.
“Some aspect that is less attractive” doesn’t mean “horrible school.” But, kids look at the list of merit aid schools and don’t see the familiar names from all the rankings and can be turned off by that. Which was the point of my post - OP’s D needs to look in detail at what these schools have to offer. Your post about Alabama having more than what you might think is a good example.
A program I watch fairly regularly has been showing a lot of ads for Montana State lately. It is a WUE school, and I’m sure there would be more money for someone with high states. The two programs I remember being featured were the film program and some biology one with research at the south pole.
Yes, that is another issue. She will need money for graduate school. I’ll show her this thread so she gets the news from others than just me.
Check which WUE schools give a WUE discount AND merit. Many WUE schools will NOT give both merit and WUE discount. Often it’s choose one or the other…not both.
MSU Bozeman has merit and WUE but you can’t combine. The 2260 would likely give her the max of $15k/year which would leave under $18k/year left.
Pitt has biomed engineering and they have full tuition but it’s somewhat random. Geographical diversity may help! They have competitive full rides
True, some WUE schools don’t allow the WUE 150% tuition and the big merit award, but do allow the WUE 150% tuition and other merit aid - talent, department, other named scholarships.
Wyoming doesn’t allow WUE and the Rocky Mtn scholarship (automatic merit aid for OOS with certain gpa/ACT) but does allow music, theater, engineering, minority scholarships, outside scholarships, and ROTC-type scholarships to be stacked with either the WUE or Rocky Mtn (which can also be 150% of tuition for the highest level). You can still chisel away at the tuition bill.
Okay, I ran the net price calculators and realized we still get some financial aid, bringing the cost down about 20k a year to a more reasonable 43k a year with room and board. We told Grandpa, and he is kicking in another 50k if she gets into a top school (the top five on our list). Unfortunately, none of the WUE schools have decent/ABET accredited biomedical engineering programs or at least not that I could find.
Reach-
Vanderbilt University
Northwestern Universitiy
Rice University
Johns Hopkins
Duke
California Polytechnic State University
Cal State Long Beach (Next to grandpa)
University of Washington
University of California–San Diego
North Carolina State University at Raleigh
University of Wisconsin - Madison
Arizona State University
On the fence about University of Michigan
She’ll get aid at UW-Madison? Your EFC is $14k or less?
If she got into honors at UW, there are fantastic study abroad options - maybe that would compensate for staying relatively close to home.
http://depts.washington.edu/uwhonors/international/
I can’t think of a school within WUE that is better than UW.
Maybe look at Case Western? Good merit scholarship for stats there. Pretty sure it has BME.
Yes, the international program might help to lessen her disappointment in having to go to a really great school in a really great state. The poor, unfortunate child. 
It is funny how as teens, we all want to try something new. Ultimately, I think that might be a really good option. I’ll discuss it with her. Also, she is feeling a bit better about U.Washington anyway when you start showing her how cool that program is…though, she might not even get into it as it is pretty competitive.
And no, we don’t have EFC of 14k or less. We have mostly had to give up on the idea of getting good merit aid. I might have to take UW-Madison off the list because the more I read about it, the worse it sounds in terms of finances. It is hard to gather so much information in such a short time…and she is busy studying for her SAT subject tests, writing essays for admittance, and doing her homework for AP classes, so she doesn’t have a lot of time to research either.
I really wish I had known about this years ago so I could have planned better.
She won’t get a nickel of need based aid as an OOS student at UC San Diego. The UCs no longer give need based aid to OOS students. She would be full pay there.
ASU is a good safety. Make sure she looks into the honors college.
There is no need-based grant aid at UW-Madison for non-residents with a FAFSA EFC of $14001 and higher, and highly likely no merit aid as well.
Scholarships are very limited for non-residents*, the application is time-consuming and requires recommendation letters and amounts are generally one-time awards of $500-$2000.
*For example about 1500 incoming freshmen apply for the approximately 90 College of Letters & Science scholarships and fewer than 10 are allowed by donor stipulation to be awarded to non-residents.