To be clear, my post was about dance (and movement studies) generally, not ballet specifically.
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This is a bit random, but the other day in the NESCAC thread we took a dive into the online information available about Dance at the Five Colleges schools (UMass, Amherst, Smith, Mt Holyoke, and Hampshire), as a sort of test case about what Five Colleges might offer to people with such an interest:
Through Five Colleges, you can major in Dance at any of them, although it seems pretty clear from the course listings and other materials that if you were thinking of actually doing that you might choose Smith (which also offers an MFA in Dance) or UMass (which also offers a BFA in Dance), including because they seem to have the deepest course offerings at their college. Amherst, for example, is one of the schools which itself only offers a Theater and Dance degree, but again you can actually get a Dance degree through Five Colleges at Amherst.
And generally, if you were just interested in doing some Dance, maybe at the minor level or even less than that? You’d want to do more than just online research for this purpose, but off hand it looks to me like any of the Five Colleges might be good for that, and then you could otherwise favor whichever of those colleges appealed to you most for other reasons.
And I know Amherst, which we visited, has a very open curriculum, and while it doesn’t offer merit grants, it has a robust lineup of college-funded summer and school-year paid research positions.
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I forgot Bard, too.
One possible thing to consider is whether the presence of a degreed dance program means fewer opportunities for non-majors to take classes or perform.
Exploring extracurricular dance can be hard, too. See if there are online videos, and visit and attend class or performance if possible.
I know you have other interests! I am posting about dance because that is what I know a little more about.
Are you applying to U. of Washington?
D23 will be attending Mt. Holyoke in the fall. She received a very generous merit award/financial aid package. She also applied to Smith but was waitlisted. Smith NPC indicated our cost would the lowest cost of all the schools that she applied to. In our case the NPC was very accurate.
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OP said this:
However, as noted previously, University of Washington is not a safety if access to the computer science major is needed, since both direct admission and secondary admission to the major tend to be reaches.
Other Washington public schools should be considered for safeties.
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To state the obvious, that’s a great result!
And the relevance to the OP is I think she could pretty much populate an entire application list from “reach” through “target” to “likely” with schools that one way or another would (or at least could) be affordable and that would all be great opportunities for someone like her.
All dependent on what OP determines with her family is budget and what schools have to say about achieving it.
Until then - we don’t really know.
It’s great to know the Mt Holyoke NPC is accurate - so the students family can check.
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Yes, but I think schools which offer merit aid, lots of paid research, and so on can count as schools which “could” be affordable even if their NPC (or MyinTuition) on their own suggest they might be above budget.
It is undoubtedly sound advice, though, that applicants should also have “likelies” that will be affordable even if none of that works out.
Many schools include merit in the NPC. Hofstra, Bradley as examples.
Many don’t.
I would not count on paid research. You don’t know if the student can access or if they can handle given the time constraints.
Personally I go where is affordable with no additional help required.
Nonetheless if I’m told by my fam $25k a year and the NPCs say $60-90k - that’s why to me it’s all premature.
Hopefully OP comes back with at least a general figure.
I imagine it’s hard for kids to ask that question and hard for parents who may not have given it a thought to answer it.
It may be the EFC, since it’s known, becomes the de facto budget.
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Obviously this is getting into the realm where it is going to get very personal.
So speaking just personally–my parents were actually adamantly against me getting a job during the term, but expected me to get a job during the summers, as they thought that combination was likely best for my overall development.
I think I had internalized a similar view going into this process, but it is now becoming obvious to me these paid research/abroad positions are really a different issue. The big difference being they can actually be a significant part of your academic experience, and not just a pay check.
So, again personally, I am much more open to the idea of my kids doing a paid research position or study abroad program during the term, and for that matter doing that rather than delivering pizzas or lifeguarding or so on during the summer.
Of course availability is also an important consideration. Still, some of these schools are now suggesting at least some of these programs are basically available to anyone who wants to participate. Abroad and summer programs are maybe most in that category, but other sorts of college-funded research during the term is supposedly converging into that category as well.
OK, so it is again very personal how you want to factor these possibilities into a budget discussion, and I would definitely suggest doing a lot of careful due diligence if this sort of thing might be an important consideration for you and your family.
