Thanks everyone for all the information and advice. I’m going to see up a meeting with my GC and my mom… although I don’t know if my mom would want to come since she’s been so reluctant to get involved so far.
My stats are pretty good - 2310 SAT and a decent GPA - but it looks like a lot of places ask for the FAFSA if even you’re only applying for merit-based aid.
Again, thank you all, and I’ll keep you posted.
What does your counselor recommend?
With 2310 and strong gpa you shouldn’t have to go to community college (depending in where you live ans how many aps you took the commutable cc may not have any class for you ) and would likely be eligible for a lot of scholarships . Note that if you attend cc first you lose all these scholarships since transfers aren’t eligible for them.
You’re going to have to apply to all possible full ride and full tuition scholarships, competitive and automatic. Most deadlines are Dec 1st so work quickly every day till then. If you manage to convince your mother to sign the fafsa, you’ll have options. If you don’t, having applied to many schools you’re sure some won’t need the fafsa and that is where you’ll be going. Some colleges may post rhis but many don’t so you don’t have a choice and must apply to as many as you can in the next 3weeks.
Please keep us updated, thanks
@TechGirl101,
How would your Mom react if you showed her this thread? It might be helpful to hear from a lot of other parents who have been through the college search with their kids that working your way through college the way some of us did a generation ago just isn’t possible anymore and that your best opportunity is to fill out the forms so that you can qualify for need-based and/or merit aid. It sounds like your mom has a lot on her plate right now, so it’s possible she hasn’t been able to get her taxes done or that her financial situation is messier than she wants you to know, but as other posters here have mentioned, she can still fill out the current year’s taxes to qualify you. You could even help her fill out her taxes if it would make it easier. It can be uncomfortable for parents to reveal their finances to their kids, but filling out the FAFSA would be an act of love, as it would allow you to go to college and to be able to go forward into adult life with minimal college loans dragging you down.
You might also want to remind her that this is a totally anonymous forum, so no one here has the slightest idea who you or your mom is. It’s clear you that you didn’t come here to shame the family or to complain about your situation but to find a solution.
@techgirl No, most schools do NOT require you to fill out FAFSA for huge merit. Not true.
My kids got huge merit scholarships and we’ve NEVER filled out FAFSA.
Are you a likely NMF? What was your PSAT? Did you make NMSF?
What is your M+CR score? There are schools that will give you a free ride even w/o your mom’s info or FAFSA.
Do not go to a CC. You’d have no money to transfer to a univ later. You need to get the most merit now.
What is your GPA?
Forget about your mom. She likely has some dark reason not to fill out FAFSA…and you’re not likely going to change her mind. So, tell us your M+CR of your SAT and your GPA.
What is your major and career goal?
Folks…forget about her mom right now. that’s not a priority right now. She can deal with that in January.
the deadlines for huge merit without FAFSA are very soon. THAT should be the priority now. She needs to focus on where she can get HUGE ASSURED merit for her stats without FAFSA.
^I agree.
Right now, the priority is applying to universities with full tuition and full ride scholarships, both the automatic and the competitive kind. Time each day should be set aside for this purpose.
With a 2310 the CR+M is at least 1400 which will qualify OP about anywhere; she should be a NMSF/likely NMF, hence applications for those schools should go out immediately (Oklahoma and Alabama, for starters, would be done in 20mn tops and be assured.)
I would then start with Pitt, which selects based on SAT score - NOT the expedited app but the full-length one that qualifies you for better merit and honors college.
@TechGirl101 : The links you need are here. Work fast and efficiently because in 3 weeks most of those will be past.
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/1678964-links-to-popular-threads-on-scholarships-and-lower-cost-colleges.html
@mom2collegekids @MYOS1634 With a 2310, the CR+M score is at least 1510, and probably higher.
http://automaticfulltuition.yolasite.com/ lists the following full rides (based on your usually-unweighted HS GPA):
Troy (with 3.7 HS GPA)
Tuskegee (with 3.7 HS GPA)
Alabama State (with 3.76 HS GPA)
Arkansas - Monticello (with 3.0 HS GPA and top 10% rank)
Howard (with 3.5 HS GPA)
Florida A&M (with 3.5 HS GPA)
Louisiana Tech (with 3.0 HS GPA)
North Carolina Central (with 3.5 HS GPA)
Prairie View A&M (with 3.5 HS GPA)
It is likely that most do not require FAFSA for these automatic merit scholarships. If you are unsure about a particular school, you may as well apply now and decide later with the acceptance and scholarship in hand, rather than regret in April not having applied by the deadline.
Once you have your full ride safeties from the above list, you may also want to try for competitive full rides listed at http://competitivefulltuition.yolasite.com/ .
Really, the most efficient way to “work your way through college” is to earn a big merit scholarship.
Of the ones above, I’d mostly keep Howard, Louisiana Tech if you intend to major in a tech field as your screen name implies. Most of the others I wouldn’t bother with considering your stats.
UAlabama, UArkansas-Little Rock, U Mississippi (Ole Miss), Temple, UMiami Ohio, USC Columbia, Pitt are all different environments with excellent merit scholarships, so look into them all to find a few that would be okay. UAlabama’s advantage is that its Honors College is among the best in the country, as is USC’s.
http://scholarships.ua.edu/nationalscholars/
http://nmfscholarships.yolasite.com/
If you’re NMSF/NMF, Texas Tech would be a possibility, as would UT Dallas Mc Dermott scholars, the Robertson and others at UNC-Chapel Hill, ASU/Barrett should be looked into too (mini-campus for the Barrett Honors College to escape the usual ASU pandemonium), UNiversity of Kentucky as well as University of Western Kentucky, most of the Florida Universities.
