Great kid, good grades and scores, NOT a superstar

<p>As the parent of D who grew up with a sib with autism - and the usual cc credentials as well, but minus private tutoring, EC’s involving large amounts of parental attention or money - I would second mini’s advice. </p>

<p>While a well-written essay about disability and activities involving disabled children can enhance an application as long as it is about the applicant and not just the disabled individual, we found that it did not necessarily move our own daughter (or any of a few of her friends with similar family situations) past the Naviance rates at our well-regarded suburban high school. (That is, she got into about half the reach schools that accepted about half of the applicants from our high school within her range.) </p>

<p>Also, if you feel that your daughter has lacked many of the experiences her peers took for granted (enrichment or EC opportunities that involve family time or money that is just not available in your household), but has nonetheless thrived, I would quietly let your GC know about this, by submitting a parent description of your child. Many schools ask for this by the beginning of the senior year anyway. You might also inform teachers (if applicable) that your daughter has not only excelled, but excelled within the context of a tough family situation not at all typical of suburban students.</p>

<p>Find the safeties and financial safeties first (it would help to get the test scores up just a little to qualify for the big merit awards at schools such as Pitt and CWRU as well as UMiami and Tulane), help your daughter get excited about attending one or more of these schools, as any one of them will probably have some attractive features unique to that school, even if not as many as the reachier schools, and then go to the reaches. Have her learn about these schools and find specific academic reasons why any would be especially attractive to her, and then work these into her essays and short answers.</p>

<p>But then, should she be admitted to a reach school that does not give merit based aid, you might try filling out the FAFSA anyway and, after it is denied for lack of evident “need”, try calling the financial aid office and explaining your family’s situation. It was our experience, and that of other families we know who have autistic children, that financial aid officers at some reach schools will listen to appeals from families such as ours, and will take ongoing expenses associated in raising a child with significant special needs (that make it difficult to save or plan for the future) into account when evaluating our family’s income and assets for need-based aid. A few also took into account a lack of past college savings, because of the expenses of raising a child with significant special needs.</p>

<p>Sorry, I just skimmed. Did she take PSAT? (In other words, any chance at National Merit Scholarship?)</p>

<p>I’m speechless (a rarity for me). Thank you all so very much for your thoughtful replies and excellent suggestions.</p>

<p>I absolutely should have mentioned initially that WE do think she’s a superstar, it’s been bugging me all evening and I’ve been anxious to get on here and correct any impression that we are somehow not totally in awe of all she’s achieved. </p>

<p>Going to try to reply to the questions raised above but may have to do that tomorrow because I’m pretty sleepy.</p>

<p>Re: the PSAT, she didn’t do great for National Merit scholarships, and we decided to focus on the ACT (more popular in the midwest as I suspect you all know). She’d done poorly on the PLAN test (which was supposedly a predictor of ACT scores) and clearly did fine, so I suppose we should’ve worked on SATs after all. </p>

<p>Regarding our financial situation, we know we won’t get anything from the top schools and according to FAFSA calculators I believe we qualify for nothing. We do look good on paper! How much we can afford vs how much we’re able and willing to spend on college, you’re all right, we definitely need to come to that number. I just can’t really imagine denying her the top of the heap if she makes it there, considering the challenges she’s dealt with at home over these past 11 or so years. I guess my husband and I need to discuss that huh?</p>

<p>What DO you do about a really motivated and hardworking kid whose sense of self is tied so closely to her academic success and who’d look at anything but a top school as somehow letting herself down? I guess that’s a pretty loaded question too.</p>

<p>How do people survive this with more than one child? I know my second won’t have any of these issues but I can’t fathom trying to figure it out with more than one!!</p>

<p>Again, thanks to all who replied, PMd, etc. Sincerely appreciated.</p>

<p>Don’t worry, it will take time for the correct mindset to kick in with your D. If you start reading the Financial Aid threads from this spring, there have been countless cases of exactly what you’re talking about, the dream school syndrome that in the end is unaffordable, or forcing the parents to pay/borrow beyond their limits, also a bad scenario.</p>

<p>Even with your D’s stellar stats (and they ARE stellar BTW!) start by figuring that when next spring comes around & the offer sheets come in, with the economy the way it is your D will get less in merit money than you had expected. It’ll be some, but when you figure the bottom line net cost, you will not be happy. AND…most of those merit money schools will probably not jive with your D’s vision of a ‘top school’.</p>

<p>So…look at a bunch more schools. Remove schools that you know will be out of your price range, merit or not. There’s enough info on CC and other sites where you’ll be able to get a pretty fair idea of what your D will receive if all the apps, essays & recs are in their proper place.</p>

