<p>As I recall...the OP wants to study engineering. I don't think Oberlin or Grinnell has great engineering programs...if they even HAVE them. The OP really seems to have moved on...and has applications to some other schools that will meet his needs.</p>
<p>Grinnell has 3-2 engineering program, I believe with Washington University in St Louis.</p>
<p>Would somebody kindly guide me to a link on generally available merit scholarships to Bucknell? I don't seem to see them right away. ;)</p>
<p>I'm going to a business school that is very expensive and I have very little to pay for college. I'll be over 100k in debt but the way I look at it is if I get grants and work my hardest to get a good job I can pay off the debt rather quickly. Also I will try to become an RA which can save me money.</p>
<p>I will be ~160K in debt once I graduate... yay</p>
<p>I disagree with your comments. First off the ed deadline is passed so the advice you gave is pointless and schools do give out merit aid to ed students. I have gotten it. Ed isn't just for rich people. If the college sees that you need money then they will try to give out as much as they can.</p>
<p>Curmudgeon, here you go...</p>
<p>Scholarships</a> and Grants || Financial Aid || Bucknell University</p>
<p>OP, I have just invested a bit of time reading this thread and have to say, I am blown away by the maturity you have exhibited in the handling of both your situation with Bucknell/financial aid issues generally and the framing of your responses to all who posted to this thread. You obviously look great on paper, but it's those intangible personality characteristics you possess (positive attitude, easy going temperament and patience, to name a few) and your value system (including strong work ethic and integrity) that will make a difference, whether you're trying to get into college or grad school, land a job or promotion or simply be a cherished son, partner, father or friend. </p>
<p>Well done, and best wishes in your continuing search for a good college fit. </p>
<p>Could I leave it at just that?! No, like everyone else here, I can't resist offering my two cents, which is: If you think it is likely you will pursue post-graduate education, avoid undergrad debt if at all possible, do what it takes to emerge from college with the same stellar profile that will make selective grad schools want you and then craft the merit aid/financial aid/debt solution that will enable you to attend your first choice grad school.</p>
<p>While I can't disclose exact details (and I won't, in spite of any poking and prodding), my circumstances have changed to make Bucknell a much more viable option. I just have to come up with a little more money at this point, and my debt load is going to be very little I think. At the moment, my parents and I are just waiting on our final financial predictions, and Bucknell is, once again, a very real option.</p>
<p>Good luck Irish...and please let us know what happens!!</p>
<p>This is a fascinating thread to read!! I have 2 kids who are both currently enrolled in 2 pretty nice schools. My daughter applied ED to Colgate, and my son to Oberlin Conservatory. Both were accepted. We did quite alot of financial investigating prior to even allowing them to apply to these schools, knowing that they were both just under $40K when they started...not to mention all the costs that aren't calculated, such as travel, etc. My son did get a nice scholarship and grants, my daughter got some grants and merit aid, but not much..and she had excellent stats!! Both programs my kids are in are very competitive, and we accepted that there would be a HUGE chunk expected from us, if they were to attend these schools. We have made it very clear, that we will pay for their undergrad degrees, but they will be totally on their own for grad school. Its been a financial challenge to say the least..especially with the finanical market being so unstable.</p>
<p>Alot of people really don't seem to really know just how expensive it is to send their kids off to college, which is why not everyone goes to LAC's or Ivy's!! lol, the shock is too much. How many warnings do we get once we have kids? The banks tell us to start planning for our kids college education..tons and tons of info is out there, we just don't always pay attention to it. Our philosophy has always been to give the kids the very best education we could afford, so they'd have a fair shot at making it in the world. We knew exactly what we were getting into! I'm happy to say our D's tuition is done! We're nearly finished paying for our S's...then they graduate in May..yippee!!</p>
