^
Example: A student whose parents make 97,000 a year and own a 200,000 home would receive $47,000 in institutional aid from Denison. Their net price would be around 25K, same as tOSU.
OP has already applied and hopefully ran the NPC.
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So if I get a merit scholarship (at CWRU for example) it won’t “stack” on top of the institutional aid? That might be a deal breaker for me. I had read about scholarship displacement but I didn’t know that many universities practiced that.
The other thing I was considering doing was minoring in comp sci… I’m not sure how useful that would be though. Not all the colleges I applied to have that as a minor.
The average debt after college seems to be around $30k but if I were to get no significant scholarship/aid and not commute, I’d likely graduate with around $60-80k in debt. My dad got an associates degree at a technical college (and thus graduated with little debt) and my mom has no degree at all so they really have no idea how much is too much I guess. It just seems like way too much no matter where I go. I live in a fairly wealthy area too so none of my peers are really in a similar situation to me… most of their parents are paying for their college. Is it normal for someone in my situation to have to go into more debt? Maybe most college students come from wealthier, more educated families and maybe this brings down the national average? I don’t know.
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College policies do vary.
Here is a list of how various colleges treat outside scholarships in combination with need-based financial aid. How colleges handle their own scholarships with need-based financial aid can differ. Formatting is odd because the post was made under the old forums before conversion to the current forums.
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The reason the average debt is 30K is because the federal loans students can take is 27K, which turns into 31K with interests. It’s what a college graduate can typically pay back over 10 years.
In addition, until about 10 years ago and state budgets being hit by the Grat recession leading to major university budget cuts, public colleges were much, much cheaper. Most parents could “work their way through college”. In the 70s and 80s, public college tuition cost rougly $300 a semester (MIT was about $3,000 a year in the early 70s, Harvard $15,000 in the late 80s.) If the minimum wage had kept up with college tuition, it’d be about $45 an hour right now.
This explains why your parents, like most parents, probably have no idea what college costs nowadays.
You need to run the NPC with them on tOSU and on various colleges (Denison, Oberlin would likely offer the best financial aid in OH).
BTW if you’re competitive for Oberlin, you could run the NPC on Pomona, Scripps (women only), Pitzer, Occidental.
Typically, you’d get your FAFSA aid (federal loans: 5.5K, then perhaps some Pell Grant if you qualify but if your parents make close to 100k then it’s highly unlikely unless you have 7 or 8 siblings.) Then, State grants, if you qualify.
Then, either institutional need based aid or merit aid.
Let’s say a college decides your family can afford to pay 27K. That amount will not go down unless you earn merit aid (which is independent from family wealth). Some colleges will provide you with a package that adds scholarships, federal loans, etc, so your family pays 27K. Those are “meet need” colleges. And most colleges are not “meet need”, which means they may decide that, sure, your family’s supposed to pay 27K, but they just don’t have the money so either you come up with 38K or you’re just not attending. Or that college may decide they really really want you to come and they give you merit aid and you only have 19K to pay one all is said and done. The NPC gives a very big indication about that.
Some of the “meet need” colleges like Oberlin may stack some merit aid that replaces your loans but your family contribution doesn’t change. It does mean that, unlike having to pay 27K and take a 5.5K loan on top of it, you could you pay 21.5K and take the 5.5K loan. But that’s rare.
Finally, yes, most students commute in order to afford college. Ohio is a pretty good state though (unlike PA) because it has good state aid and public universities with good institutional/merit aid for high achievers.
BTW why don’t you/didn’t you apply to University of Cincinnati? They have a good Honors College and the Cincinnatus Scholarship is very good. They offer Informatics outside of Engineering (CEDH I think: less competition for scholarships), with paid co-ops.
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I’d give LMU, USD and Chapman a look.
good luck
grass is always greener, right? my step-niece from Southern California went to Texas Tech as it was much cheaper than any California school. She LOVES it, and wants to live there after graduation.
Seriously, if your budget is approximately $7K and you don’t find a 4 year college that’s going to work without a lot of debt, consider cc. My D’17 went to a cc and lived in student housing (4 bed/4 bath apartment- way better than a dorm room). She got to get away and learn a skill without debt or barely even touching her savings. She is out in the work world now and her bank account continues to grow without loans to pay.
Or even if you just start at a cc and get an associate’s to save on first two years. My HS friend who is a doctor started at cc.
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If you’re out of state, there’s no such thing as reasonably priced in CA. The cost of living alone makes it impossible to afford without wealthy parents. If you’re paying for school on your own, even an in-state university would be cost prohibitive for all 4 years, especially with room and board. To keep from reaching the the $27,000 federal debt cap, you might need to start at community college. My suggestion would be to apply for all the scholarships you can get. Check out Univ of AZ and Univ of AL scholarships.
Hmm, my daughter was contacted by Lafayette’s track coach, and was told she would get any $ for track, and no merit money no matter what her stats are.
OP, how do you plan on paying for OOS college? My kids received generous merit at the schools they applied to (around $18,000 a year, the highest amount before full ride), but they still cost over $30,000 with room and board. You won’t be able to borrow that without having your parents co-sign.
@bscheel: while that’s good advice overall, nowadays your friend’s path would be much more difficult since med schools no longer accept CC credits for science courses (or frown upon them so applicants better have a really good reason why they did that rather than start at a 4-year college… and they may not be able to explain that reason since the first cut off is done by an algorithm so that fewer applications go to human readers. It’s really not fair to lower income applicants and is one additional stumbling block on their path to med school).
@Novanoid
Ohio should have lots of good options though. Miami OH for 19K (and perhaps less) would be terrific, for instance.
Apply to all the Honors Colleges possible 
(as acceptance there means you’re a desirable applicant for the college, it also means preferential packaging).
Look into the “branch campuses” for tOSU just in case they save you money.
And DO run the NPCs alongside your parents, discussing how they envision the budget for your college (keeping in mind they’re probably unaware of costs and probably think you can “work your way through college”.)
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Check out Pepperdine. They do offer generous aid. You can’t find a more beautiful location, and the student community is supportive, from what I’ve heard.
I’m just going to suggest checking out the University of Arizona, even though it’s obviously not in CA, because they offer large merit aid. I’m also from Ohio looking for schools out of state and because of the automatic merit they offer, I got $35k a year, which is basically full tuition because Arizona’s oos tuition is about $36.5k. All the aid is based entirely off gpa, so it may just be something to check out.
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We live to the north in WA and visited about 10 CA colleges with my daughter.
Bottom line, CA is not affordable for an OOS student. Especially if you have an upper-middle class income on the FAFSA.
All the state schools will be unaffordable for an OOS student
The middle of the road private schools like Santa Clara, LMU, and Chapman tend to be less generous with merit aid than equivalently ranked schools from other states
The top schools like Stanford, Pomona, and USC do not do merit aid but need-based aid only. Those schools are filled to the brim with full-pay affluent parents who just write the checks.
Finally, nearly every place in CA that has colleges is very high cost of living. So once you move off campus as an upperclassman you will be paying at least double for rent compared to any city in Ohio.
CA only makes sense for an OOS student if you have parents who don’t mind paying the CA premium cost, or if you are an exceptional student with limited resources who can get into one of the top ranked private schools like Stanford that guarantees meeting 100% of need.
If you want to live in CA, save it for grad school, or move there for your career after you graduate, not for undergrad.
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