<p>Good luck!</p>

<p>I assume you have spent/will spend some time poking around the CTCL schools? This is a group of LACs that are not tippy-top rated but do a great job with their students. Many give good-to-great merit aid.</p>

<p>Many of these highly ranked schools you are talking about may cost $55,000/year. </p>

<p>If the highest merit award (at schools that give merit) is $20,000 or $25,000 annually, that is still a lot of money to come up with each year. </p>

<p>Plus your D will have to maintain a certain GPA to keep that merit aid all 4 years.
While you might not think that is a problem, things do happen, kids get mono or pneumonia etc or break a leg or something. Make sure that on the outside chance she loses a merit award, that you and your husband would still be able to pay the COA. </p>

<p>She might like to look at top-ranked LACs as well.</p>

<p>First and foremost, and BEFORE more visits, you need to sit down and REALLY look at what you can afford. Don’t wait until next April.

Are you really prepared to pay $55,000 a year times 4 ($220,000)when you get an acceptance and no merit money?</p>

<p>With stats like your D’s she should qualify for merit aid and honors college at Pitt- and it has all the programs that your daughter is interested in.</p>

<p>I personally know two smart kids who were offered full ride scholarships at Pitt though each ended up turning down Pitt for an Ivy (one Princeton, one Yale). While their parents are proud to have their kids attending an Ivy, no money was offered at either school. I think you have to ask yourself what would you do in this situation? What if your daughter gets her heart set on GW at 50+ grand a year while you could send her to a school like Pitt for a fraction of the cost or for free?</p>

<p>Also- try this out on your DD- if she gets an excellent scholarship at a school that may not meet her ideal of prestige there will be more money left over for you to finance grad school, study abroad, a new car?</p>

<p>Sounds like you are catering to her perceived need for prestige. College is what you make of it, and the higher ranked state schools offer as much challenge (maybe sometimes more) than the privates–state schools have a lot of “weed-out” intro classes and the smart, motivated kids will rise to the top while others fall by the wayside or switch to easier majors. Plus, honors college at Pitt or a similar school offers the opportunity to enroll in small size classes with extra challenge.</p>

<p>Hope this post provides some different things for you and your DD to think about.</p>

<p>i’ll throw UAB in the mix, urban campus…very strong in sciences…has biomedical/health/sciences strength. Very strong research school , very strong medical school program. Wonderful sci/tech honors program which if accepted to pays for your phd also. (it isnt mentioned much on CC but is a tier 1 school) with her current stats…you would have room and board to pay…about 9K per year would be your cost…if she was an nmf…full ride.</p>

<p>imo guilt isnt a good reason to go 220K in debt…your other child needs an education later also (and you may have to pay full costs for them), you have retirement to think about, current finances may change etc etc</p>

<p>pm if you want any info on UAB</p>

<p>I would suggest Cornell University. Take a look at their financial aid site and see where you fall in terms of aid. I could tell you that they take medical expenses into account when determining aid as I would imagine many schools do. Cornell is very generous for certain income brackets. Cornell has many schools so your daughter would be able to study any of her interests, and if she changed her mind, she has all of those schools to transfer into.</p>

<p>American with these stats is a good bet for half tuition scholarship and an invitation to the honors program. (It was my younger son’s safety and he would have been VERY happy to attend.)</p>

<p>Many of the state flagships have excellent programs and would welcome your daughter and possibly give her in-state tuition (if OOS) or merit/honors.</p>

<p>Northeastern in Boston as well as BU may give her merit…she is definitely within the striking distance…</p>

<p>She sounds wonderful and you should be very proud.</p>

<p>imo guilt isnt a good reason to go 220K in debt</p>

<p>I agree. It’s not like a strong student can’t get a great education at more affordable schools.</p>

<p>And, with a special needs child, I would be concerned about how that child will be provided for in the future - if this child won’t likely be able to fully provide for himself. I realize that no parent wants to say, “hmm, we won’t spend $220k on you because you have a sibling with special needs,” because that just sounds odd. But, if the reality is that the other child is going to need life-long financial support (thru no fault of his own), certainly the healthy sibling will understand that. It doesn’t need to mean that the healthy child will get the short-end-of-the-stick and get a crappy education elsewhere. </p>

<p>When I was growing up, my youngest sister had a chronic and life-threatening illness, it affected everyone, but we understood that family resources had to be directed at her to keep her alive. Two organ transplants later, she is still alive, but my parents have always let us know that they have money for her in case she were to become unable to support herself. We totally understand that. We don’t care if our parents leave her every cent they have - none of us would want to have her health situation.</p>

<p>I haven’t seen these suggestions, so I’ll make them. </p>

<p>McGill, Toronto, and University of British Columbia are all urban, highly regarded, public, and much less expensive than US private schools. I think the tuition stays the same (in Canadian dollars) for all four years. </p>

