Alright everyone, here’s the deal: I’m a high school senior from WI, I have a 35 ACT, 4.072 weighted GPA (3.972 unweighted), and am 1st in my class. However, by graduation, I’ll either be 2nd or 3rd due to extra rigor bumps that the kids I’m competing with will get. My parents are of the mindset that since they didn’t have any help paying for college, I should pay for my entire education. This means that they have absolutely $0 saved for me, yet my EFC is like $20,000, so I’m not going to get any aid from the government or from my parents. The factors that I’m considering are quality of education, price, soccer (D3), and good support for deciding on a career (I honestly have no idea what I want to do). The schools I’ve primarily been looking at are St. Olaf College, Carleton College, and the University of Minnesota. I’m also kind of considering UW-Madison, Lawrence University, Gustavus Adolphus College, Augsburg College, Macalester College, Hamline University, and Stanford (that’s my reach school). Obviously all of these colleges have their pros and cons (e.g. UMN has good academics, is relatively cheap, and has a great location, but I’d only be able to play club soccer and I’d like more of an LAC environment), so I’m basically just trying to find the school that’s the best balance of all the things I want. If anyone has any input about which direction I should go, I’d love to hear it! Thank you!
Congratulations on your hard work and success!
Certainly apply in state to a couple of publics!
One you might look at is Miami of Ohio. If you google “Miami of Ohio merit aid” you get a simple chart showing you would be on the top line and ELIGIBLE for half to full tuition. Note that priority deadline was December 1. I’d advise getting the application before your new semester starts if you are interested. The University of Alabama is very generous with merit aid for high-stat OOS students.
You might also look at some other large midwestern publics that offer merit aid to OOS students. I’m thinking of Kansas, Kansas State, Iowa, Iowa State, and Nebraska. Some of those might come in close to in-state tuition, maybe you could get a little more, I"m not sure.
It sounds like colleges that meet full financial need will not work well for you, since your EFC will be a lot higher than what you’ll actually pay. You might also google colleges that offer generous merit aid.
Good luck!
There seems to be a total disconnect. You’ve said that your parents won’t pay anything towards college.
Yet, you have a list of schools that will leave you with a substantial bill to pay. How will you pay? You can only borrow $5,500 for freshman year. How’s the rest going to be covered???
Stop wasting time applying to schools that will never be affordable to you.
Sadly, you’ve missed some serious deadlines at the schools that would have give you huge merit…because that is what you need.
Your parents are terrible naive. Perhaps they went to school when state tuition was very cheap and they commuted from home. Or maybe they went part-time and worked their way thru. Or maybe they borrowed at a time when young people could borrow a lot (that’s not possible anymore.)
If your parents are stubbornly thinking that they’ll qualify and cosign big loans for you each year, that’s just awful. You’re young, you’d have no idea of how the burdens of huge cosigned debt will haunt you.
Undergrads shouldn’t borrow more than the federal limits, which means $5,500 for frosh year.
How do your parents expect you to pay for college? Are they offering to cosign huge loans???
If they’re banking on you getting enough scholarships to pay for nearly all of the costs, why didn’t/aren’t you applying to the schools that will give you huge merit for your stats???
Please realize that outside awards are NOT going to pay for college. The awards that will help you are the ones that are give by the schools themselves. There aren’t private entities that help middle class kids pay for 4 years of college. They have no interest in that. The exception is the Coca Cola scholarship which is highly competitive …don’t know its deadline.
Most outside awards are small and only for freshman year. You’d be stuck after frosh year and have to come home with no degree.
Are you a NMSF??
You have no idea of what you want to do…what are your FAVORITE subjects???
Check out merit aid at University of Arizona. There’s also Baylor and TCU. You should get a tuition scholarship at all three.
If you want a LAC, try University of Minnesota Morris. It still may be unaffordable, but should be more affordable than some of the schools you listed. The direct costs are about 22k per year.
University of North Dakota. Lots of merit aid. Lots of kids who work. My son loved it. He had a 32 on his ACT which was high for UND, but he really enjoyed his college years. He just graduated, is debt free, and now can concentrate on getting a job.
U of M Morris is more like a community college with only about 300 students graduating per year.
U of M Twin Cities is about $26,000/year. You could work for a year before attending. There are a lot of very smart students at the U. There is some merit money but not as much as at UND. We have a daughter who got a 34 on the ACT and has a 3.961 GPA. She will be attending the U next year but did not get any merit aid.
Are you more interested in science or business ? = may be a reasonable starting point.
Are you willing to consider honors colleges at large state universities ? University of Texas-Austin, University of Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, Arizona State University, etc.
@katrina1
University of Minnesota Morris is not a community college. It is a public liberal arts college with about 1,600 students attending.
@Publisher Did you read the OP’s posts? How is UT, for example, even remotely an option for a student from WI with no money?
UT awards scholarship grant money. OP has a 35 ACT score & near perfect GPA.
All of the universities that I listed above award scholarship grant money which is why I listed them.
Sorry. I should have been more clear about my response regarding U of M - Morris. It is not a community college. It is like a community college in that a lot of students start there and then transfer out in freshman or sophomore years in order to complete their degree. When we visited three years ago, I was told that only about 300 students actually graduate from U of M - Morris.