Help finding a safety?

College Search & Selection
1

<p>I need to find a place that I know I can get into and know I can afford. </p>

<p>I've got a 3.93 GPA, 34 act, full IB, decent ECs. My current list is Brown, Vassar, Swarthmore, Amherst, Wellesley, Barnard, Smith, Bard, Whitman, and Lewis & Clark. As you can see, it is heavy on private LAC schools, and empty of reasonably priced schools. I am middle class, and I am eligible for financial aid, but I still need a real financial and academic safety. I'm interested in majoring in pretty much everything, and have a particular interest in chemistry, cognitive sciences, english, and theatre.</p>

<p>I'm a Washington State resident and thus far I have considered:</p>

<p>University of Washington
Pros: Damn good school, in-state prestige, beautiful campus, great Honors program, good food.
Cons: Very big, less than 1hr away from home, recent budget cuts in the arts, rapidly increasing tuition, the honors program rejected some of our top applicants last year, I'm not sure I could participate in theatre if I didn't major in it, minimal IB credit</p>

<p>Western Washington University
Pros: I like the town, fun campus life, good in humanities, smaller than UW, less competitive Honors program admissions, lots of friends there, farther away from home
Cons: Less prestige, minimal IB credit, much lower ranking</p>

<p>Oregon State University
Pros: TONS of IB credit (I could begin with sophomore status, priority housing, and automatic scholarships if I get the IB diploma), I love Corvallis, I have spent a week on the campus and feel very at home there, good honors program that isn't as competitive as UW, strong sciences
Cons: Not known for humanities, no theatre major, too expensive OOS on the off chance I don't get the IB diploma and skip a year, food sucks, half of my extended family attended U of O and take their school pride very seriously.</p>

<p>Does anyone have any thoughts on the schools I've already listed, or suggestions of other affordable options to consider? Thanks!</p>

2

<p>Since you’re from WA, what are your thoughts on Evergreen as an affordable option?</p>

3

<p>I really don’t know very much about Evergreen, I only know about the type of people from my school who go to Evergreen and that sort of turns me off of it…We send a handful of students there every year and they tend to be the type who didn’t put much into school, never have we sent a full IB student there. They all tend to be creative writing majors or things like that. Maybe I don’t have the right impression, though, so perhaps I should visit…</p>

4

<p>I am middle class, and I am eligible for financial aid, but I still need a real financial and academic safety. I’m interested in majoring in pretty much everything, and have a particular interest in chemistry, cognitive sciences, english, and theatre.</p>

<p>Keep in mind that academic/financial safeties are typically the schools that do NOT give financial aid beyond federal aid - which is not much - and the fed grants are for low income students.</p>

<p>So…in your case…a safety is going to likely be a school that will give an ASSURED big merit scholarship for your stats. A school with competitive merit can’t be a safety since you won’t know if you’ll get the scholarship. </p>

<p>How much will your parents contribute? </p>

<p>What is your likely EFC?</p>

5

<p>I don’t know much about Evergreen either, but in CA it has more panache–sort of a quirky, smart, liberal small public school. Sometimes greater distance = more prestige!</p>

6

<p>My parents make ~90k a year, idk what the EFC for that would be…</p>

<p>I have 5 years worth of credits at a Washington State public school through a GET program, that can be transferred dollar-for-dollar to an out-of-state or private university (it was supposed to be for my brother and I, but it doesn’t look like he’ll be going to college). So attending UW or WWU would be easy, and graduating in only 3 years at OSU with IB scholarships would be close to the price of four years at a WA public, but I’d have to transfer the GET credits which would be a tad more complicated but certainly do-able.</p>

<p>My parents have promised to cover room and board and food, and beyond that and GET they said they’ll “do the best they can”. So that would be around 22k a year from my family.</p>

7

<p>So…you have a prepaid tuition program! Great!</p>

<p>Will your parents let you use it all? Or will they want to save some of it for your brother.</p>

<p>*My parents have promised to cover room and board and food, and beyond that and GET they said they’ll “do the best they can”. So that would be around 22k a year from my family. *</p>

<p>??? Room and board would probably be about $8k - 12k depending on the school. Where do you get the $22k figure from?</p>

<p>BTW…ask your parents for a dollar figure. Are they saying $22k per year or is that your guess?</p>