<p>The strange thing I've seen with alot of my kids freinds and their parents, is the sense of entitlement so many kids this age seem to have these days. Yes, we are personally guilty of making it easy for our kids to go to nice schools, but in order for them to get there, they had to prove they could appreciate the opportunity by being excellent students in HS...they were. This may not make sense, but I just got struck with reading posts where people wanted to go to the best schools out there, and think they should go for free. I understand that education should be available to everyone, but if schools are using the same calculations to decide how much a certain family should expect to pay..that means that somewhere you have that money. They aren't making up the numbers..you give them the information. So, basically everyone is in a similar boat. You or your child will pay what is expected. There is really no law that says we all get to go to college. There is a balance to this in a strange way....there are kids who actually desparately need the money because they may be extremely bright students, from a very poor family who will get the package we all wish we could get. The downside is, in order to get that in alot of schools it means your quality of living is probably lower then most. </p>
<p>I know I'm rambling, but there is just something about expecting more for yourself then others will get, kind of rubs me the wrong way, lol...maybe its because I'm tired of living "lean"!! Thank God May is right around the corner...yay!!! sorry for babbling.</p>
<p>Most people don't know how much it costs to send their kids off to college at a highly selective school because the only frame of reference they've had are cheaper schools, or they have no frame of reference at all. I know I personally expected that as a school's endowment went up, my EFC would go down as well, due to their enormous fund pool. I was comparing Vanderbilt to stuff like University of Tennessee and Tennessee Tech, which have moderate endowments (small compared to Vandy) yet give out a ton of merit aid and need based aid. King College, a small school in Bristol, promised a laptop to every incoming freshman in a brochure they sent me, and I know their endowment isn't huge. As stupid as this sounds now to many of you, it is the notion I had going in, because I saw that many private schools around my area charged significantly less, yet no one I knew seemed to be as far in debt as many of the students described even on this forum. Plus, even if a student paid for EVERYTHING there was no way they could go $150,000 in debt. I always figured that, as much money as these small, poor schools were giving out, surely very wealthy schools gave enormous amounts of aid to all but the most extreme wealthiest applicants.</p>
<p>In my area, at least, most of the so called "entitlement" of expecting more money is born out of ignorance and a sparse knowledge of the financial aid process more than a sense of entitlement.</p>
<p>Rich</a> Colleges Receiving Richest Share of U.S. Aid - New York Times</p>
<p>This article, though old, illustrates some of the confusion I have had, along with many of my peers.</p>
<p>Most students have no idea how the aid process works, and unfortunately, many parents don't, either. Schools that have big endowments don't necessarily give out the most money per student in aid. It's such an individualized process, based on multiple data points, determined by parents income + many other factors. </p>
<p>Colleges are essentially non-profit institutions. Public colleges are subsidized by the state governments through tax dollars and student's tuitions, supplemented with alumni dollars and endowment funds; private colleges, essentially is paid by tuition, room and board, fees and through endowments and donations from the public. Some colleges have more in endowments - or did - until recently.</p>
<p>Your lesson is one that is too often hard learned, in the spring of senior year, when parents and students are trying to scramble to figure out how to pay for it.</p>
<p>EFC calculators are a good tool, but they aren't perfect. FAFSA has a new site that allows parents to plug in numbers before the student's senior year to see what they will be faced with.</p>
<p>You can never assume that a college has more money than another based on a brochure, or is more generous for their students. I can see how that might be easy to assume, but sometimes those other colleges are just more in debt - new buildings, hiring more staff, etc. There is never a guarantee that they will be giving a student more money in need or merit aid.</p>
<p>Just in the last few years, some colleges have given out way more money to middle class income families. Again, no guarantee that you will get it - so much is based on the institutional and federal methodology that the college uses. </p>
<p>The best thing to do for all parents/students is to run those EFC numbers early. Check out the FAFSA forecaster, each tax year. Apply to several colleges, some that only use the FAFSA and some that use the CSS PROFILE and FAFSA. Compare aid offers. Apply for outside scholarships. </p>
<p>Wishing you the best of luck. Hope your funding source works out, Irish Thund3r.</p>
<p>I couldn't agree more with you more LGM, and it backs up my previous post; many, including myself somewhat, are ignorant of the process, but don't feel entitled.</p>
<p>No, Irish, you do not seem entitled -- but you did not hesitate to come here for advice and support...and ya got plenty...</p>
<p>and now you are not sharing how you may have arrived at a solution. Intentionally.</p>
<p>Now I respect your privacy and that of your parents, but it is a little odd that you cannot explain, generally, how you suddenly can attend Bucknell. Someone else here
may benefit from your experience.</p>
