<p>Well, that could very well be the case for you, depending on what your EFC is. But if it is, then I suspect most of the aid you’re projecting from private colleges is need-based, not merit, because their merit awards (at least according to the colleges themselves, who have no reason to lie about it) just aren’t that big. So I think you need to be a little more careful about how you talk about this, because I think you’re feeding misinformation to people with repeated posts about the generous merit awards that their kids can expect.</p>
<p>bclintonk–no, it’s all merit based. Our EFC is higher than the schools cost so no need based in there at all. Feel free to look up the merit aid awards available at various LAC in the midwest and tell me I am wrong. We are looking at anywhere between $15000-20,000+ in schools in the $30-OMG range and after various NPC’s costs between nothing and $24,000–all less than what would be offered at the U of MN-TC. Having many friends with kids attending that school, none of them got much merit aid-including our 4.0, 35 ACT friend, $300 merit aid–got more than enough to pay next to nothing at other Big 10 schools.</p>
<p>I just re-ran the U of MN-TC NPC to see if I missed something and zip, nothing, nada. The merit aid awards there are NOT automatic like almost every other school we are looking at and IF they were to get one of the awards, it would still be the most expensive school on their list coming in at around $25,000 living on campus. Now, if you qualify for financial aid, your numbers may differ but in our case, not so.</p>
<p>We had to run those numbers twice with both Ds as they compared U of Mn-TC and almost every private in MN and Iowa. D1 graduated from a private in IA and D2 is currently a senior at a MN private. The costs weren’t even close. Way less expensive to go private with merit aid. We don’t qualify for any need based aid. Both Ds were great students but were also recruited athletes so there could have been extra “merit” dollars in the pot. D2 took an OOS DI sports scholarship her freshman year but then transferred home to a private school. They were very generous about offering her the original scholarship from freshman year as a transfer student. Morris is a nice little school with a good reputation if you don’t want to be in the Cities. The U-TC is also good if you don’t mind a larger school.</p>
<p>A small private you may want to look at is St. Mary’s in Winona, MN. Winona is a smaller city (around 27,000 people) but is only about 1/2 hour from La Crosse, WI and an hour from Rochester, MN.</p>
<p>I personally know one of the biology professors and he’s a great guy. From what he has said the school is focused on the students. I have known kids who have attended and they love it. In the upper division courses it can become almost one on one due to the small size.</p>
<p>The UofM can sometimes be very generous with merit aid for high-stats students, so it would be worth applying. Otherwise, I honestly think the educational opportunities are probably comparable at UIowa or Iowa State (that statement goes against my personal bias, but there it is).</p>
<p>For some majors Bemidji State might be worth a look. It is affordable and in a good location for outdoor activities.
How do you know that? Like, how do you define and measure the “academic standards” of a university?</p>
<p>I just don’t see it, SteveMA. I mean, I don’t doubt you get the figures your get from the NPCs; everyone’s situation is unique. But at least for us, all the private schools we’d even remotely consider come in at a much higher net price than the publics. </p>
<p>As expected, the Carleton and Macalester NPCs don’t even ask merit-related questions, and we come out full pay at both schools, i.e., zero grants/scholarships, net COA in the high $50Ks, so about $30K more than UMN-TC for a Minnesota resident. Again, those with a lower EFC will do better, and the lower your EFC the better you’ll do financially at these schools. </p>
<p>St. Olaf says we can expect about $6,500 in merit aid, nothing in need-based, so a net COA of $42,350, or about $18K more than UMN-TC</p>
<p>Gustavus says we can expect $15K in merit aid, nothing in need-based aid, but that still leaves a net COA of around $32K, about $8K higher than UMN-TC for an in-state student. And I think Gustavus is low-balling their true COA; they throw in $1,783 for books & supplies, transportation, personal and miscellaneous, which seems unrealistically low to me. UMN-TC puts in about $3,200 for those items, which I think is much more realistic. You’ve got to be careful in comparing both sticker-price COAs and net COAs, because some schools will low-ball those figures, and others will be more honest. Then again, there’s not a lot to do in St. Peter, MN, so maybe kids going to school in the Twin Cities do spend more on “personal and miscellaneous.” That becomes something of a quality of life issue in itself, though.</p>
