Help finding safeties/matches?

<p>Hey, I'm starting my junior year of high school and I'm starting to build up my list of potential colleges. I've had no trouble finding reach schools, but I'm having a harder time coming up with more realistic/safe schools to apply to.
Stats overview:
4.0 UW GPA
Taking Sat on Oct 5. based on practice tests, 2250-2300 is a pretty safe bet.
2 AP's, both 5s, will have 8 or 9 by graduation.
ECs: lots of public speaking involvement in forensics/debate/youth in government, state and national level awards for those. Lots of rock band stuff. Job programming in PHP. Several other scattered jobs/ecs/awards.
The List:
UChicago (definitely 1st)
Stanford
Cornell
Columbia
Brown
WUSTL
CMU
Duke</p>

<p>Ideas for safeties
UToronto or McGill (Canada)</p>

<p>I'm looking for places in the 4,000 to 15,000 undergrad class size range. I'm planning on majoring in either Computer Science or Math, but I also want something with a strong core education (kind of like what UChi and Columbia have). A strong intellectual vibe is a plus. I'm in love with everything I've heard about UChi's culture. I'd like to go somewhere in a medium to large city, hopefully with an awesome and relatively contained campus. The ability to give reasonable fin. aid packages is also important. Any suggestions for places that won't leave me biting my nails quite so much at admissions time? Thanks!</p>

<p>Price limit? State of residency? Have you run net price calculators on the various schools?</p>

<p>In the financial aid and scholarships forum, there are sticky threads at the top with lists of automatic and competitive full tuition and full ride merit scholarships (the automatic ones would be for safety candidates). If you have National Merit status, look in the National Merit thread for more.</p>

<p>I’m from WI but there’s nothing in state I like. I’ve looked at aid calculators for the schools I have on my reach list. Don’t necessarily need full ride, just schools with the ablility to help out. I’m not applying to schools that don’t offer OOS scholarships (like UC’s, NYU). Mainly interested in finding schools to consider in general.</p>

<p>Too bad you don’t like University of Wisconsin - Madison.</p>

<p>Next door, at almost-in-state price, is University of Minnesota - Twin Cities.</p>

<p>Stony Brook, Virginia Tech, NCSU, and Cal Poly SLO have relatively low out-of-state list prices, although you should not expect much financial aid beyond that. Virginia and UNC-CH do offer good financial aid to out-of-state students. Ohio State does give some merit scholarships to out-of-state students. USC (the private school in southern California) also gives merit scholarships, although it is still fairly expensive even after a half-tuition scholarship.</p>

<p>Not all of the above are necessarily safeties, though they may be matches for admissions.</p>

<p>Thanks, these definitely look pretty promising. The UW is an awesome school and I’d definitely apply there if I hadn’t lived less than a mile from campus for my whole life. Kinda want to go away from home for college.</p>

<p>wbrown97 -</p>

<p>Have you sat your parents down to have The Big Money Talk yet? If not, do that now. You need to know just exactly how much they are ready, willing, and able to pay, and under what circumstances. With UW in walking distance, their criteria could possibly be “No more than what it would cost you as a commuting student at UW.”</p>

<p>A safety is a place that you know for dead certain will admit you because the stats required for guaranteed admission are right on the website. It also is a place that you know for dead certain will be affordable. I don’t see anything with guaranteed admission on your current list. All you have so far are reaches, and maybe some matches.</p>

<p>With UW in walking distance, their criteria could possibly be “No more than what it would cost you as a commuting student at UW.”</p>

<p>Exactly. Be sure to ask your parents how much they’ll pay. With such a nice school in your backyard, they may have always planned to spend about $10k per year to send you there. They may not be willing to spend $25k+ to send you elsewhere. </p>

<p>This sort of thing happens when you have a very good school within driving distance. I know a Duke prof whose kids would get a huge discount to attend, but they want to “go away”. Since he won’t pay more than what he’d pay for them to attend Duke (about 25% of tuition), they had to find schools that would give them huge merit for the difference. </p>

<p>Going away to school is usually a luxury. Some parents won’t/can’t pay for it.
Ask yours for a figure.</p>