FAU’s scholarship covers everything but books and the Honors COllege has its own campus near labs, so you’re 20mn from the large campus if you ever want to go to a football game but have your own distinct “college”.
http://www.fau.edu/admissions/scholarship-os.php
Truman State and UMW both have clear criteria for their scholarships, see whether they’d be within budget.
MANY LACs will have good merit scholarships , too, but it’d depend what you’re looking for (CS would keep more schools into play than engineering, for example).
techgirl –
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financial aid until you are 24, married or a parent, requires your own parent/guardians participation in filling out forms. Colleges consider the ability of parents to pay until then, and require parents to prove their ability to pay. There are very limited ways around this requirement.
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so, the first step is, is there any way to convince your mom to participate in filling out the forms. If mere lack of knowledge about financial aid here is the problem, potentially your GC will help her understand. Alternatively, do you have any other trusted advisors your mother might be willing to talk to (pastor, family friend, . . .)?
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Might there be some financial/legal reason your mother is concerned about filling out the forms (not paying taxes, not filling out taxes, undocumented status, legal reasons, . . . .?) Please don’t identify these, if they exist on this public forum, but if they do exist, and, especially if your mother does not want to disclose them to you, might a family friend be able to intervene to find out/address issues.
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is your family circumstance in particular distress right now, and would applying next year for college improve your family’s ability to participate in your college process?
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if you will be going it alone – the lists of merit based scholarships will be a useful start.
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in addition, if you are facing the reality of not having college at all, you could consider hail mary applications to wealthy schools (caltech, harvey mudd, mit, . . . .). Caltech has, in the past, dealt with individual circumstances. You can’t count on acceptance nor special treatment, but if you can get a fee waiver to apply, you won’t be worse off then not having a college to go to. This option is enhanced (though it’s still a long shot) if you are truly needy (i.e. disadvantaged and not just temporarily out of money, are special as an applicant, and if you are an underrepresented minority)
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enlisting in the military is a viable option to finding money for school – if you think this might be an option to reconsider.
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the deadline for military academies is in fall (in november, and I don’t know exactly when)l, but if this is an option you might consider, it is possible to apply for a nomination (check with your congress person) even next year, after you have graduated, if you meet the eligibility requirements.
Please don’t give up. There is no magic money, but there are options. You have a number of options to pursue suggested here (find a way to convince your mom to fill out the forms, apply to merit aid schools, hail mary passes, the military). But, if they don’t work, don’t imagine that the choice is now or never. You can still apply to schools next year, if circumstances make it impossible for you to go now.
I agree - don’t worry about mom right now OP. Focus on schools with known merit awards because those deadlines are looming big on the horizon.
Adding to the list - University of Alabama Huntsville: http://www.uah.edu/admissions/undergraduate/financial-aid/scholarships/merit-tuition-scholarships. Check out the handy table to see if you could get Charger Excellence which is full tuition plus housing.
Also, don’t think of the military as a “financial aid” option. Even if you’re fit and healthy, the reality is that it’s not a financial aid program, it’s a training program for SOLDIERS. If you don’t want to be a soldier, don’t enlist and certainly don’t apply to the military academies. Those require true vocation.
However, you can try to do ROTC, but scholarships have become few and far between. And you’re still training to be a soldier, even if it’s fewer days a year, and are still committed to serve.
I wish people would quit recommending the military as an option for poor kids to go to school. As MYOS1634 so aptly stated, it’s a training ground for soldiers, not a financial aid program for college.
Techgirl, you mention you are in JROTC. Have you thought about applying for an ROTC scholarship? Many schools have ROTC programs. That way, you are not enlisting, so to speak, but going to school under their program and then you serve after you graduate. Unless it has changed, I believe you have to apply to at least on school in your home state that has the ROTC program you want (like Navy or AF) and the other schools can be anywhere.
austinmshauri, Well, I offered my two cents before I saw your comment. I think the reason people mentioned the military it is because the OP is already in JROTC and ROTC at a university is definitely an option the the ROTC scholarship, if that is a livliehood she is ok with after graduation, without having to enlist strait out of high school.
@TechGirl101 http://www.uah.edu/admissions/undergraduate/financial-aid/scholarships/merit-tuition-scholarships
For your stats, at UAH, you’d get free tuition and housing, but ALSO very likely another award from the College of Eng’g.
Also…Miss State would likely award you a free ride.
None of the above require you to submit FAFSA
BUT…are you a NMSF? If so, you’d have more choices.
Also…do not go to a CC. you’d have trouble paying for college once you transfer.
Get a job this summer and save your money. If you can, start working/saving now.
Thank you all so much. I got back home and saw your comments and it was like, wow… 
I’m going to stay up to work on applications. I’ve read about some of these schools, but I’ve never seen that long list of colleges that give out merit aid. I had no idea so many existed.
Talking to my mother about it is not a real option. She spent all our savings and borrowed a lot because of the family situation we were dealing with and that situation is still ongoing and doesn’t look like it’ll change anytime soon. As far as college goes, it looks like I’m on my own right now.
Again, thank you guys so much. I’m going to apply widely and broadly. I’ll keep you guys updated.
If the interest is engineering, note that other automatic full ride schools with engineering include Tuskegee, Florida A&M, and Prairie View A&M, in addition to Howard and Louisiana Tech. Specific types of engineering can be checked on each school’s web site.