<p>There are also discrepancies in the COA figures used in the NPCs of some of these schools, and the COA figures they use on their websites. At Carleton, for example, the NPC uses a total COA of $55,728 on its NPC, including books, travel, personal & miscellaneous. But elsewhere on their admissions website, they show that tuition, fees, and room & board alone come to $55,996, so that by the time you add in books, travel, personal, and miscellaneous, their total COA would be more in the $58K range. And notice that none of them promise you those merit awards; it’s an “estimate,” and my guess is a lot of it is a lot less automatic than might appear to the naked eye.</p>
<p>I’d also point out that D2’s GPA and test scores are above the 75th percentile for St. Olaf, and way high for Gustavus. So my guess is there are a couple of things going on here. These schools may offer bigger merit awards to lure applicants from greater distances. We’re local, so they undoubtedly get a lot more like D2 and don’t need to be so generous to land a reasonable percentage of them. Second, our EFC comes in way high due to a particular, relatively illiquid but ultimately valuable asset we own that doesn’t produce any present income for us. So my guess is there’s a hidden “need” element in their merit formula, and they’re probably throwing us into a category of affluent people who are not particularly price-sensitive when it comes to higher education. And they’re right, ultimately; we’re willing to pay full freight to get the best education for our kids, but it’s not because we’re rolling in income and liquid assets. To my mind, Carleton or Macalester would be a step up in quality from UMN-TC or UW-Madison, and I’d pay for that increment of quality, even though it would cost us more than twice as much. St. Olaf would be either on a similar level or a step down in quality from UMN-TC and UW-Madison in my book; there’s no reason for us to pay extra for that, but bottom line D2 would prefer either UMN-TC or UW-Madison to St. Olaf anyway, so that’s not even a discussion for us. Gustavus, in my opinion, would be a definite step down in quality from UMN-TC or UW-Madison, and more expensive to boot; that’s just out of the question for us. So we’re going with UMN-TC and UW-Madison as D2’s safeties, and they also happen to be her least-cost options at a level of academic quality we would find satisfactory.</p>
<p>Others will make other calculations, and no doubt for some the Minnesota private schools will turn out to be less costly than the publics. But don’t assume that’s true for everyone.</p>
<p>I attended <em>The U</em> back in the early 70s when it was almost free for instate. I felt it was a really good school, even in the huge intro classes. Even when I was an undergrad, they let me take grad school courses that were under 20 students and had great profs. Don’t know what it’s like these days, but I expect it’s still good, if not free. </p>
<p>Morris is certainly excellent by reputation.</p>
<p>bclintonk-Try running the NPC for the other LAC in MN, WI, IA and see what you get. Carleton, St. Olaf and Mac were never considerations for our kids and realistically, they aren’t much different then trying to get “merit aid” from schools like Notre Dame. </p>
<p>Just ran the NPC for St. Olaf using DS’s numbers and he would be eligible for 15,000 in scholarships if he went there, not including if he tried for any music scholarships, etc. Keeping in mind that these are not automatic scholarships so he could end up with nothing too.</p>
<p>As for the personal expenses at Gustavus vs U of MN-the U of MN is going to be much higher, costs in Minneapolis are a lot higher than St. Peter, most of the stuff on campus at GAC is free for students, U of MN you pay a fee for a lot of events, etc. Food, entertainment, etc. is just higher at the U of MN.</p>
<p>As for quality of education–that will be just a matter of opinion as I think GAC is a better school than the U of MN and on par with Madison.</p>
<p>Our total freshman output for S2 was around $4000 thanks to very generous merit aid at the twin cities campus. We received a letter last spring that they will be increasing one of his scholarships for Jr & Sr year. We are thrilled with the Honors courses and advising. If I recall, the Nat’l Merit award for last years incoming class was $7500.</p>