Still, I personally would not suggest everyone entirely ignore this issue either. Because it seems apparent to me it is now a reality of the modern US college ecosystem that some colleges are increasingly putting funds into supporting students financially in these ways, outside of the grant channel.
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In thinking about your interests, I pulled up all the colleges that IPEDS data says offers the majors of computer science, linguistics, and creative writing. This link shows the results: College Navigator - Search Results. That does not mean the list is exhaustive, however. Some may have a creative writing concentration within their English major. Others call CS Computer and Information Sciences (here’s a list of the ones who do CIS, linguistics, and creative writing: College Navigator - Search Results). So there are still tweaks and such to be made to find schools. But, if you’re interested in exploring various fields, it would help if they were at least offered at the university with sufficient depth.
Although the budget is still an open question, these are some schools that offer all your majors that I didn’t see on your list. Some of them are Big Names while others are lesser known but still offer a quality education. There’s no need to start researching all of these, but this list is designed to show that pretty much regardless of whatever budget your family sets, there will be options.
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Bennington (VT): About 800 undergrads
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Binghamton (NY): About 14k undergrads. This NY school (that most consider the flagship) is also trying to attract more out-of-state students to increase its profile. I suspect you’d receive nice merit here, too.
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Brandeis (MA): About 3600 undergrads
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Bucknell (PA ): About 3700 undergrads
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Carnegie Mellon (PA ): About 6900 undergrads
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Emory (GA): About 7100 undergrads
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Haverford (PA ): About 1400 undergrads and in a consortium with Bryn Mawr & Swarthmore
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Miami U. (OH): About 17k undergrads. Many people have indicated that the campus feels like a larger liberal arts college and they give some very generous merit aid.
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SUNY Oswego (NY): About 6100 undergrads, and the cost is unlikely to be more than you would pay at UW, if that.
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Truman State: About 3900 undergrads at Missouri’s very well-respected liberal arts college, which is also a great bargain
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U. of Arizona: About 37k undergrads, so in no way, shape or form a liberal arts college. But, it gives very generous merit and has a well-regarded honors college with about 5900 participants in the main campus, which would be like a school within a school.
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U. of Chicago: About 7600 undergrads
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U. of Montana: About 7200 undergrads and as a WUE school, the rate would be quite competitive.
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U. of New Mexico: About 16k undergrads, a WUE school, and you’d probably get excellent merit here.
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Western Washington: About 14k undergrads but I think it’d be great to have an in-state backup in case UW doesn’t work out (particularly since CS is so competitive)
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Agree 100%
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Hi everyone, thank you so much for all the help. Here’s some updated context for my college search. Sorry about my delayed response!
I talked to my parents about budget and my parents don’t plan to pay anything toward my college right now, so I would have to take out loans for any family contribution. Looking at the MyinTution calculator for many of the schools on my list, I can see it’s unrealistic to plan on attending any of those schools without an unexpectedly massive scholarship. The student/parent contribution is around 25k to 30k for most of the schools on my list. My parents don’t want me to (and of course I don’t want to) graduate with tons of loans, especially if I end up pursuing a non-STEM career, so ideally that number should be as close to 0 as possible, but based on some pretty rudimentary playing around with numbers, the cap would probably be 10k per year.
I know I definitely need to look at some more financial safeties—WUE schools being some great choices since I’d love to go out of state. UW is such a perfect fit as a safety besides comp sci, so I probably will apply as some other less competitive major. A couple of people mentioned Universities of Montana and Arizona so I’ll definitely look into those, and all the other schools mentioned.
My dream has always been to go to an elite liberal arts college in the Northeast or Midwest. I know UW and other mentioned safeties are fantastic schools and I could definitely be happy there, but part of me really really wants to go to a smaller, more selective school. I think I have a fair chance at admission at some of them, so the barrier is definitely cost. I would hate to get into a school and be unable to attend due to the price, but I also don’t want to eliminate these schools from my list entirely. Is there any situation at all where merit aid significantly exceeds what a school determines is my “need”? Or any schools that estimate need to be significantly higher than other similar schools? I’m having a tough time reconciling my dream for the past four years with my financial reality. My parents always talked about me getting a full-ride, and I thought it was a joke, or a pipe dream, but now I see how it may be the only way to attend one of my dream schools.
