<p>Once I got into Penn State, I knew that it would be the perfect school for me. But last night I received a scholarship to West Chester. Full Tuition, renewable for four years. The look on my mother's face was priceless and I'm so grateful that I received the scholarship because my family has basically no money. And my parents are still trying to repay loans from when my two brothers went to college. But I don't want to go to West Chester at all. I just applied there as my safety school. But now, of course, my mom wants me to go there and I have to go to the college that offers me the most money. I don't know what to do though! I'm going scholarship hunting like crazy though so I can try to get a lot of money for Penn State. Help? Comforting words? Advice? Anything?</p>
<p>Congratulations for being accepted to both! the thing I always said to my kids about college is that you will love wherever you decide to go, it’s what you make of it. Receiving a huge scholarship is your payment for doing well in high school, and that’s a huge honor in itself. Its nice to see how you are considering your parents financial situation. Take the scholarship and graduate debt free!!!</p>
<p>Were you at one time willing to attend West Chester (I assume so since you applied as a safety)? Is it only because you got into Penn State that you don’t want to go? What will it mean to your family if they have to help you pay for Penn State? Talk it through with them.</p>
<p>Thank you both for responding. I still don’t really know anything about West Chester, I just applied because everyone at my school seems to (I know that sounds bad). But I’ve been to Penn State and I loved it. It was one of those moments that I could imagine myself going there. I will definitely talk to my parents but I feel that this scholarship was given to me for motivation. So I’ve been working really hard on scholarship applications for private organizations since Penn State only offers a little amount of aid through the FAFSA.</p>
<p>There are some advantages of West Chester vs. University Park. The main one is size. U. Park has 4 times as many students as West Chester. The average class sizes are likely to be much smaller at West Chester. You are less likely to be lost in a crowd - you will see more of the same people everyday, which makes it easier to make friends. </p>
<p>Also, West Chester is in the middle of tremendous opportunities for internships and job hunting, because there are so many major businesses nearby. </p>
<p>Both are great towns, with many things to do. However, once you leave town, you have a 1,000 more things to do in the Phila. area than you do in State College.</p>
<p>West Chester also has some high quality new on-campus housing, but it is expensive. I’ve read a number of complaints about the quality, over-crowdedness, and limited amount of on-campus housing at U. Park. </p>
<p>West Chester is also at a much lower elevation, which means less cold and windswept winter weather. That is particularly an issue at U. Park, where there are very long distances between classes and housing.</p>
<p>I’d suggest a compromise - you agree to do 2 years at West Chester, and then if you do well and it is affordable, you transfer to Penn State for the last 2 years. That takes advantage of the wider course offerings at Penn State. That is how most Penn State students do it anyway - most go to school somewhere else and then do 2 years at State College.</p>
<p>If you don’t know anything about West Chester, than you should go see it. You may love it too. Are you willing to take on ALL the debt for Penn State? If not, and if your parents can’t help, then you may need to go to West Chester. No debt is a wonderful thing. Your college experience will be what you make of it.</p>
<p>Remember that for many fields, masters degrees have become necessary. Try to save some of your debt capacity for a future graduate program.</p>
<p>I second the recommendation to GO AND VISIT West Chester!!!</p>
<p>You should also keep in mind that those private scholarships you are applying for are likely only good for your freshman year . . . after that, you’re on your own again.</p>
<p>And I agree that 2 years at West Chester followed by 2 years at Penn State sounds like a great idea . . . definitely worth considering.</p>
<p>Keep in mind that the real goal here is the 50+ years of the rest of your life after college. College is 4 short years and there are many paths to a good life. Coming out of college with little or no debt means you can get started right away on your real life or as some have said, continue in grad school. Significant debt can slow down progress in your real life considerably. You and the effort you put into college is more important in future success than the college you attended.</p>
<p>My cousin went to West Chester. She has a great job, and was determined that her kids would be able to go to whatever school they so pleased. She wanted to go to Penn State or UMd or U Del, any big rah rah school but the money was not there so she commuted to West Chester, met her husband there and is doing very well, but her kid was gonna do better than that. Well he was luke warm about the entire college process, but did get into all three of the before mentioned school and turned them all down much to her incredulouty. He wanted to go to some private schools that required about $20K more than she and her DH could afford, especially with another kid that would be going t0 college in several years. And so he’s going right now with loans and stretch everywhere financially. Funny thing is that he liked West Chester and other like smaller PA schools better than the big school but didn’t applly to any of them as he got into a small Catholic college with a free tuition scholarship early in the process that was his safety and his family figured that there was no sense in applying those other state schools. </p>
<p>Getting out of college debt free will really be a big deal for a longer time than the euphoria of a Penn State, I assure you. It’s not just that your family will be scrimping to get you through college but there will be loans to pay and other expenses when you get out as well, before you are self sufficient. That’s for most kids. That zero loan balance and that extra cushion can mean a lot for your family and , yes, you , in the future.</p>
<p>Thank you all for your advice. I will take all of it into consideration. Also something that I should point out, the scholarship is only tuition. Room and board isn’t included so even though the scholarship is a lot of money, it doesn’t cover everything.</p>
<p>Sarah, yes, room and board still has to be paid. But how much is Penn State? It just made number 1 as the highest cost state school for instaters in the country! You have to board there too, don’t you? The other thing is that you can live off campus after freshman year and lower some costs that way. West Chester is a nice town and from what i understand, finding part time work there is not so difficult and there are some good rental possibiities locally there and you can save a lot cooking some of your own meals. University Park is one big machine that is fueled by student dollars so finding deals there is a more difficult. </p>
