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<p>No, she’s not saying that. Bama gives full rides to OOS NMS – and the funds that it does so with are apparently those of private alumni / benefactors and sports revenues. And, the predominant source of funding for Bama is apparently tuition / fees - not taxes from the pocketbooks of the people of Alabama.</p>
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<p>My DS just took the PSAT this October and I have been looking very hard for colleges we can afford. We are pretty confident he will score over 205. As such, if we were living in Mississippi (cut off 205), he would have a full ride at these schools and our search would be over. However, in Texas, where we live, the cut off will probably be closer to 219. So, the question becomes, where does he go that is affordable, if he gets something between 205 and 220 on the PSAT? It seems to me, there is a pool of smart kids in America with NMF equivalent P/SAT scores between 2050 and 2220 with decent GPAs etc, that will not be elegible for the NMF scholarships. Some of these may get lucky and get admission to an ivy or another with deep pockets, the rest will be out of luck and have to pay a signifcant part of their education.</p>
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<p>Yes, there is no guarantee that smart students will be given free rides to college, which means that they and their parents have to make hard choices, as we all do at times.</p>
<p>agnijay…re: post #136 – VERY well said! :)</p>
<p>"@emilybee</p>
<p>Sorry, but it seems like you’re contradicting yourself. First, you think that it should not be difficult for instate students to get into a school, and now you say that they should only accept the best.</p>
<p>What?</p>
<p>You first have to get the best to apply; that’s where the NMSFs come into the picture, and then you have to have a yield- that’s the scholarships."</p>
<p>No, I said it’s good that Alabama was only giving full rides to their in state NM students and not OOS students, which has nothing to do with admitting other, less qualified students. </p>
<p>And now I would like to congratulate you on your success and a job well done. You should be very proud of yourself. </p>
<p>What I take issue with is this:</p>
<p>“My family makes about $250,000 a year- I’d say we’re upper middle-class. We qualify for almost no need-based aid, yet expenses are tight. Why? We have a lot of medical expenses, we live in an expensive area, and we went to private school for a long time.”</p>
<p>You have no idea what you qualify for unless your parents have filled out the CSS profile and the colleges determine, based on their own FA formula, what, if any, institutional aid (grants, not loans) you are eligible for. Most of the top schools in this country use the CSS and take into consideration all the things you mentioned, even including the cost to your family of the expense to send you and your siblings to private school. Need based aid is not just based on salary.</p>
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<p>You’d have a point if those full rides came from Alabama taxpayers, but if mom2collegekids is to be believed (and I have no reason not to believe her), she was saying that those full rides come from private benefactors and sports revenue.</p>
<p>That may be the case- if we were still in private school and my dad was still having kidney issues. However, at a school like Bates, we would get about $900 per year according to several detailed calculators we have used- that’s a drop in the Atlantic.</p>
<p>Also, Bama gives the full ride to all NMS, and I think we’re forgetting that Bama is one school of dozens which gives free rides based off of test scores.</p>
<p>perizzaman- that is the exact situation m son is in. We are in MD, with the cut off at 221. He missed that cut off for NMF. He was able to get his SAT sores high enough to qualify for UA’s full out of state tuition, and an additional $2,500 as an engineering student. They also have some wonderful honors college opportunities. We are very greatful that UA has that opportunity based soley on stats. It has made the application process and funding issues much more managable for us. There are a very few other schools out there that offer guaranteed scholarships for specific stats, but they are few and far between. We looked pretty hard, and could not find another opportunity that meet my sons academic needs, and met our financial needs. It is quite discouraging in an overall picture, but we are really blessed to have found the opportunity at UA.</p>
<p>I think the bottom line is that it is a SCHOOL’S decision on what they do with their privately given merit aid.</p>
<p>(I can’t edit posts on my phone)</p>
<p>Many of the schools being discussed here (ie the publics) do not use the CSS, emily. For people in your case who obviously have a big income but extenuating circumstances, then yes by all means apply to CSS schools as there is a financial benefit in it for you. AND BY THE SAME TOKEN students who score well on the PSAT should explore schools that reward this with merit aid, as there is something financially in it for them. This isn’t rocket science.</p>
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You haven’t been on College Confidential very long, have you?</p>
<p>^^^ LOL Hunt…</p>
<p>“No, she’s not saying that. Bama gives full rides to OOS NMS – and the funds that it does so with are apparently those of private alumni / benefactors and sports revenues. And, the predominant source of funding for Bama is apparently tuition / fees - not taxes from the pocketbooks of the people of Alabama.”</p>
<p>I went back and re-read and I was mistaken. </p>
<p>Well, I guess there won’t be any hair pulling from Alabamans that the state is initiating large cuts in their funding and the fed’s stimulus money has run out since most of their money comes from tuition and fees (which, btw, they will now have to rise due to the cuts.) </p>
<p>What would be nice, imo, is if they used the sports revenue to hold the tuition at it’s present level but to each his own. </p>
<p>And with that I am off to bed. Ta.</p>
<p>*the parents cafe</p>
<p>And by that I mean that schools aren’t eliminating race based scholarships in droves like they are with NMS.
What’s ultimately important is what the schools do… Not the opinions of helicopter parents and crazed, paranoid students on CC. (Not that everyone fits this category here)</p>
<p>Wait, emily-
You left before you said that Bama can’t offer legacy admissions because then they’d have to admit everyone since they all marry their sisters or their cousins. You missed an opportunity to insult them yet again. I am disappointed.</p>
<p>“Many of the schools being discussed here (ie the publics) do not use the CSS, emily. For people in your case who obviously have a big income but extenuating circumstances, then yes by all means apply to CSS schools as there is a financial benefit in it for you. AND BY THE SAME TOKEN students who score well on the PSAT should explore schools that reward this with merit aid, as there is something financially in it for them. This isn’t rocket science.”</p>
<p>Yes, I understand that they are publics and don’t use CSS. My issue is that people assume, based of their income, that they won’t qualify for need based aid at the top schools and limit where they apply based on that reason. </p>
<p>What my son got from Bates was vastly different than what our EFC and other calculators said we’d get. You cannot know without applying, getting accepted and seeing what the package is you are offered. And on this thread we are talking about the best and the brightest who have a shot at getting into these schools, no? </p>
<p>Now I really am going to bed.</p>
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Sounds like pure projection. YOU are assuming they think this, not the others here.</p>
<p>Why must they apply to the CSS schools because you think they should? What if they want to go to a large university and have no interest in a smaller or private school? Should they not be permitted to find schools of their liking that offer financial support to them? Sheesh. Nitey night. Don’t let the bedbugs bite (as my late dad used to say).</p>
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<p>Yes, and making it understandable why schools such as NYU are ending their affiliation with NMSF and diverting their limited financial resources towards non NMF applicants who score higher than NMFs eligible for full rides at other schools.</p>
<p>Thread has run its course.</p>