<p>A good friend of mine was accepted to Elmhurst College for music education and was offered $4,000 (not sure if it was a scholarship), but even with the money they offered he can't afford the tuition (over $28,000). Does anyone know schools that are still holding auditions and offer a pretty penny for a need-based kid? I'm sure he wants to stay in Illinois close to his home in the southwest suburbs.</p>
<p>Not if he wants to go to school next fall. Early May is a bad time to be determining whether or not you can afford to go to school. (But I'll bet he's figured that out himself.)</p>
<p>If he really can't afford it, and can't get loans, he can
1. Call the school, explain the situation (it had better be more than "My parents won't give me any money") and see what they say.
2. Live at home and go to a local college for a year, and try again next year, with perhaps a few more financial safeties, or schools that meet full need.
3. Work for a year.
4. While either attending a local school or working, also look for and apply for as many outside scholarships as possible.
5. Go to school part time and work - putting yourself through school isn't a popular option these days, but it is still an option.</p>
<p>Best of luck to your friend. Hope something works out for him.</p>
<p>$4K is a really good offer from Elmhurst, if it was a scholarship. He could try calling Illinois Wesleyan and see if anything is available there, but they are more expensive than Elmhurst. Last time I looked they were around $35K per year.</p>
<p>Another option would be Western Illinois which has a music program too. I don't know about Southern, Northern and Eastern. I also assume that U of I was considered, but not acted upon. </p>
<p>If he's from the SW burbs, then is commuting an option? That would elminate a good $10K or so from his bill, taking him down to $14K, which is pretty reasonable in anyone's book.</p>
<p>There is a local university near him, St. Xavier, but he would prefer Elmhurst because of the clean campus and attractive neighborhood. I don't think he looked at NIU, so I'll tell him about that.</p>
<p>Every year about this time, <a href="http://www.nacacnet.org%5B/url%5D">www.nacacnet.org</a> publishes a list of colleges that still have room in their fall class. (I just checked and did not see it there yet, so try again in a few days.) Unfortunately, the odds are going to be against finding a school that is still accepting music ed majors and has not already committed all of its merit-based financial aid resources for the incoming class, particularly if he limits the choices based on geography.</p>
<p>BassDad, that leads me to a question. What happens to the financial aide offered to candidates who turn down schools at the 11th hour? Is it redistributed to people who accept and file appeals on financial aide? How is that money accessed?</p>
<p>Schools make offers with the expectation that a certain number of those offers will be turned down, so the actual amount of money to be redistributed is the difference between what was actually accepted by enrollees and the amount that the school expected to be accepted. If they wind up with more financial aid accepted than anticipated, the school has to dip into savings to make up the difference and there will be nothing else to redistribute. They only have some extra funding to go around if they have less financial aid accepted than anticipated. In that case, it could go to fund appeals, to make offers to people on the wait list, or to go into savings to make up for the years when they underestimated.</p>
<p>The NACAC list of colleges with openings for Fall 2007 is up at <a href="http://www.nacacnet.org/MemberPortal/forstudents/2007SpaceAvailabilityResults.com%5B/url%5D">http://www.nacacnet.org/MemberPortal/forstudents/2007SpaceAvailabilityResults.com</a></p>
<p>Wow, that's a great list - there are some really good schools with space still.</p>