<p>Its always good to visit if you can with the only downside being that if you fall in love with the college and they don’t offer significant financial aid you might have to deal with a heart broken teenager.</p>
<p>This is obviously mitigated if you only visit colleges after acceptance and financial aid letters are sent.</p>
<p>I guess the bottom line is that most people feel that if money is really an issue, there is no harm in waiting until you get acceptances and an acceptable financial aid package.</p>
<p>how to know by just looking at the website what other factors the school will consider with regard to merit scholarships? If my son is strong academically (yes he did get a 35 on his ACT), plays a club sport that is offered at the school, but likely isnt athletically skilled enough to play D1 or D3 sport, and has volunteered a lot, and is planning to 'give back" what else should I look for on the websites?</p>
<p>Look at the “Schools known for good merit aid” at the top of the parents forum.</p>
<p>When I was looking for merit money for DD, I would go to the college site and put merit scholarships in the search bar. Many of the merit scholarships are numbers driven and fairly straightforward.</p>