<p>Ive been reading on CC for a while now and finally decided to post something, because i'm kind of stuck right now.</p>
<p>I'm an IB student from Amsterdam, The Netherlands and have been living here for my whole life. Ive been researching about US colleges but there's one big obstacle in this process: how to choose a safe and not famous uni? Not being for the USA, the only names that i'm really familiar with are ofcourse the Ivies and the other top-notch universities like Berkeley and Stanford.
I want to apply for 2 or maybe 3 of these 'dream' colleges but there has to be a safe bet. For now i'm not considering SAT and IB scores, i really just need some names. My carreer counselor keeps telling me to google, and read books like the Princetin Review, but reading ALL of the three hundred and something colleges is TOO much and again: only the names I know of seem appealing.</p>
<p>Sorry for the long story, and here is the big question: could anyone PLEASE enlighten me with some relatively good colleges that you know of but that are not extremely selective, where you don't need excellent ECs etc.</p>
<p>Help is genuinely appreciated. Thanks in advance!</p>
<p>The biggest issue is money. How much can your family afford to pay? Sit down with your parents and find out. There are plenty of colleges and universities here who will be happy to admit you if you can pay it all. However if you need a scholarship, everything will change drastically.</p>
<p>Thank you! Yeah i was thinking about the Fulbright center too, so ill give them a call i think :). I’m not looking at the finances yet (well i am, but not too much) because the only thing im still looking for are some good names and after that i’ll figure out if they offer majors i like, and if they offer need-based aid to internationals. Because from what ive been reading on some college sites up till now is that i’ll be eligible for full covered need-based aid.</p>
<p>Don’t choose some schools and look at their majors and worry about aid after applying!</p>
<p>I’ve seen so many kids at my school get into their dream schools (Ivies and Public Ivies). However, they realized after getting extremely excited about the schools that they would not be able to attend because the institution offers horrible aid. </p>
<p>Someone above me suggested NYU. Who knows, they may offer everything you’re looking for: large city, social life, your discipline, etc. However, they are notorious for offering HORRIBLE financial aid! I applied there and was admitted. They sent me my aid package (according to FAFSA my EFC is 0) and I ended up having to pay 15k a year just to attend! They only requested the information from my custodial parent who current makes below 25k! </p>
<p>With all that being said, don’t wait to look at aid! I don’t want you to be the kid who realizes when it’s too late that he will not be able to attend any of his schools because they cost too much.</p>
<p>Edit:
It’s hard to answer your question without seeing your stats. We need to see your stats in order to determine what a safety school is for you. At my school kids considered our state university (UGA) to be a safety school. However, others in our district who didn’t do so well in high school looked at a community college and considered it to be a safety school.</p>
<p>Zoulikhahaha, I am surprised to read your statement that you expect to be eligible for full need-based aid. As an international applicant, finances play a crucial role in your college search and the expectation for full need-based aid will limit your search considerably.</p>
<p>"NYU, BC, BU, Tufts, U of C, Northwestern "</p>
<p>Real helpful to give some of the most popular schools in the country, including just the initials of some. Recommending “U of C” to an American is too vague to be helpful, much less a foreigner.</p>
<p>Colleges that are fairly easy to get into but offer excellent educations: Fordham University, Miami University (the one in Ohio), University of Colorado, Virginia Polytechnic Institute (Virginia Tech), Florida State University, University of Miami (Florida), University of Vermont, American University, University of Kansas, University of Arizona, University of Wisconsin (Madison).</p>
<p>Your financial situation is a crucial piece of the puzzle if you’re an international applicant (I imagine it’s important for domestic students as well, of course, but internationals applying for aid face overwhelmingly bad odds of admission wherever they apply); as an international, you simply cannot decide which schools to apply to without taking your family’s financial situation into consideration.</p>
<p>(To the poster who suggested “U of C,” stop ■■■■■■■■. UChicago’s acceptance rate for internationals seeking financial aid is around 4%. Simply put, it’s as competitive as Harvard, if not more.)</p>
<p>Okay, back to the OP. There are a few things you need to be aware of.</p>
<p>i.</p>
<p>The very first thing you need to do is realize that even schools with acceptance rates in the 30-45% range very often have acceptance rates around 10% for internationals seeking financial aid. Here:</p>
<p>Whitman College, Walla Walla, WA (overall acceptance rate: 43% in 2009)</p>
