<p>While the scholarships are very competitive, your daughter might want to consider applying to the Emory Scholars program at Emory. She looks like she would certainly be competitive in that pool, and you never know...</p>
<p>Rice is also excellent with merit money for your daughter. </p>
<p>I know a lot of happy students at both schools.</p>
<p>what do drunken sailors invest in?</p>
<p>Midmo and boysx3 beat me to the punch ... I was also going to suggest Rice. There's really nothing southern about the feel of Rice -- but it is a friendly, collaborative, dynamic, inclusive environment. They have some wonderful merit scholarships and a wealth of research opportunities for undergrads. Carnegie Mellon, on the other hand, is very stingy with merit aid (and it's almost impossible to get unless you're a female in a male dominated school, like Computer Science, or you're a minority).</p>
<p>USC offers 1/2 tuition for NMFinalists, and the opportunity to win a full tuition scholarship after an interview. [That's what my son has] Be SURE she gets her application in by the early Dec deadline. USC has the Thorton School of Music, which is one of the best conservatory programs on the west coast.[ another reason he chose USC over many other more highly ranked schools]
Re sports; as a student at USC, it isn't hard to ignore the sports hoopla there if you want to. [Feel free to PM me if you have questons about USC and U Chicago, which my son attended for 1 qtr, before returning to USC]</p>
<p>"what do drunken sailors invest in?"</p>
<p>Walt Disney or InBev stock.</p>
<p>I know you don't think she would be happy in the south - but Richmond is beautiful and the Richmond Scholars program is outstanding.</p>
<p>Brandeis sounds like a great fit for your D, and Brandeis offers fantastic merit aid to top students: Brandeis</a> Admissions | Costs/Financial Aid | Scholarships
In a sleepy-ish suburb of Boston, but with easy access to the city. Great performing arts opportunities. Definitely not a school with a strong athletic culture.</p>
<p>Did you read this NYT magazine article about a girl who tried to get a free ride at a bunch of top colleges. Sounded exhausting.</p>
<p>Sharon,</p>
<p>Curmudgeon is very (no, make that VERY) knowlegeable about merit aid. So I won't attempt to better his suggestions on the topic.</p>
<p>What I would suggest though, is assembling one of those "bottom up" lists where every school on the list is loved by your D. The reason is that many schools tend to love applicants that love the school, and it can be hard to "show the love" for a school that's on the list primarily because of it's merit aid policy. JMHO.</p>
<p>Congrats to your D on her 36 ACT, and best of luck with her list.</p>
<p>She might be very interested in Lewis & Clark or Goucher. Both give good merit aid, are near cities and looked great to us. Or Clark U in MA.</p>
<p>She might also take a look at the University of San Diego (not University of California, San Diego, but the private Catholic university). Very good science programs, including many research opportunities, and some decent merit possibilities for someone with her stats. </p>
<p>USC already mentioned is another very good possibility for merit money. Willamette in Oregon and Whitman in Washington State would be my top picks for biology with merit money in the pacific northwest. Whitman, in particular, might be a very solid fit - excellent academics, good track record with graduate schools, and one of the most active theater programs in the country. Definitely worth a look.</p>
<p>The University of California schools are expensive for out of state students, and offer very little merit money. If you would be open to a Cal State, however, you might look into Cal Poly San Luis Obispo - no merit money, but quite a bit cheaper out of state than the UC's.</p>
<p>Finally, not yet mentioned, but I'd take a look at the University of Michigan honors college. U Mich is big yes, but a wonderful school for the sciences, and the honors college makes it feel smaller. Some opportunity for good merit money there for top students as well.</p>
<p>If she wants to study natural science in graduate school she will get full support, so she doesn't need to save a cent for graduate school. Indeed, she should be able to get decent paying work in a research lab as an undergraduate with that kind of interest and background, so the financial worries don't look as large as they would if, say, she wanted to study medieval literature.</p>
<p>Hey Token,
question for you re:"If she wants to study natural science in graduate school she will get full support" -I'm under the impression that grad schools only offer "full support-no tuition, stipend, etc, if a student is accepted into a PHD program, but if the degree is a masters, students are still charged full tuition.[ I'm not referring to MBA programs or law school] True? Not?</p>
<p>"Finally, not yet mentioned, but I'd take a look at the University of Michigan honors college. U Mich is big yes, but a wonderful school for the sciences, and the honors college makes it feel smaller. Some opportunity for good merit money there for top students as well." Agree with Carolyn. I know a top student from my son's HS [ in Calif] who was offered a full ride at Michigan this year, but she ended up going to MIT.</p>
<p>most schools do not have a terminal masters degree in the sciences (atleast no schools that are worth going to) it is possible to get a masters by completing the first two years of the phd and then dropping out, but that would still be funded.</p>
<p>xiggi hit it on the head.Arizona State U-Barrett Honors College. Free ride for NMF.Smaller Honors setting. Fabulous research/investments going on,especially in the sciences.Current U President is a top notch "rain maker" he has brought in millions in research $$,faculty,building programs.You can avoid the party/sports atmosphere (D did it,though football is having a resurgance now) Honors College requires senior thesis,including presentation and defense, which involves the undergrad in research,mentoring,develops skills for Grad,etc.Tempe is a great town,intregal part of Phoenix. Easy air transportation,accesible airport.Cosmopolitan town,cultural opportunities,natural setting is unparalled.Relatively cheap off campus housing if desired.franternity presence is not overwhelming.Interesting student mix, with a large # of hispanic students you don't find elsewhere and a Native American presence.Plenty of Midwesterners and Easterners, and West Coasters too. Also Hawaians and Alaskans.
