<p>Was also going to post about taking the ACT. See from Erin’s Dad above my post, that is popular thought!</p>
<p>My boys found ACT much easier. Shorter sections. Advice, just work fast. Read questions and answers first, then go back to passage or chart. Lot’s of extra info given that should be ignored. That’s what an ACT book recommended and it worked for my kids. (and they didn’t study for ACT, just a better test for them.)</p>
<p>URM status will help you a lot for acceptances and merit.</p>
<p>2collegewego, my son only applied to one school which was a need only. The other 7 gave merit aid. The need based only school gave him the most money. The next school, which was ranked lower than the need only school gave him $30K a year in merit money and so on down the line. He got merit aid only at 7 schools. I don’t understand what is so difficult to understand. The higher the ranking of these merit $$$ schools the more money they gave him, so for example, School B with a ranking of 45 gave him more merit money than School C, with a ranking of 65, which gave him more money than School D. with a ranking of 80, etc., etc., etc. His stats, OTOH put him at the top of the heep the lower the school was ranked.</p>
<p>Emily, That is great news, as my d’s stats are close to your s’s! It’s very exciting that he got such a great deal. Does he love his school?</p>
<p>NJ, he loves his school. Very, very happy there.</p>
<p>Re: schools in Canada</p>
<p>You may want to add Waterloo and Toronto as well as McGill.</p>
<p>emilybee, It’s not hard to understand and I’m glad things worked out for your son; it’s just that you are using the term incorrectly and it’s actually more helpful to distinguish. You wrote, “Institutional aid is what it’s called at schools that are need based only. Institutional aid is based on an assessment by the school of a student’s financial need. It is not based on merit…” Actually, ‘institutional aid’ is just talking about who provides the funding (the college/university), not whether it’s merit or financial aid. That’s why most of us talk about need-based or merit-based aid. Also, if your student did best with need-based financial aid, conventional wisdom would have dictated to target those schools. That’s why I’m suggesting to this mom to figure out where she would do best. Unfortunately, in her case, even if her daughter would do better at a meet-full-need school, the need to acquire a ncp waiver means she needs to include schools that are less expensive (like Canadian or instate schools), where the student will likely get merit (like some of the suggestions here) or schools where the ncp form is not required.</p>
<p>Yes, it was the confusing terminology, and the claim regarding merit $ at places that don’t give merit $ that prompted my question. Thanks to 2college and entomom for clearing it up.</p>
<p>I wanted to be sure that I wasn’t missing some kind of pure merit opportunity that I didn’t understand (I wasn’t).</p>
<p>When finalizing the list, make sure the find the safety schools first.</p>
<p>These are schools that:</p>
<p>a. She will definitely be admitted to.
b. She will definitely be able to afford based on stated guaranteed non-loan financial aid and scholarships.
c. Have sufficient breadth and depth in her prospective majors (including graduate-level math since she is two years ahead in math and is likely to want to take graduate-level courses as an undergraduate if she majors in math).