<p>Which means that the acceptance rate *you *need to be looking at is 6.67%. That’s seven people out of 100. (The quote is a little unclear on whether 300 is the overall number of international applicants, or just the number of internationals applying for need-based aid; in any case, I don’t expect the acceptance rate for aid-seeking int’ls to be much higher than 10%.)</p>
<p>Trinity’s website says that its overall acceptance rate for internationals is 29% (no year given), which amounts to 132 students, and that it usually offers “over 2 million dollars in financial assistance to highly-qualified international applicants.” If we assume that Trinity’s average financial aid package is worth $35,000 per year (which may or may not be the case; I’m just trying to give you some tangible numbers to work with, however inaccurate), then that means that less than half of the internationals it admits receive aid. So, around 13% of all international applicants end up receiving aid, even though it’s quite likely that more than 70% of them actually need it–and this is a school with an overall acceptance rate above 60%!</p>
<p>Now, my calculations may be based on faulty premises and wild conjecture, but the point still stands: Trinity is much harder to get into for internationals than it is for domestic applicants, and it’s not even that well known outside of Texas. (Even though it’s an awesome school.)</p>
<p>So, Vassar’s acceptance rate for internationals seeking financial aid is below 7%. Granted, Vassar is quite selective in general, but the point is that these numbers are consistently low across the board; I don’t know if the overall quality of the international applicant pool is higher at places like Vassar and Tufts than it is at Whitman and Reed–and that may well be the case–but on paper at least they are all (almost) equally hard to get into.</p>
<p>In short, as an international who cannot fund his/her education, you are at the mercy of luck, love and fate. Unless you are a mind-blowing candidate, you have no safeties.</p>
<p>*******</p>
<p>The colleges I used as examples are all schools I applied to, and that’s why I knew where to look for their data; even though I’m not familiar with many other schools’ admission stats, though, I know where you can find them:</p>
<p>This website is a very useful resource and I encourage you to use it extensively in your college search. You can even set up an account to make the process easier.</p>
<p>When looking at a college’s profile, pay particular attention to its acceptance rate and international student body (both can be found in the At a Glance tab), and to the “number of enrolled international undergraduates received [sic] aid” (in the International Students tab). The acceptance rates in particular may be slightly out of date, but at most institutions, the number of internationals receiving aid rarely changes dramatically from year to year. So that should give you a rough idea of how things stand.</p>
<p>Also, if a certain school catches your eye, visit its official website. University websites are usually very reliable sources of information.</p>
<p>ii.</p>
<p>Now that you know what you’re in for, I have some good news for you: At least you’re from a small European country and not from India, China, Pakistan or Korea.</p>
<p>Most schools seek to admit ~X people from Europe, a certain number of people from Asia, ~Z people from Africa, etc. And this is why you’re usually evaluated in the context of your geographical area, and competing mostly against people from your own country and region. Now, this varies from school to school, of course–Harvard claims it doesn’t consider your nationality at all (I think? Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong), while at UChicago you are assigned a regional officer who oversees your case throughout the whole application process–and you can always be passed over for someone from a completely different background who’s just that much more impressive, but for the most part, there are subgroups within the larger international applicant pool at almost every school. And yes, you guessed it, Asian applicants are pretty much screwed wherever they apply.</p>
<p>I’m not saying Europeans have it easy, but the competition is slightly less fierce. So that’s something, at least.</p>
<p>(If any Asian students are reading this, I feel for you!)</p>
<p>*******</p>
<p>Another thing that might make life a little easier for you is an interest in something other than math, science or economics/finance; most internationals applying to schools in the US tend to be strong in one (or more) of these three fields of study. I have no sources to back this up, but I imagine that going against the grain on this would make you stand out more.</p>
<p>iii.</p>
<p>If you’re a girl, apply to Mount Holyoke. It has the largest international student body in the US (as a percentage), gives very generous aid, and is a great school that offers some unique academic opportunities.</p>
<p>Oh, and try to choose schools that promise to meet 100% of your need. Getting accepted is meaningless if you don’t receive enough money to attend.</p>