I encourage you to make a visit when the time comes and check it out. Don't predetermine and discard ahead of time you could be squandering a fabulous opportunity.</p>
<p>Hi, menloparkmom, yes, I was making an assumption that the OP's daughter would want to go for a Ph.D. She appears to have a high school record that will get her into a great undergraduate college and there she should be able to keep up a record such that she will get into a great graduate program. As another reply has since indicated, typically a master's degree in a natural science is a consolation prize for a graduate student who decides (maybe because the interest in the Ph.D. program cools compared to offers in private industry, or possibly because the student doesn't persist in following the research path) to leave the graduate program. But usually that student will have been actually putting money in the bank while studying at graduate school. I was a humanities major as an undergraduate, and went to my undergraduate classes with professors' kids who knew daddy would pay for their graduate studies, so I never learned that it's routine (as it was for one of my high school classmates) for graduate students with the right stuff who major in science, technology, engineering, or mathematics (STEM) to be well supported. It's penny-wise and pound-foolish to skimp on the undergraduate education to save money for a grad school education that ought to be free (and even paying).</p>
<p>Some of the landgrant colleges, Oregon State, Washington State, Cal-Davis, have or did have great genetic programs that is agricultural related. I don't know what the jump is from agriculture to human genetics but monocloning in agriculture has been going on for at least 40 years. The xmas tree you bought is monocloned.</p>
<p>Check out University of Rochester. Great in the sciences, and gives full tuition to outstanding students. Your d should at least be considered for the Renaissance Scholarship. No need required.</p>
<p>Wow, I can't thank you all enough for your answers. Definitely a lot to digest. The main issue at this point is to compile a list of possibles so that they can then be looked at to determine if she's interested. I agree totally that there would be little point in her going to a school that she's not interested in just because of the money so that's the reason for trying to be a bit selective in creating the list of places to research. We're starting some college visits this year (Vanderbilt later this month and probably Kenyon since its nearby) just to give her a feel for things but with her 5 AP class schedule I think more will need to wait until May and even summer. If her feeling about Vanderbilt is possitive and its southern feel doesn't concern her, I think we'll probably add some more in the South to the list. I don't think we'll know until after the visit. We'll probably get her up to Case as well since our S is there. I went with S to NC on college visits and we went to both Duke and UNC. He loved UNC and was turned off by Duke. Not sure its worth doing that trip again although the two kids are different.</p>
<p>With regard to saving the money vs spending it now. The deal with the kids was that whatever they don't spend for college is theirs to start their lives off so its to their advantage to find something that will make them happy while trying to save some of the money that was set aside. My S was sure he just wanted straight science and now wants to go to med school so both kids have learned its important not to spend it all on undergrad. The issue we have with financial aid has to do with our assets and not with income. Most of our savings are NOT in retirement accounts because of how they were acquired and so to the colleges it looks like we can afford the world. But my husband plans to retire within 2 years and the assets are what will support us. I suspect that even with Harvard's revised plan we would still not qualify for aid. </p>
<p>With regard to U of M, it, like OSU and UCB in my opinion are just too big. While OSU and UofM both have honors program which segregate the students there's still lots of problems getting into courses early on and classes are huge. As D said the other day, she learns best from interaction with her teachers and large lectures are not really her thing. Obviously she'll need to learn how to do that too but a smaller setting would help.</p>
<p>Again, thanks for the suggestions. I'll add them to the list to look at. What I found with my S was that the best role I can play is to broaden the list of places to be looked at. Otherwise the kids just don't know where to start.</p>