<p>How much is GET each year? The website says…</p>

<p>2010-2011 academic year: 1 GET unit is worth $85.92 (payout value). </p>

<p>So, how much is that per year?</p>

<p>BTW…that GET account is considered to be an asset for FAFSA purposes. So, the GET, your parents’ income, and any other savings/assets will affect your EFC. At many schools, you won’t qualify for much (if any) financial aid.</p>

8

<p>I get 22k because 5 years of tuition is ~50k (I don’t know how many “units” we have), 50k/4 years is 12.5k + ~10k a year directly out of my parents’ incomes = ~22k a year would be my estimate coming from my family. Sorry, that wasn’t really clear.</p>

<p>I’ll have to have my parents fill out some sort of EFC calculator. They really don’t tell me enough about our financial situation. They basically tell me “you pick the schools and we’ll worry about paying for it”, not really realizing it doesn’t work that way. They aren’t really involved in my college process any more than my father telling me I can’t be a Cougar (at WSU).</p>

9

<p>Ahhh…now I get it. :)</p>

<p>*I’ll have to have my parents fill out some sort of EFC calculator. They really don’t tell me enough about our financial situation. They basically tell me “you pick the schools and we’ll worry about paying for it”, not really realizing it doesn’t work that way. *</p>

<p>I’m starting to doubt that an EFC calculator is going to give you any happy results. It doesn’t sound like your parents intend on applying for FA - maybe because they may know that their savings and GET will indicate an EFC that is too high. </p>

<p>However, if they intend on having you apply for FA, then it’s important to know now what your EFC is because if it’s a lot higher than $22k per year, then your strategy for schools may have to change.</p>

10

<p>We’re definitely applying for financial aid. The GET savings are less than 1 yr at a private school, they can’t expect us to pay 150k out of pocket. My parents have told me that much. I think its more that they’re just expecting me to get scholarships no matter what.</p>

11

<p>Bates, Holy Cross(don’t have to be religious). Holy Cross has nice campus like Wellesley and is 1 hour from Boston.</p>

12

<p>*We’re definitely applying for financial aid. The GET savings are less than 1 yr at a private school, *</p>

<p>So, the GET total is worth about $50k? </p>

<p>they can’t expect us to pay 150k out of pocket. My parents have told me that much. I think its more that they’re just expecting me to get scholarships no matter what.</p>

<p>Yes…there are schools that don’t give much aid and will expect many people to pay for most/all costs. I know it may sound crazy, but MOST schools cannot afford to charge a sliding scale based on income/assets. In many cases…it’s like buying a pricey car. You don’t buy it if you can’t afford it.</p>

<p>A LOT will depend on how much your parents have in personal savings/assets/investments. If they have a lot, then that will cause a high EFC…perhaps too high for much/any aid other than loans. That’s why you need to find out what your EFC will likely be. </p>

<p>EFC is based on savings, current income, and future income…so not $150k at one time. </p>

<p>For instance…with your parents’ income alone (about $90k), then you could have an EFC of about $20,000. If they have a lot of savings/investments, then that EFC could be substantially more.</p>

<p>The mistake many make is that EFC is NOT the most you have to pay at many schools. Many schools do not have funds to give to those who have EFCs that exceed Pell grants.</p>

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<p>Two good EFC calculators are at [FinAid</a>! Financial Aid, College Scholarships and Student Loans](<a href=“http://www.finaid.org%5DFinAid”>http://www.finaid.org) and at [College</a> Calculators - savings calculators - college costs, loans](<a href=“College Board - SAT, AP, College Search and Admission Tools”>Calculate Your Cost – BigFuture | College Board) If your parents prefer to do the calculations by hand so that they can see exactly which factors affect the results, they can print out <a href=“http://ifap.ed.gov/efcformulaguide/attachments/111609EFCFormulaGuide20102011.pdf[/url]”>http://ifap.ed.gov/efcformulaguide/attachments/111609EFCFormulaGuide20102011.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Good luck!</p>

14

<p>With an income of $90K, the EFC could be more like $30K. </p>

<p>The first step needs to be establishing the EFC, unfortunately I think you may see you can’t afford many schools on your list. Private colleges will look at income and assets such as home equity. Your college savings will not lower what they will expect of your parents’ income. A third of income is pretty typical as they expect savings and borrowing too. </p>