<p>THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH! This is way more info than my carreer counselor ever gave me - he always gave ne the impression that financial aid isnt that big of a deal, since he thinks i will be eligible for that anyway. But because it clearly is crucial. I looked at the need-based aid and how much you would receive based in family income and was extremely happy to see i would get amazing help according to those things. Not considering the fact that thats for US residents, ouch. I WILL need full-covered aid (as far as i know now). Plus i looked at the ones the Ivies offer, so yeah. </p>
<p>As for my majors, i’d like to major in something NOT science/math related. Journalism, Communications or International Relations/Affairs are the ones i’m looking at now. </p>
<p>As for my stats like grades etc - i’m in my junior year and i’m taking SATs in June probably (quite late, i know but again, my school didnt really help me with this and they dont offer SATs themselves). So I dont know where I’m at precisely, but i’m taking practice tests the coming weeks. My IB score is going down at this point because of personal circumstances but me and my teachers expect it to be AT LEAST 36/42 at the end of this year and hopefully next year will be even better. ECs are not a focus at my school AT ALL so ive tried my best to look up nice and interesting organizations etc outside of school. </p>
<p>I really appreciate your help, since my school isnt helping me that much,which is not even THAT bad, but then theres also not really a focus on getting into American colleges unless youre from the US or have lived there a while. Classmates mostly stay in Holland because we have relatively good unis that dont ask for top scores, ECs, personal statements etc) People in my school are not really aiming for top universities (like i am - and i repeat myself AIMING :)) and are not looking for unis yet - theyll see when they go back to school after summer. </p>
<p>So having this great advice is really helping me. It’s hard to figure everything out by myself, with SO MUCH info available on the internet but not knowing where to start.</p>
<p>Moneyp, im afraid i cant avoid applying for aid. At first i was really happy seeing that at some schools over 70% of the student body receives a big amount of aid (read this on some of the ivies -cant remember which ones exactly). Now ive been reading CC i see that im actually already disadvantaged as an international student because of the ‘quotas’ and then i also need financial aid which cuts my chances even more… :(</p>
<p>I sympathize with you zoulikhahaha, my son had a difficult time as he is an international asking for aid. That is why I tell internationals, if you can avoid asking for aid, do so…find other ways to raise money to be able to enter university. Asking for aid really obviously lowers the chance for internationals (as rightly so, the aid priority is for Americans) as there is very limited aid for internationals. My son had very good stats but had a very bad application experience because of his need for aid.
For your info, you can try looking at a few of the schools that he applied to with success: SUNY Geneseo, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Colgate University.</p>
<p>I think in the OP’s case not applying for aid would be pointless. As hard as it is to get accepted with aid, getting in without it when you really can’t afford to go to college is meaningless.</p>
<p>My advice would be to apply for aid, but to do it wisely; choose schools where your test scores (when you get them) put you at or above the 75th percentile of all students, for example. Or ask your counselor which US colleges, if any, have a good track record with your school (i.e. colleges where people from your school have been accepted with aid before)–for example, Trinity and DePauw are two such colleges for my school, and I was almost certain I’d be accepted to both based on my school’s Naviance. It also tells me that Bentley, Williams, Carleton and Grinnell are other schools where I’d have had a reasonable chance of getting in, based on past history (even though Williams is incredibly hard to get into for anyone, let alone internationals, its acceptance rate for applicants from my school is actually >30%).</p>
<p>Try to find out how Dutch applicants fare in general–which schools are consistently accepting people from your country, and which ones aren’t.</p>
<p>And lastly, realize that for internationals, acceptances and rejections are partly determined by factors that don’t affect domestic students to the same extent, like severe financial restraints and rigidly defined institutional needs, which makes the whole process is especially unpredictable. One of my friends was accepted to UPenn, for example, but waitlisted at Reed. Another classmate was accepted to Johns Hopkins’ BME program, but couldn’t get into a small liberal arts college. Et cetera. What I’m trying to say is that when the decisions start rolling in, you shouldn’t get discouraged by the first rejection. I was rejected by a few schools that I foolishly expected to get into, yet I was accepted to other, more selective colleges, and waitlisted at my one extreme reach. It really is a crapshoot.</p>