George Mason and University of Maryland (out-of-state)

<p>I have a few questions:</p>

<p>How generous are these two universities with aid (both financial and merit) for OOS tuition? </p>

<p>Are these colleges that like to attract OOS students or are they more interested in admitting their student body from in-state?</p>

<p>Comparing them to nearby colleges such as American, George Washington, and The Catholic University of America, where do they rank?</p>

<p>Any other information about these universities in terms of an OOS student would be greatly appreciated!</p>

<p>US News & World Report Rankings
51 GWU 99% OOS
56 UMaryland-College Pk. 32% OOS
79 AU. 86% OOS
120 Catholic. 99% OOS
143 George Mason. 22% OOS</p>

<p>My son received very good scholarships/grants from 5 private schools (including AU) but zero aid from OOS publics George Mason and Penn State. He chose U Miami (FL) which gives generous merit aid for students scoring at least 1350 on SATs. Hope this helps. Good luck with your search.</p>

<p>I got zero aid from UMD as an oos applicant from NJ.</p>

<p>Neither of those schools is going to give an OOS their need-based aid. Typically publics charge OOS tuition for a reason. It wouldn’t make much sense if they just covered it with need-based aid. Taxpayers don’t like to provide aid to OOS students. </p>

<p>however, some OOS publics will give high stats kids merit scholarships. I don’t know if either of those schools give generous merit scholarships to OOS students. Look at their websites and find out. If they do, the scholarships may be competitive or automatic. Merit scholarships usually do not come from taxpayer money. </p>

<p>What are your stats? If you have high stats, you should apply to the schools that will give assured scholarships for high stats.</p>

<p>*3.4 GPA (unweighted)
SAT: 560- Reading, 540- Math, 550- Writing (<<First time, will be retaking)</p>

<p>EFC= $15,000
*</p>

<p>Did you use an EFC calculator? </p>

<p>Will your parents pay their EFC and likely more than that because most schools don’t meet “need”?</p>

<p>Right now, your stats aren’t high enough for these schools to be motivated to give you a great FA package or to give you merit scholarships…</p>

<p>Re: schools that give good merit scholarships…rule of thumb…your stats need to be in the top 10-15% of the school. </p>

<p>You need to protect yourself by applying to some schools that you know **for sure **that you can afford.</p>

<p>My parents will only contribute the EFC for my college tuition, so I am thinking that these two schools are out.</p>

<p>Since you know that your parents will pay $15k per year and you can borrow 5500 for frosh year, you need to focus on schools that will be affordable with that budget.</p>

<p>you can apply to some other schools “just to see”, but those schools may not be affordable.</p>

<p>If you are able to increase your scores significantly, you might be able to get some merit scholarships that will make other schools affordable or you might get accepted to some private schools that give good financial aid (but those kind of schools usually need better stats to get accepted).</p>

<p>What state are you in?</p>

<p>state= Indiana</p>

<p>George Mason University is notoriously frugal with aid to Virginia resident students, let alone non-residents.</p>

<p>Yeah, I am thinking GM is out.</p>

<p>Unless you get their full ride, UMD gives bad aid in state, let alone out of state.</p>

<p>What is wrong with Indiana University-Bloomington?
COA for in-state seems very reasonable.</p>

<p>I am applying there, already sent in my May SAT scores. </p>

<p>-My problem is I don’t want to go to school in Indiana.</p>