<p>I'm thinking about studying engineering in college, and was wondering if anyone could suggest any private school matches for me. (34 ACT 4.3 W) I am trying to add more private schools to my list because I think they are more apt to give me financial aid. Right now i have 1, USC. The reason I am asking is because the public schools I am looking at</p>
<p>UIUC (in state for me)
Purdue
Wisconsin-Madison
Michigan
Cal-Berkeley
UT Austin</p>
<p>are not known for giving out significant financial aid. Any help?</p>
<p>What income bracket are you in? Your basic stats are fairly close to mine, and I applied to a few of the schools you listed here. UIUC actually gave me a pretty generous offer, I think something like 1/3 total cost. I never found out my FA offer from Purdue and was rejected from Berkeley (in state for me). I was accepted by Rose Hulman and got something like almost half tuition. I ultimately ended up at Rice with nearly full tuition in need based aid, although I now have part of that replaced with a scholarship they gave me for the upcoming year. </p>
<p>Along with Texas, you might want to check out UT Dallas. It’s a public school but they’re very generous and have a good engineering program.</p>
<p>Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) is a very highly respected, quality engineering education. It is the oldest engineering school in the US (1824). They are very generous with financial aid/merit scholarships.</p>
<p>No, CMU does not give good financial aid. I’d also suggest Rice. In addition to FA, Rice gives out merit scholarships to about 1/3 of its admitted students.</p>
<p>Most public universities aren’t going to be very generous with aid to a non-resident. The exception are schools that are actively enticing out-of-staters to apply, U of Alabama-Tuscaloosa for example.</p>
<p>You may want to consider LACs that have a 3/2 agreement with University Engineering Departments. Your level of aid would be sustained when you transfer from the LAC to the engineering university. Look at LACs such as:</p>
<p>Beloit College, WI
Pomona College, CA
St. Lawrence University, NY</p>
<p>NJIT has awesome merit based scholarships if you get into the honors college and/or make NMF. It should be pretty decent for engineering, at least in NJ, people think of it as such. Not sure about its reputation out of state.</p>
<p>I would recommend Rice and RPI as well as Bucknell. We don’t have much in the way of your complete stats and resume, but Rice is not a match for very many candidates, if any, as it is an “ivy-equivalent” school.</p>
<p>What can anyone tell me about University of Miami? (FL) I was there for spring break last year and took the campus tour, but I never considered it past that because its not the greatest at engineering. But I heard it gives good aid and I wouldn’t mind taking my talents to South Beach for 4 years…</p>
<p>Rose Hulman can be very hit or miss with financial aid, but it should be considered, especially since you are close enough to visit and get a feel for the campus. Of the students that I know that were accepted, all got merit aid, but the “financial” package was very heavy on loans as well.</p>
<p>Oh, I was just wondering because I checked the engineering rankings tonight and Berkeley was in the top five for every discipline except aerospace, biological and bioengineering. I thought that was pretty solid and worthy of including them as a top engineering school. :-)</p>