Who is paying for your education, and are they allowing you to make these decisions without any input or guidance?
Are they able to pay for the costs of any college? And will they agree to pay for your choice of school? Do they have any demands about where you must attend?
Be certain of your source of money for college, and any limitations on offer to pay or dollar amount limits.
Please reach out to trusted adults who know you well and can give you guidance. It sounds like you are alone in this major decision, and sometimes young people can be shortsighted in their vision for their future.
@am9799 Part of it is that my parents cant afford any of the other state schools I got into so I’d rather wait a year and reapply to Princeton (gives good need based aid) and other schools that do so. Also, Princeton is my dream school so I’d rather do this then be somewhere for a year I’d hate, rack up debt, and hope I can transfer elsewhere.
I think some of this is getting confused. If you decide to reapply, whether P or elsewhere, your year off needs to be strategically productive. Not idle, travel, DL, not a repeat of hs-like activities. In other words, present as a *better * candidate than before. Raise the level of responsibilities taken on.
This is different than an approved gap before starting freshman year, at a deposited college. In this latter case, you can sometimes play. Depends.
Are you now thinking of the EA admit school? This talk of contacting them confuses.
Don’t view this as a dream. You need to be rational, informed, smart.
Why should Princeton take you next year EA and provide you a ton of FA ? They have plenty of full pay waiting in line whom they can admit. Did you not get any merit based aid in other state schools ? Do you have any hooks ? Are you an URM ?
This story doesn’t make sense.
“Part of it is that my parents cant afford any of the other state schools I got into so I’d rather wait a year and reapply to Princeton (gives good need based aid) and other schools that do so. Also, Princeton is my dream school so I’d rather do this then be somewhere for a year I’d hate, rack up debt, and hope I can transfer elsewhere.”
Okay, it sounds like you don’t have an option that you can take, which makes a gap year necessary.
First of all, you should try to do something productive during the gap year. If you are interested in “math, science, robotics”, then try to find something to do which is at least remotely related. Spending part of the time traveling seems okay to me also. However if you are having trouble affording university then it is hard to imagine how you could afford traveling without making the “paying for college” worse. Given how young you are, you are not expected to know what you want to do for the rest of your life, so some “exploring other options” makes sense.
More importantly, you need to have a much more realistic list of universities to apply to next year. Princeton EA is fine, but you also need to apply to at least one and preferably a few universities where (i) you are almost sure to get in; (ii) you are almost sure that you can afford it; and (iii) you would be willing to go. Most state universities are very good at Math and Science. If you want a job in this area on the most part what matters is what you know and what you can do, not where you learned it.
If your parents can’t afford any of the state schools that you got into, did you apply to your own state schools, and if so what happened?
@grtd2010 Yes I’m an URM and the need based FA that Princeton would have provided far outweighs the merit aid I would have gotten from a state school. @MatzoBall What doesn’t add up?
Why didn’t you formally decline the Ivy you got into? Why didn’t they meet full need? Don’t intend my comments as criticisms. Just confused.
@DadTwoGirls That’s the thing, I did apply to my state schools and I’d still have to pay ~$20k even with merit as opposed to the estimated $3k from need based scholarships at Princeton.
@MatzoBall They couldn’t match as much financial aid as was predicted by Princeton’s FA calculator even after I showed my family’s income etc.
So you can’t afford the Ivy you did get into?
OP wants all grants only FA, a very little debt or family contribution.
There are still schools that are looking for highly qualified applicants. There is a thread that references the NACAC; it tracks all the schools that still have seats available - jump on it asap
@Chembiodad Ok thanks. Will do!
OK, so if the current situation is that you didn’t get into any colleges that your family can afford, a gap year might make sense.The gap year would be to strengthen your application with meaningful activities, getting a job to save money to help pay for college, and making a college list for this fall that includes some schools that are guaranteed to be affordable, perhaps that offer a full tuition scholarship or similar for your gpa/test scores. If I were you I’d start a new thread in the financial aid forum for that specific question, many helpful posters there.
Also check that NACAC list though I’m not sure any would beat the FA offered by (I’m assuming Cornell) https://www.nacacnet.org/news–publications/Research/CollegeOpenings/
But where OP applies depends on aid he might get.
And I’m surprised Mystery Ivy was unaffordable. By how much? Did that follow what the NPC projected? If there’s something unusual about your family finances (it’s not just income, ) the Princeton projection could be off, too.
Starting to sound like a lot of unknowns.
@OHMomof2 Ok thanks for the input! I will make a list that isn’t just limited to that Ivy and other schools that may be affordable. @lookingforward I just thought Princeton’s projection would have been a lot more generous but you’re right maybe I miscalculated the FA calculator for Princeton as well.