<p>Steve, we are in state and were totally blown away when the award letter arrived in the mail. (plus they gave him a freshman research grant for 2nd semester)</p>
<p>Kajon–I would have been blown away too. We know several kids at the U of MN-TC and many of them have outside scholarships paying all or most of their way there (thanks to various large foundations in MN) but none of them were offered much for institutional merit aid. One grad at our high school, perfect ACT and 2390 SAT, NMF, got the $7000 award, but turned it down because of the foundation scholarship he got giving him a free ride for up to 5 years. Turned down Yale for U of MN as a result. Want to go into Bio-Medical Engineering as one possibility so the U of MN was better for that anyway I guess. We know a couple kids that are there that are Evan’s Scholars too, so they aren’t paying much either. We just don’t know of anyone that has gotten significant merit aid directly from the U itself. Nice for your DS though!!</p>
<p>OP here. Our older son gets the NMS/St Olaf scholarship, plus the Presidential, making St Olaf just do-able for us financially. He loves St Olaf and is very successful there. Second son has different strengths and preferences. If there is one thing that stands out, it is that each applying student is unique, and luck and timing play a role. He will pursue both private and public in IA, MN and WI and see what shakes out. This has been a very valuable thread for us. I’ll post again when we are farther along in the process. Thanks!</p>
<p>UMN is a wonderful state school for those looking for a large urban university. S1 is excelling there and was lucky to get an almost full tuition scholarship as they are generous to high achieving students. S2 is a nms and was offered the 10000 per yr Gold scholarship and an additional 5000 for the 1st 2 years and 7000 for the next 2 years. He turned it down as he wanred a warmer climate. OPs son should take a look and if he likes it apply to see what he might get financially there…it might be better than lacs or worse but you never know as esch student has a different experience.</p>
<p>Carleton and Mac give out very little merit aid, but St. Olaf’s common data set says they give $6 million/year in merit aid, not trivial for a school that size. But it could be that a lot of that is for music.</p>
<p>I did run the NPC for Grinnell last night and it says they’d give D2 about $20K in grants/scholarships, which would still leave it costing about $10K more than UMN-TC full-pay. I don’t believe it, though, because it also said we’d be eligible for subsidized federal Stafford loans, which is definitely not the case. There’s an asset category that they ask about in their NPC (just like everyone else) that doesn’t show up in the summary at the end. Assets in that category are what make us full-pay at schools that give only need-based aid. I suspect it’s just a programming error in their NPC. D2 probably will apply there, so we may see eventually, but her top schools are in the Northeast and if she’s admitted ED to one of her top choices, game over. If she ends up at Grinnell, price won’t be the deciding factor.</p>
<p>She has no interest in other schools in MN-WI-IA beyond those I’ve already mentioned in this thread, and I don’t have time to run the NPCs on a bunch of schools that she’s not considering.</p>
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<p>Opinion, yes, but my opinion is based substantially on UMN-TC and UW-Madison having better students and better faculties. I suppose my thinking may also be shaded by the idea that if D2 applied to UMN she’d likely be admitted to the Honors College, which we get a lot of highly favorable reports on from kids who have gone there. But Honors College aside, just the regular UMN students are a cut above Gustavus students stats-wise. </p>
<p>There are, on the other hand, good reasons to prefer an LAC-style education, at least for some kids, and my D2 is probably one of them. But she’s got better LACs than Gustavus on her list, including some (not in MN-IA-WI) that are objectively safeties for her. Not meaning to trash Gustavus here; I actually think pretty highly of the school, and it would be a very solid choice for someone looking for a good LAC who either can’t get into or can’t afford or doesn’t want to pay the high price of a Carleton, Macalester, Grinnell, or St. Olaf.</p>