<p>Few of the highest ranked schools give good merit aid, and those that do she’s not likely to be competitive for. Rice might be worth a shot. </p>

<p>NYU is a good school, highly ranked, large and urban, but I don’t recall them being good for merit aid. </p>

<p>BU is better for merit aid. University of Pittsburgh is very good for it. Ohio State Honors is potentially also good option.</p>

<p>sujormik, you have a wonderful daughter, and we wish you both the best. </p>

<p>You mentioned she wants an urban environment. She looked at Tufts, Emory and WashU, and didn’t like them. What were her reasons? That might help other posters understand her preferences better. </p>

<p>You said she wants the “designer shirt” name school, but those schools certainly aren’t lacking in that department! If she is only willing to settle for Penn and Brown, that may be a problem. </p>

<p>It seems to me the key might be to have good communication. If she were to be accepted to Brown or Penn, can you afford full freight? If not, she has to know that now, not after she gets accepted.</p>

<p>Rice, Emory, USC, Brown, Penn, WUSTL, Cornell, Carnegie Mellon, and Johns Hopkins are not safety schools.</p>

<p>They might be worth considering AFTER you have found safety schools, schools where she is surely to be admitted, will love, and you can afford.</p>

<p>sjormik:</p>

<p>Here is a website that my help you with data on financial aid:</p>

<p>[College</a> Navigator - National Center for Education Statistics](<a href=“http://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/]College”>College Navigator - National Center for Education Statistics)</p>

<p>Simply type in any school and you’ll get very detailed info on financial aid. The most helpful may be the net price of attendence by income level. </p>

<p>The site also provides other financial aid info, detailed admission data culled from the school’s common data set, and campus safety stats. Hope it helps.</p>

<p>You are getting multiple recommendations for Pitt and Bama. Both generous in merit. Both rolling admissions. Rolling Admissions is the best gift during the stressful process. I beileve those who applied last year in August know acceptance results in September. Talk to her about the relief to know of acceptances early. </p>

<p>Visit Pitt and Bama this summer. </p>

<p>Sit down and talk about the merits of a “financial” safety. Both Pitt and Bama with the merit would meet financial safety without too much sacrifice of prestige. Sure, they are not top 20, but their rankings are high, especially Pitt as you dig into specific fields.</p>

<p>NYU – You will find many posts on CC about NYU giving little FA. Remember, many schools won’t/can’t meet the EFC of many families. There is little hope if your EFC is high.</p>

<p>Pitt is a top school for undergraduate neuroscience and psychology, strong in foreign relations/languages, and average in engineering (although tops in bioengineering). Also is mid-sized state-related, urban, and not overwhelmingly Greek. It is comparable to BU, but has a much larger medical/research infrastructure and more of a rah rah atmosphere. As stated elsewhere, it has a good reputation for merit aid. It’s honors college is an open system but students seem quite accomplished (see [this</a> thread](<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/1041074-best-honor-programs-public-universities-updated-12.html]this”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/1041074-best-honor-programs-public-universities-updated-12.html)). It’s rankings are often better if you look outside US News and at things like [Times</a> Higher Education](<a href=“http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/world-university-rankings/2010-2011/north-america.html]Times”>THE World University Rankings: Measure by measure: the US is the best of the best | Times Higher Education (THE)) or the [Center</a> for Measuring University Performance](<a href=“http://mup.asu.edu/research.html]Center”>http://mup.asu.edu/research.html).</p>

<p>Someone mentioned this early, but I would just like to reiterate that you should think seriously about women’s colleges. They are competitive for merit aid, but I think your D would be a strong candidate for STRIDE scholarship at Smith for example or a similar scholarship at one of the other schools (Mt. Holyoke 21st Century scholar, etc.) She might like the supportive atmosphere of a women’s college. </p>

<p>Barnard would be a great fit, a nice way to give her both small and large, its very urban, and still top name (she can take classes at Columbia and graduate with a degree from Columbia University, while attending Barnard College within that university) since that seems important to her. Wellesley another good one to consider, it’s very close to Boston and opportunity to cross-register at MIT and other local schools. Smith is not urban, but it’s in a very cool, funky town with a lot of the hallmarks that people who want urban look for (good music & arts scene, lots of stuff going on, diverse crowd). Smith also is the only women’s college with an engineering program. </p>

<p>IMHO, GWU and NYU are very expensive schools that don’t give good aid and may not be worth the higher cost unless she wants to study at a very specific institute within them (Tisch school, for example). Even if she’s interested in international relations/poli sci, she can get a great education in both of those without being in DC and at a lesser cost than GWU.</p>