<p>The solution is not completely finalized, and my situation is not completely resolved, therefore I'm not posting full details until it is. I assure you, however, I will put everyone in the know once I know exactly what we are going to do, and I think it will be okay to reserve a little confidentiality until then. I don't want to jeopardize any opportunity to go to Bucknell because I blabbed about something that isn't completely resolved as of yet.</p>
<p>A couple of salient points here that I think have been missed.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>First of all, while Bucknell is an outstanding school (we have children of friends there), it is a quintessential preppy upper class school. Make sure you fit the culture and you get that "warm and fuzzy" feeling when you are on campus about being able to excel there. Lots of times kids are enamored with a school and when the honeymoon wears off, as it always does about 6 weeks into the semester, you want to wake up in the morning and still feel like you made the right choice and not be facing a feeling of awkwardness. Not suggesting that will happen to you, only saying to be sure you "fit". This is true for any school you are thinking of attending, not just Bucknell.</p></li>
<li><p>Many people are enamored with a name or the prestige factor. Fine. Its human nature, and often their feelings are based on solid facts. But its also true that an outstanding education can be obtained at most any school, and if you take away the prestige factor, many schools are strikingly similar. Don't look a gift horse in the mouth, and consider very carefully any "full ride" offers you may have. U Tulsa is a fine school. I know someone who went to Tulsa Law School and loved it.</p></li>
<li><p>NO financial aid offer is complete until you submit your FAFSA and CSS forms and the school gives you their final response. Until then, its an estimate. You need to communicate with Bucknell your complete situation financially so they can make their best offer to you. Most schools that admit you ED will do whatever they can to make sure you are able to attend. But you must be willing to accept the federal student loans available (about 6,500 a year). You have to be willing to invest in your own future, and not put the entire burden on the school and your parents. Also, get a job and start saving. Do that now. Your college search is over, you can afford to work weekends now, and even a 40 hour week during Spring Break. My D did just that, and the prestigious retail company that hired her, LOVES HER.....and BEGS her to come back every holiday and summer. They are salivating at the thought of putting her into a management job when she graduates, even though she is very unlikely to go into a retail profession (its a MAJOR chain in the United States, and its not fast food.) Managers in that company make excellent money. So you never know.</p></li>
<li><p>Your family finances and your personal situation are your business. Don't let others pressure you into disclosing what you don't want to or need to disclose. </p></li>
<li><p>Despite what many people say, ED is discriminatory in many ways, particularly financial. Some people game the system by NOT applying for financial aid freshman year, and waiting to do that sophomore year. There is risk in doing that, however. </p></li>
<li><p>Tens of thousands of highly successful people, including CEO's, CFO's etc went to large public universities. So success is not determined so much by where you went to college, but by your work ethic once you graduate. There IS a HUGE difference however, in the overall "college experience" between a large public and a prestigious LAC. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>I like Bucknell. Its a special place. But its also not for everyone. Good luck to you.</p>
<p>God bless.</p>
<p>I would like to thank everyone for their words of support and advice, and now I'd like to share what is most likely to happen...</p>
<p>I was awarded a $10,000 Dean's Scholarship, which I was hesitant to sure because I wasn't sure if it was absolutely guaranteed. It is, so I can include it in my financial package. That leaves my parents with about $2000 left to pay for tuition, which will be covered by me not owning a car. My parents were expecting to buy me a car, but I am going to not own one for the entire four years.</p>
<p>My freshman costs should be covered. Sophomore through Senior years, I am going to apply for an RA position so that I can have free room, leaving me with only board and the difference of tuition to pay for. That should work well, but any money that I still need will be supplemented by my summer and part time jobs, and maybe an on campus job during the year.</p>
<p>Whatever happens, I should be able to graduate with minimal debt, so I can go to grad school later and not be saddled with $50,000 of undergraduate debt.</p>
<p>That is it in a nutshell. But yes, I will be working a lot this summer and probably during the last semester to save as much money as I can.</p>
<p>Congratulations. What great news - i am so happy for you. </p>
<p>And I am so delighted you are going to avoid debt as far as possible. You will be so pleased about that decision in the future.</p>