Looking for specific cost/benefit and which school you chose for your student that gave up Bright Futures/other accademic scholarships for remaining in FL to go out of state despite prepaid. I want to be realistic about costs to attend prior to the application process/touring schools. This is for 2019 grad. Thanks
Perhaps it may be more relevant to compare the net price for each school after counting relevant financial aid and scholarships. Obviously, Florida schools will have the Bright Futures advantage, but it is certainly possible for some non-Florida schools to be less expensive for some Florida students.
In terms of what to tell your kid, do your financial planning so that you know what you can afford (without compromising your retirement or college funding for younger kids, or taking parent loans or cosigning student loans). Then, before the student makes the application list, you can tell the student “our contribution is $X; your total college cost can be no more than $X plus what you can earn from work and borrow from federal direct loans”. You may want to set $X slightly lower than the actual amount you can afford, to have some budget in reserve to cover unexpected overages.
Each college has a net price calculator on its web site to estimate financial aid.
UChicago. But I’m not sure I’d recommend that for every kid, family and/or major.
If DS had been interested in engineering, I’d have considered University of Alabama - Huntsville’s scholarship an incredible bargain.
I should clarify, though, your post mentions Bright Futures (which my son qualified for, so he’s passing on by not going to a Florida university) and prepaid, which is a different animal altogether. We didn’t do the prepaid program, so that didn’t apply in our case.
BF is 100% plus $300 for books now and it has been amazing in addition to other offers FL schools have given for my other kids. I want to allow my younger daughter to explore her options but they have to be within reason. She wants to go out of state but I can’t go into debt or allow her to. I think she will qualify for some merit scholarships but whether they will be enough to get the cost of OOS school under $10,000 or under $20,000 even I want to know where she can apply that I won’t have to disappoint her if she gets in to. She has 34 ACT, lots of EC and 3.9 now academic core but hopefully can get that up some.
Tell her the price limit up front, before she applies anywhere and starts dreaming about potentially expensive schools. Do not wait until April of senior year to crush the dreams she has been building up since the previous fall.
I want to give her a list of schools that have that potential to allow her to choose from so she can apply to ones that would actually be possible
What is she interested in studying? Does she have any hard and fast preferences for school size, location, type, etc?
She has 1 love and 1 passion. She wants to major in Cellular Biology with Genetics track which she finds the most interesting, but she also wants to double major if possible in Theatre, most of her EC has been as a stage manager for non profit and professional theatre companies.
Not remotely anything either of my kids are interested in, so can’t help with suggestions on that one. But I’m sure others will have some suggestions of where such a kid could attend for under $20k. Good luck.
Not sure about those specific programs but U of South Carolina and Alabama have scholarships she may qualify for getting her COA to $20,000 or less, with good honors programs.
There is a thread in the financial aid forum that lists automatic mreit scholarships for specific GPAs and test scores. She should read through that list and see if anything looks good. That thread also has links to older ones on the topic of competitive merit aid that will be useful for her.
In FL, she should look at U of FL Gainesville, Happykid’s good friend is in the graduate program there for lighting design. I take it that this program has lots of productions every year. And a good stage manager is truly worth his or her weight in gold!
New College in Sarasota has a terrific biology program. NEw College has been part of the FL public schools for a decade, but still runs like a LAC. The Sarasota theatre group is quite active, but I don’t know if students have a direct link to the theatre group.
Theatre is well known at UCF, but that is a huge school. I don’t know anything about theatre at New College.
With her stats, you DD can receive good merit at UMiami, Rollins, Stetson. UMiami is upfront about how much merit they award to instate students based on SAT scores and GPA. I doubt you will find anything better out of state, $$-wise.
New College would be a great option for her but my concern is the lack of structure w/o GPA. The graduation rates are also concerning for those that are not capable of adjusting to their system. UCF has a lot of potential for in state, but I am hoping to find some out of state options that she could apply and I would not have to disappoint her if she gets into. I am going look for that thread on financial aid forum to see if there are suggestions for schools with merit aid for a 34 ACT.
Thanks,
That list can be a bit outdated, and several of them are HBCU’s, if that makes a difference. I’ve been hunting automatic merit and what I did was search for “colleges in ______” fill in the blank with a state you are willing to let her go to. I usually went to the Wikipedia link as they usually have a nice chart with info on each college. I went through each list, clicking on websites of schools that weren’t too huge, etc. and checked out the automatic scholarships/NPCs. Time consuming, yes, but I like to spend time on internet research . /
Run the NPC on Muhlenberg (good at Biology and theater).
UF and FSU honors should probably be on your radar, along with NCF and Wilkes Honors college.
UAlabama honors, USC Columbia Honors also.
Will you allow her to take on federal loans?
Good timing for you. You need to not only figure out comparable costs but if an OOS/private option has the academics that are much better than your instate options. Look at the instate options and quality of the majors of interest. Rank them by academics. Next look at the other factors- campus life et al. Include the probability of getting a desired major. After figuring out her best/good options look at affordable other options to see if the are superior.
We were in a situation where money wasn’t a factor but the academic quality was. There was no reason for our son to consider schools that weren’t as good in his likely majors. There are more overall elite schools that don’t do as well with his interests. There were also those he had no interest in (who refuses to see the Harvard campus when visiting MIT? Or bypass an elite on the way to another?).
You need to clarify Bright Futures and prepaid as the two are different. Family finances trump all. Figure out how much can be spent realistically. Remember any other children whose educations will need your aid in the future. Do NOT raid any pension funds. With a good student it may be worth giving up prepaid money if the budget allows. The school would have to be much better than the top option, though. Even for gifted students the flagship usually has the probable majors and peer group. HYPM are not worth going into much debt for when an honors education leading to the same result can be obtained. Choosing Alabama (or another school) over U of Florida could be worth it if costs are similar, the majors’ strengths comparable and the student wants the different campus atmosphere. Smaller private schools also.
Be realistic. Even a top HS student is unlikely to reap more benefits from most schools than their flagship. But, if the family budget allows you can afford to ignore a cheaper experience. The net price is what matters. Forgo the Bright Futures if a better option around the same cost to you is available. Ignore the prepaid if a superior experience is available. It is not better to settle just because parents invested in the past. I’ll bet there are ways of recouping some of that money- check on that as well.
You may find people who passed up BF a year or two ago, but they weren’t making the same decision you are. Until this year, BF was about $3000 for the top award and $2300 for the lower award. Often that amount could be ‘made up’ in a school that gave a small merit award and instate tuition. I know a few kids who got that deal from Mississippi state and their parents thought it was worth the exchange.
Now BF is worth almost $7000 per year. It’s a different game. If you also have FPP, you can put that $7000 in your pocket,or use for R&B. Or you can save it for grad school. The schools are also growing in prestige. UF and FSU have always been good options, but now UCF has a lot of top programs, especially in robotics and 3D printers. USF and FIU are growing, including their sports programs.