I have really been thinking lately and realized that I really do want a pretty big sports school where I can get a relatively good amount of merit aid. I wanna study biochemistry and do premed, 31 ACT, 95.1 UW, 98.6 weighted. Interested in staying in the Northeast or Midwest (North Carolina is the furthest south and Minnesota is the furthest west, I live in NY).
List of where I’m applying:
Holy Cross FREE
Dartmouth
Fordham FREE
Lafayette
Lehigh
Marquette FREE
Northwestern FREE
Seton Hall FREE
St. John’s FREE
Binghamton
Buffalo
TCNJ FREE
UMinnesota-Twin Cities FREE
Villanova
I’m on the fence about: Old Dominion, Virginia Tech, UVA, Michigan State, UMich, Rutgers, UMass Amherst, Bucknell, Wake Forest, Boston College, Syracuse, UNC
Please help!!! Which would be worth applying to where I could get a decent amount of money (I qualify for a decent amount of need-based aid as well.)
Personally, I wouldn’t call many of those on your list “pretty big sports schools”. I’m not sure about aid, but for your location and sports preference, I’d think about adding UConn, Maryland, Virginia Tech
Sports? There is a huge difference between a Holy Cross, Fordham, Lafayette, Lehigh, etc… versus a Power 5 Conference sports environment. Consider the better academic (or major specific) Big Ten, ACC, SEC schools. Duke, North Carolina, Virginia, Northwestern, Michigan, Vanderbilt, Indiana (Business and a few others), Virginia Tech (engineering), Georgia Tech (engineering), etc… are where you want to shop for both Power 5 sports environment and academics.
My daughter gets to run out onto the football field tonight before they get walloped by #3 Georgia. She’ll get goose bumps.
I think you are mixing up merit aid and need based aid. You asked about merit aid and then list some schools as FREE when they don’t even give merit aid. Are you just assuming you’ll get 100% of COA due to your need? It doesn’t work that way.
Unless the only spot you are interested in is basketball, most of the schools on your list are not ‘big sports’ schools.
You need to run the NPC for each school and look up the merit scholarships available. Generally, the state public schools are not going to be 100% free to OOS students, so look carefully at TCNJ, UM=TC. Virginia, VaTech, UNC, Michigan State, UMass, etc.
But I still don’t get all the FREE labels you have put on the listed schools.
Do you want big sports in terms of spectator sports or participation in sports?
Where do you live? If you are in NJ or NY—- you’re crazy if you go anywhere other than TCNJ or Binghamton if you are lower income.
@twoinanddone the free just means I have free applications to them
A free application to a college with no chance of being affordable is still a waste of time and effort. Check the net price calculator on each college’s web site to see what financial aid it may offer.