I’m an US citizen, who completed high school outside the US, and will be coming back for college. In this respect, I am simply considered an OOS student for all state colleges. How difficult is it to gain residency after staying one year at a college? Is it different for different states?
If it helps, I have a parent who is a California resident. But what if I go to an OOS college?
Sorry, non-California college
Each state is different. You will actually have to look at each college residency policy. Some make it easy to become residents, but most don’t. Usually when you start as a nonresident you will always be a nonresident for tuition. For US residents you are considered a resident where your parent lives. But for you I am not sure. You had better read up quick on CA resident requirements to see if you will qualify because CA doesn’t allow non residents to get instate tuition easily.
Are your parents registered to vote, have driver’s license, and/or own property in California? If so, they may still be considered residents. Otherwise your residency may be rather grey and you will be considered out of state most places. We fall in a grey residency situation after living overseas for a very long time, but my daughter compensated by seeking merit scholarship opportunities.
In most states, you will not be able to establish residency while in college. Utah is a counter example, they seem to even encourage it.
Are you 24 years old or older?
If you’re already 18, then I think it’s a problem for you to get instate rates in Calif based on a parent. you won’t qualify for Cal Grants because you didn’t go to a Calif school or become a resident before 18th bday.
How much will your family pay for college?
looks like you’ve already found out that you’ll be OOS
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My parent living in California is an US citizen, and pays taxes- since I m also an US citizen, I will be considered a regular, out-of-state student, with international schooling (I’ve asked all campuses). Actually, I will be applying to a few other schools outside Cal as well, so I don’t really want to apply to so many UC schools. (also, is U of Pittsburgh a safe school for me? They have a really high acceptance rate, so i was curious)
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UCs will be over $50k per year. Not worth it for an OOS student who says he’s premed
My niece established residency in Texas after 1 year. She had to work a part time job for a year which was not on the university campus. She ended up working at the Starbucks across the street from the university about 15 hrs/wk and she started in July before she started school so she could get the residency before her sophomore year. She also got a Texas voters registration and drivers license. The school, UT Austin, was helpful to her during the process. This was 5 years ago, so hopefully the rules have not changed but worth checking out.
Missouri rules sound similar to Texas, once you’ve been there a year. A fair amount of continuing documentation is needed, e.g. pay records. You can’t leave the state for more than 14 days during the summer or you’re disqualified.
@mom2collegekids : Its actually a ‘she’ 
I am well aware of the residency requirements in California- I have spoken to them at length about this, and they have all said that I may get in-state tuition. I may even get a waiver for the first year, until I become a resident. In California, my actual problems are elsewhere (parents divorced, my dad is the Cal resident-we have a house in Cupertino- but he will prob not cooperate, in which case, yes, I will pay OOS tuition- its a sticky situation). Will have to rethink my premed plans then- especially since I am currently not 100% set on premed anyway. Will go the BME/biochem paths.
Continuing on this vein, could anybody give me more examples of colleges with low OOS tuition, that provide quality education? UT Austin is def one of them, and I’m applying, any others? My problem is that I don’t want to go too Midwest 
I had read something about establishing residency in Texas after 1 year, which is why I asked.
And no, I am below 24. @NorthernMom61 : Could you please elaborate on the merit scholarships? I’m interested, but I’m not sure where to start. I’m also a pretty above average student, not brilliant, so do I have chances? Also, with a single parent, do I have an added advantage when getting FA? Do out-of-state students usually get FA?
On your other threads you have a lengthy list of OOS public universities, and private colleges. How will you pay for these? Many of the private schools on your list will require financial information from both of your oarents regardless of their marital status.
Your SAT score seems strong enough. What is your GPA?
If your GPA and SAT CR/Math are high enough, you could garner good merit aid at Alabama. But the application is due SOON.
@MindCastle15, we have a high EFC and even at the most generous of schools, when I ran NPCs we were full pay. Without a clear cut residency, my daughter selected schools where she had a very high chance of getting merit offers based on her statistics that were also geographically close to relatives because we, her parents, are still overseas. She was a high stat student, perfect GPA, high test scores, research internship, accomplished musician, plenty of extracurricular activities. We gave her an amount we would pay each year plus the merit offers she got made it doable at each school where she was admitted. In the end she landed a full tuition offer so we are paying less than half of what we budgeted each year.
You have to look for schools where your stats are high for the school and meet their criteria for being eligible for their merit scholarship offers. You have to look for this information on the school’s websites. There are lists of automatic and competitive scholarships posted on this section of this website above.
OOS publics are not going to give you need aid or care that you live with a single parent. Those are private school criteria. They give merit based on scores plus gpa. Exceptions are Michigan, UVA and UNC. So you will have to look at the scholarship tables at each school to see if you will get enough. Same with residency, you are looking at exceptions, it is not the rule. Most states you will always be a nonresident. Some schools do have OOS waivers for your stats. Many of these are linked in the posts pinned to the top of the forum. You seem like you need to wrap your head around the idea of compromise because that’s the position you are in. It doesn’t mean you can’t do well and achieve your goals but it may mean you don’t get to pick and choose where your location is going to be.
Texas A^M will waive OOS tuition if you get any scholarship from them for 1,000 or more but doesn’t look like many do as they have very few OOSers.
U of Pittsburgh has about a 50% acceptance rate, not sure if that is “high”. But OOS cost is $40,000 I think.
If you have a 30 ACT and 3.5 GPA and major in engineering at U Alabama you could get full tuition and $2,500 a year.
But how would you pay the rest?
It is very hard to get into BME at UT Austin. Another school to look at in Texas is UT Dallas. They give away a lot of merit money and is known for the STEM fields. Also, a large shopping/restaurant district is opening next fall across the street from the university and I’m sure they will be looking for employees. That would help in the process of establishing residency.
One more thing, at UT Dallas, if you get any of the AES scholarships, you receive in state tuition.
Make sure you’ve done everything required to be considered a CA resident, otherwise you won’t be considered instate; are you sure your parent in CA won’t cooperate?
If that’s sure, then you can apply to a few CSU’s (SDSU, Cal Poly SLO, CSU Chico Honors) but focus on private universities and universities that will give you money for your stats.
My financial situation is, well, complicated. Its not really as simple as ‘just a single parent’. I won’t go into that here. But I have done my research on colleges, and am only applying to those I can reasonably afford, with a high EFC. If it comes to that, I will do my first 2 years at a CC in California. Right now, I’m looking for some colleges that are financial safeties- I know Alabama fits the criteria, but its not an option How is Clemson for undergrad education? It’s a safe school for me, financially and otherwise, and we have people we know at the college.
@BrownParent : All 3- UMich/UVA/UNC Chapel Hill are very, very hard to get in as OOS- am I right? So if I apply at all to these 3, it’ll only be one. And I know I’m OOS everywhere (except maybe California after an year)- I WAS looking for the exceptions. I heard about UT Austin, so I looked at others.
As I said, I’m an international student, so I don’t have a gpa- but I was mostly a B+/A- student in school, and have a SAT score 2120.