Some of the selective, but not too selective, private schools we identified whose NPC results came in very favorable for moderately low income included Brandeis, U of Rochester, Case Western, U of Miami, and Tulane. These are places where you might receive merit/need aid combinations approaching the Ivies in generosity without needing the crazy stats and luck to get in. These schools all emphasize expressed interest, but you can do that by requesting info, attending visits to your HS or local area, participating in online chats, etc. without actually visiting campus. Some schools in the same class that did not appear to offer especially great need-based aid as a matter of course were NYU, Carnegie Mellon, GWU, BU and Northeastern.