<p>Do the numbers and see what the bottom line is and what can be done to meet expenses at either school.</p>
<p>sarah80 -</p>
<p>Why don’t you sit down with all of your offers so far, and this handy calculator, and run the numbers? You will be able to compare several institutions side by side: [FinAid</a> | Calculators | Award Letter Comparison Tool](<a href=“Your Guide for College Financial Aid - Finaid”>Award Letter Requirements - Finaid) Then go pay a visit to West Chester. The students I’ve met who studied there were very happy.</p>
<p>I would add that West Chester is the most popular of the PA. state-owned (as opposed to state-related) university and the most difficult for admissions. My daughter knows several students there who really like it.</p>
<p>In answer to a question above, Penn State in-state runs around 16K for tuition and fees for most majors, but up to 20K for others.</p>
<p>At West Chester, with standard federal and state grants and federally subsidized loans, you should be able to cover the cost of room and board, without taking on any high interest rate debt. Your summer job then hopefully can cover living expenses and books.</p>
<p>*I’m going scholarship hunting like crazy though so I can try to get a lot of money for Penn State. *</p>
<p>Private scholarships aren’t likely going to work. They’re usually only for freshman year and for small amounts.</p>
<p>Are you OOS for PSU?</p>
<p>Even if you have to pay for R&B at West Chester, that’s still cheaper than PSU. If your parents can’t afford to pay for PSU, then it’s going to be off the table.</p>
<p>My daughter applied and was accepted to West Chester for vocal performance. It was her first acceptance since they do rolling admissions. We took a tour of the school and spent some time in town - great little shops and restaurants. The kids seemed really happy there. She ended up going to an in state school (largely for financial reasons) and loved it, but has friends who went to West Chester who really liked it there.</p>
<p>It sounds like you and your parents didn’t really have “the money talk” before you applied to colleges. If so, then it would have been made clear that:</p>
<p>1) Your parents are already strapped with loans from older siblings’ college costs (don’t know why parents do this, when they know younger kids have to go to college as well).</p>
<p>2) they can only spend XXX dollars each year for your college costs, so you’re going to have to find schools that will give you merit scholarships for the difference.</p>
<p>3) they can only borrow XXX dollars for your college (or maybe they can’t borrw ANY more).</p>
<p>4) If you get a large scholarship to one or more schools, then one of those will likely be where you’ll have to go unless you commute to a local state school or CC. </p>
<p>Then you would have realized that PSU wasn’t likely going to be affordable, even if you got in, so you better find other safeties THAT YOU LIKE that will be affordable. </p>
<p>Now, you need to sit down with your parents and go over the situation. You need to be wearing your “big girl pants” during the discussion…drama won’t accomplish anything except get everyone upset.</p>
<p>Your parents probably already feel stressed because of the outstanding debts from your siblings’ college costs, so expecting them to take on more (or a lot more) debt will not be productive. They probably are feeling awful about the situation and have been hoping for some miracle (scholarship) to alleviate the situation.</p>
<p>Look at it this way…you say that at West Chester, your family will stll have to pay for room, board, and books. Well, how much is that? Probably less than $12k per year. Do you realize that that amount may ALREADY be a stretch for your parents? They may need you to take out a Stafford Direct loan to cover half of that so that THEIR remaining costs are about $6k per year (which for THEM is about $500 a month for the next four years.)</p>
<p>you say that your family has no money, so won’t it be hard for them to even come up with $500 a month to put towards some of your room and board? </p>
<p>If so, then you can see why PSU would be impossible. Even as an instate student, your costs will be about $28k per year (PSU is one of the most expensive flagships in the nation for instate students). Your parents don’t seem willing to borrow another $100k for you to attend PSU. Do you realize what a burden that would be for their future? They’d be paying over $1000 a month for TEN LONG YEARS.</p>
<p>I’m not trying to be rude mom2collegekids, but since you clearly know about my parents financial plans for college just from a paragraph I posted online…I probably already had the money talk wearing my big girl pants and everything.
But thank you everyone for your input. I do live in pennsylvania and I plan to visit west chester soon but I have to make a decision fast because the letter asks me to send a decision by march 17th.</p>
<p>Other people who are more knowledgeable than me can chime in here, but I believe you can accept the scholarship and then later change your mind and not attend the school. I think you are in effect saying that IF you attend you will take the money. That would give you a few more weeks of breathing room to think it over. You don’t have to withdraw your apps from other schools until 5/1, unless you did an ED somewhere and got accepted. This is a huge decision and you shouldn’t rush it. Make sure your parents know that you are doing it to buy time to think, not guaranteeing you will attend.</p>
<p>Good luck, Sarah, whatever you end up choosing. I’m glad you are visiting and thinking about W seriously. You can also talk to Penn State and ask if there is anything they can do in terms of giving you some sort of package and though they may not consider W a peer school, do let them know about the award from there and your situations. It doesn’t hurt to ask. I get a sense that PSU is concerned about their enrollment this year, in that the numbers of those committing lag from the year before. Do ask them about any merit awards that might be available, and any financial aid. Talk to both Admissions and FA, if you are eligible due to EFC for financial aid. If there is something more that may come after March 17th, you might want to consider sending the enollment contract by that date to W, and lose whatever deposit if something else comes up subsequently. </p>
<p>As others have said getting merit awards for freshman year, though great and will definitely help whereever you may go, most of them are for one year only. Also going two year to W and then transferring is an option you might consider too, if PSU doesn’t give you anything. It’s not like you are losing any monetary award that way and as a poster said, you are compromising. Who knows? You may end up wanting to stay at W.</p>