<p>So many with a $90K income will end up with an EFC they can not pay. And that’s at schools that meet need which several on your list do not.</p>

15

<p>I don’t consider your list empty on affordable if you include U Dub & Western. 2 solid schools which you can get into with your stats and afford.</p>

<p>I have a high respect for Western Washington – Bellingham is nice. Great size and nice atmosphere. Not much red tape if you decide to change majors. I’m in PA – Our Community Colleges have higher tuition than Western Washington! And the R & B is reasonable ( $8-10K depending upon room type & meal plan)</p>

<p>I encourage you to apply to U Dub and Western, than add at least 3 privates that offer merit as a “financial reach” based upon where you want to live, size of school and what type of atmosphere you wish. From there, you can reivew the Best Schools with Merit sticky thread.</p>

<p>I’d cut down on the list of privates you gave. </p>

<p>Before applying to Brown, Amherst, Swat and the like you MUST HAVE PARENTS run EFC – These schools do NOT give merit, but have generous financial aid and higher income limits to qualify for aid than most other schools. I would not want to see you waste time & energy on applications where you could not get financing. </p>

<p>Best with Merit that haven’t been mentioned yet often include:
Tulane (LA)
Alabama (Honors)
Mid-Western LACs (Grinnell (Iowa)seems to appeal to many who like the academics of Swat/Amherst)
Rhodes (TN)
Ursinus ¶</p>

<p>Many LACs will not have CogSci major, but will easily accomdate all majors to partake in Theater productions.</p>

<p>Your stats are great! I suggest throwing out the typical safety/match/reach formula based on academic stats and replace it with safety/match/reach of financing.</p>

16

<p>kenzie - we are all shooting a bit in the dark here. First off, is that GPA weighted or unweighted. Next, try and give us an idea what you would like in the following if you could have exactly what you wanted.</p>

<p>1) Size of school, undergrads (0-2,500; 2,501-10,000; 10,001-20,000; 20,000+) I guess we already know you prefer 0-2,500, but might as well confirm. Are you OK with 2,501-10,000 or even the next size up?</p>

<p>2) Location (Highly urban, suburban, rural)</p>

<p>3) Geography (are there parts of the country you prefer or some you will not consider)</p>

<p>4) Weather (prefer warm, snow…?)</p>

<p>5) Sports (looking for competitve Div. 1, don’t care…?)</p>

<p>6) Greek scene (thinking about joining, want to avoid even a whiff of it, or in between)</p>

<p>7) If female, are single sex schools an option?</p>

<p>8) Anything else that you might think is important to you personally (you ride horses, like rock climbing, active arts scene, whatever).</p>

<p>Knowing the answers to the GPA question and these will really help focus on the right schools with merit aid.</p>

17

<p>The 3.93 GPA is unweighted. My school does not weight or rank, although if we did rank, I would be top 10% (that would include all kids who got a 3.9ish in partial IB or regular classes)</p>

<p>And to everyone who tells me I should re think my list, I appreciate the suggestions, but the question was to help me find a safety, not for you to tell me I shouldn’t apply to my dream schools. I only listed my chosen schools to give an example of what I want in a college. that should answer your question, fallenchemist. If not:

  1. <10000
  2. anything
  3. west or northeast
    4)Anything
    5)don’t care
  4. don’t care, won’t join
    7)last I checked Wellesley, Smith and Barnard are all girls, so yes
  5. the ability to take a range of classes from all disciplines </p>

<p>I’m really only asking for input on UW vs. Western vs. OSU, or for suggestions of other schools that could be a financial safety for me. My list is unchanging. If I get in and I don’t get enough money to go to Brown or Vassar, ok, it’ll suck, but at least I tried. I’m applying for outside scholarships, and I know most of the schools on my list meet need. I know what I’m doing in that respect. And that’s why I’m just asking for the safeties. Let’s get back on what I asked, shall we?</p>