Again, thank you so much for all of your help! I’ve already learned so much and have a much better picture of the reality of applying to college from all of you.
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Look at the elite with your parents. Perhaps you have and it’s in the 73 posts but have them run a net price calculator. Perhaps you qualify for need ? If so they can lower your cost.
And don’t forget schools like Seattle U, W&L and SMU that have full rides.
There are schools in the south where you can get a full ride or close to it too.
Thanks.
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How about the ischool at UW for the OP? About a 32% acceptance rate.
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You can only take out very limited loans in your own name (freshman year: $5500, sophomore year: $6500, junior & senior year: $7500 each). Any family contribution above those amounts has to be paid from money you have or loans taken out by your parents or co-signed by your parents (so they are taking on the responsibility and risk for paying for the loan if you don’t pay it back).
If the NPCs of private schools that are at least moderately generous are giving expected family contribution’s in the $25K-$30K range (as I think I understand from your last post), you will need to focus on schools that are either extremely inexpensive or that give very high merit if your parents truly plan to contribute nothing.
Unfortunately, it seems unlikely that the type of East Coast private schools you are hoping for will be affordable unless you are one of the very few people who earn an extremely competitive full scholarship to one of the few schools that give them (BC, BU, I think a few in the southeast).
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Maybe see if applying for Stamps Scholarship at Univ. of Oregon could be a fit; five awarded to out of state residents.
Elizabethtown near Lancaster PA might be of interest but the Stamps only covers tuition and an enrichment fund.
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Does that mean $0 toward any school, or nothing beyond the cost of UW? Do you live within commuting distance of UW or another Washington public university? Generally, room and board alone is at least $10k (often more like $15-18k in some areas), and that is assuming that you get a scholarship for full tuition and fees. So, even if you take out a loan and have a part-time job and summer earnings, at best you’re covering your room and board.
Just remember that if you don’t apply as a comp sci major, it is extremely unlikely that you will be able to switch IN to a CS major, should that become your desire.
If your family’s intent is to pay $0 toward your college expenses, then a full ride is your only chance at attending a residential college without incurring any loans.
As you enter the world of merit scholarships, remember that in general schools tend not to “stack” a merit scholarship on top of need, they just use the merit scholarship to replace need. So if your family is expected to pay 25,000 at a full-need school, if they gave you a $25,000 scholarship it would replace some of the need based aid they were giving you. Most elite private schools in the midwest or NE do not give full-ride scholarships, but rather a proportion of tuition as their max. It is more common to see full-ride scholarships in southern schools that are trying to attract students who otherwise were not looking south. Some of these are great schools.
My favorite of these is Rhodes College in Memphis; might be worth a look. Generous scholarships, including full-rides. But as with the other schools that offer these, they are extremely competitive. This is a “Colleges that Change Lives” school.
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Up front you said you prefer not to go to the South - but then you need to find schools that will give a full ride without need.
So yes, they may be in the South but a Troy University in Alabama.
The Scholars Award
- Students with a 30-32 ACT/1360-1440 RSAT and a 3.7 GPA will receive tuition and basic housing
Louisiana Lafayette - Live Oak- it’s hard to tell but I think it’s a full ride.
Alabama Sate (HBCU) is a full ride.
Tuskegee (HBCU) is a full ride.
There’s more. You can 100% go to college but there are trade offs when you can’t afford to go and don’t qualify for need (do we know this)? Or you can say and I don’t mean this meanly - but beggars can’t be choosers - meaning - when in this situation (no contribution), you have to be thankful someone is willing and able to cover you.
There may be more - check directional schools out there - E Washington, etc.
I feel for you. That’s tough. What’s your parent’s reasoning or is it affordability?
Undergraduate Scholarships | Troy University
Incoming Freshmen Scholarships - Fall 2023 | Office of Scholarships (louisiana.edu)
ASU Academic Scholarships | Alabama State University (alasu.edu)
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