d. Are suitable otherwise (i.e. she would like to attend those schools).</p>
<p>My D, who is black, with 2000 plus SAT, and about 3.9 uw GPA got only small merit offers from most places, and none from the majority. She was not a science major, but her ECs were not too shabby for not top 10 schools. The major exception was Santa Clara. Son, accepted for engineering, worse stats, better ECs fared the same, except his exception was LMU, and not sure how long that will last. We had two in privates when that happened, but were not eligible for need based aid. Also Willamette was very …welcoming, but they don’t have engineering, and I don’t know about their sciences.</p>
<p>Having SOME need, and SOME adversity might help. </p>
<p>Anyway, might be different in California for Hispanic applicants, but she might want to check out west, and in the pacific northwest. They could REALLY use some pigment up there! ( joking?).</p>
<p>College2go, Ok, I stand corrected. </p>
<p>As for targeting schools with need based aid, we had no idea, until after the fact, how it would pan out, not to mention that the need based aid school was his highest reach, as would have any other need based only school have been if he applied. In addition, he would not be a URM at many of those schools. Also, we were certainly not going to put all our eggs in that basket, especially given the fact that my DH’s income is over $100K year and our EFC was way more than what his aid turned out to be.</p>
<p>However, it was our experience that the higher the ranking of the school the more merit aid he was given, which flies in the face of suggesting that the amount of merit the OP’s daughter might receive will be less than she would get at a lower ranked school where her stats would make her at the high end of the applicant pool. </p>
<p>My son’s safety and low match schools gave him much less merit money than his high match and reach schools. </p>
<p>I know this seems counter intuitive but when your kid is a URM you cannot go by conventional wisdom.</p>
<p>“Yes, it was the confusing terminology, and the claim regarding merit $ at places that don’t give merit $ that prompted my question. Thanks to 2college and entomom for clearing it up.”</p>
<p>MrK, I never claimed he got merit money at any school which doesn’t give merit aid. Point to where I said that, please.</p>
<p>In addition, there was really nothing confusing about my using the term institutional aid to describe what he is receiving at his NEED ONLY school as the fact that it is need only means no aid is merit.</p>
<p>have you considered reviewing this thread:</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/767486-where-did-your-3-3-3-6-gpa-child-get.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/767486-where-did-your-3-3-3-6-gpa-child-get.html</a></p>
<p>you may find students with comparable stats to your daughter. You will see where they got in and if there was merit $$</p>
<p>I second the idea of spending time on the Hispanic students forum.</p>
<p>I also second Lehigh and Pitt. Lehigh actively recruits Hispanics. Also, if your daughter can get her SAT up, she can be a National Hispanic Scholar and let me tell you, she will be inundated with mail from colleges.</p>
<p>Sorry if I confused you. I thought it was obvious when I said that particular school gives no merit money that anyone reading it would conclude it was not merit $$$.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Perhaps you misspoke; here you very clearly make that argument (the discussion is about merit money):</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Your terminology complicated things, so probably it’s not what you meant. But this last statement got me thinking that I had missed a source of merit dollars in my own research.</p>
<p>Anyway, thanks to entomom and 2collegewego for deciphering, and unraveling the confusion.</p>
<p>Because women make up 56% of college freshman in 2011, I believe you will find that is what made schools much more generous to your son…the schools you mentioned needed males. Unfortunately, it is likely to be a different ballgame for your D.</p>
<p>"They could REALLY use some pigment up there! " Hee hee! She’s applying to two schools in Minnesota–hope the need it there as well!</p>
<p>This is a no brainer</p>
<p>APPLY to Carnegie Mellon</p>
<p>But first apply to their summer program in diversity- SAMS, Free!
Or MITES and MIT. Also free</p>
<p>Am adding one more suggested thread, to scan for names of colleges:
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/931514-colleges-jewish-b-student.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/931514-colleges-jewish-b-student.html</a></p>
<p>I echo the excellent suggestions made by Entomom and Sybbie (post 51) above to peruse:
CC’s Hispanic Students forum, and the
“Where did your 3.3-3.6 child get in” from Parents Forum</p>
<p>Your eyes will get quite a workout, but lots of wisdom in 3 places. Parents looking for B-student colleges look hard for merit money, and of course the Hispanic Students share first-hand about their opportunities with a reality check as well.</p>
<p>Which 2 in MN?</p>
<p>WPI’s Chavez Scholie up to full tuition, merit and need-based
[Diversity</a> Programs: Thurgood Marshall/Cesar Chavez/Russell Means Scholarship - WPI](<a href=“http://www.wpi.edu/offices/diversity/mcm.html]Diversity”>http://www.wpi.edu/offices/diversity/mcm.html)</p>
<p>Colby in Maine is need-only HOWEVER, they do have a “preferentially packaging” FA for URMs</p>
<p>Amherst also has the “preferential packaging” and the NCP stuff isn’t too bad</p>
<p>UNM has a great scholie program for OOS residents, Amigo scholie, but she will no longer be a URM in NM!</p>
<p>Kat
Vandy has a scholie for URMs as well but it is HIGHLY competitive
Sewanee is looking as well.</p>
<p>In Philadelphia area, check out the Catholic colleges…they may be able to throw some money toward an URM with math/sci interest. Look into La Salle U and Saint Josep’s U. At Saint Joseph’s, they have the John P McNulty Scholars which is full tuition for women majoring in natural science, computer science or math.</p>