18

<p>Well excuse us, we are just trying to help. Besides, I don’t think anyone told you to rethink your list, there was a passing comment that if it were them they would cut it down. So what? It isn’t them. You are the one that said: “Does anyone have any thoughts on the schools I’ve already listed, or suggestions of other affordable options to consider?” Longhaul made some suggestions for other schools, so didn’t he do exactly what you asked? Since we knew nothing about your preferences, how could we suggest a financial/academic safety that was meaningful? Obviously it makes no sense given what you said above to suggest big state schools in the south, but otherwise Alabama would have been a perfectly good suggestion. Tulane fits except for location, and you would have a good shot at a full tuition scholarship. They are strong in all areas you mention: chemistry, cognitive sciences, english, and theatre. But it isn’t in the west or northeast. Finally, when you are asking for help it really is rude to be sarcastic back. I am talking about your comment regarding the all woman schools. That is a standard list I paste on for these types of questions. Excuse me for not tailoring it just for you.</p>

<p>With your criteria I cannot think of an academic and financial safety that makes more sense than the ones you have. If you are willing to expand your geography, I would recommend going for a full tuition scholarship at Tulane. You certainly have the stats for it, and the school meets all your criteria except location, as I said. If you want to know more, I am happy to help. If not, then I truly wish you the best of luck.</p>

19

<p>*I suggest throwing out the typical safety/match/reach formula based on academic stats and replace it with safety/match/reach of financing. *</p>

<p>I agree with this completely.</p>

<p>Those who will likely have high EFCs that their parents won’t pay need to look at schools from a financing standpoint.</p>

<p>*I’m really only asking for input on UW vs. Western vs. OSU, or for suggestions of other schools that could be a financial safety for me. My list is unchanging. </p>

<p>If I get in and I don’t get enough money to go to Brown or Vassar, ok, it’ll suck, but at least I tried. I’m applying for outside scholarships, and I know most of the schools on my list meet need. </p>

<p>I know what I’m doing in that respect. And that’s why I’m just asking for the safeties. Let’s get back on what I asked, shall we? *</p>

<p>Well excuse us, we are just trying to help. Besides, I don’t think anyone told you to rethink your list, there was a passing comment that if it were them they would cut it down. So what? It isn’t them. You are the one that said: “Does anyone have any thoughts on the schools I’ve already listed, or suggestions of other affordable options to consider?” Longhaul made some suggestions for other schools, so didn’t he do exactly what you asked? Since we knew nothing about your preferences, how could we suggest a financial/academic safety that was meaningful? Obviously it makes no sense given what you said above to suggest big state schools in the south, but otherwise Alabama would have been a perfectly good suggestion. Tulane fits except for location, and you would have a good shot at a full tuition scholarship. They are strong in all areas you mention: chemistry, cognitive sciences, english, and theatre. But it isn’t in the west or northeast. Finally, when you are asking for help it really is rude to be sarcastic back. I am talking about your comment regarding the all woman schools. That is a standard list I paste on for these types of questions. Excuse me for not tailoring it just for you.</p>

<p>Students who have strong stats who have an assumption that they will get financial aid often get a bit testy when it is suggested that their family’s income/assets may be too high to get much/any. </p>

<p>We’ve told the student what to expect. The ball is in her court. She can apply to a bunch of favorite schools which may prove to be unaffordable and end up at UW or another good school. As long as that’s fine with the OP, then I guess she won’t care that she missed other big merit opportunities.</p>

20

<p>Alright, I might be a little testy and I’m sorry about that, but I’m a stressed out IB senior completely on her own for the college search process. I’ve worked really hard for four years and I’m not going to sacrifice the opportunity to try for what I want. I’m doing the best I can and I was getting a little bit of the “you have no idea what you’re doing” vibe from some of you, which I found offensive. I’m asking for safeties because I DO have an idea of the realities of college. I’m asking for suggestions because I DON’T want to miss out on merit opportunities or a really great public school somewhere. The criteria I listed in response to fallenchemist’s questions would be for my ideal school, but I know my financial safety isn’t going to be my ideal school (also, the sarcasm, that’s just the way I talk, I apologize for it coming off as rude). I didn’t want to list a bunch of criteria in the first place because I didn’t want to limit my options, I’d prefer NE/NW but I will definitely look into Tulane and others.</p>

<p>My initial list is unchanging. I’ve already put a lot of time into completing most of the applications. I am asking only for suggestions to add to the list. Thank you to those who have suggested schools. </p>

<p>The best criteria to go by is that I am looking for schools where I could easily be in a 20-25k a year (or less) range, which is what I could pay without taking out any loans. That includes room and board. Thanks </p>

<p>And yes, mom2collegekids, the ball IS in my court. It is, after all, my college decision, I don’t see why it ever wouldn’t be :)</p>