Grade 9:
H Bio
H English 1
Health
Leadership Development (online)
H Math 2
H Math 3
Principles of business and finance
Spanish 1
H World History
grade 10:
AP Chemisty (4)
AP Psychology (5)
AP Stat (5)
H Chem
Programming 1
H English 2
H Pre-Calculus
Spanish 2
grade 11
AP Human Geo
AP Calculus AB
AP Calculus BC
AP USH
AP Physics 1
AP ES
H Programming 2
H English 3 (i hate english)
EC’s
NC Science Olympiad - regional 2nd
FBLA - regional winner and state top 5
FIRST Robotics - Most important EC - won first in NC, second in SC, and Engineering Inspiration, Industrial Safety, as well as Gracious Professionalism Award.
Internship at a Gastroenterology clinic
Volunteering includes: Key Club, Leo Club, Cary Teen Council, NHS,
Volunteer at UNC Chapel Hill Hospital over summer
College List so far:
Stanford
MIT
Georgia Tech
Northwestern
Cornell
U Michigan Ann Arbor
Rice
NC State
UNC Chapel Hill
UNC Charlotte
U Maryland College Park
Duke
Vanderbilt
Carnegie mellon
Caltech
UC Berkeley
UT Austin
UI Urbana Champaign
Purdue
Virginia Tech
Texas A&M
Dartmouth
The list NOT in order of preference. As you can see there are too many reachers Need a little help trimming.
Intended major: IDK maybe some sort of engineering. Planning for either MBA or MD for grad.
My parents aren’t too willing to disclose any financial info other than 250K max for undergrad and graduate. But I want to do everything I can so they don’t have to pay as much. Any advice for scholarships or ways to cut costs?
UC’s offer not financial aid for OOS students and little in the way of merit (anywhere from $2000-4000/year) but a drop in the bucket when you have UC’s cost of around $60K/year. UC’s will most likely cost you the full budget and leave little for Grad school. Run the Net Price Calculators on each school and you could probably eliminate a few just based on costs.
Ok, so you will reassess the state schools to determine cost. Then you need to do some self-reflection and research on your preferences in undergrad programs, climate (both weather and politics), and other variables.
What are you looking for in a school? My daughter is a FIRST alum . She wanted hands on engineering because of her FIRST experience, she wanted a smaller school with STEM focus that has a semester abroad options , where as engineering major a semester is not lost. She looked at Stevens (NJ), WPI and Illinois Tech. She received at least 20k from each. She chose Illinois Tech in Chicago, and loves it. She is in her 2nd semester! Likes that it is urban, has found friends, she is planning her semester abroad , where she will take engineering classes in English. Check out Illinois Tech.
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My parents aren’t too willing to disclose any financial info other than 250K max for undergrad and graduate.
maybe some sort of engineering. Planning for either MBA or MD for grad.
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At virtually all of the OOS publics, like UT, GT, Purdue, UIUC, etc…you will be full pay. You may also be full pay at all the privates since your parents have indicated that they can pay $250k for your education.
Only your parents can run the NPCs since they won’t disclose their income.
Do your parents own a business? Do you have a parent who is a physician?
Do they have no intention of applying for FA? (Maybe they won’t if they know they won’t qualify for aid)
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But I want to do everything I can so they don’t have to pay as much. A
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You need to alter your list if that’s what you want. Your current list of schools will eat up most/all of that $250k. Add in some schools that will give you merit for your stats.
@mom2collegekids I didn’t think we qualified for financial aid but I guess I can still apply to FAFSA. They don’t own a business or are doctors. I was hoping to work part time in college and get some scholarships to offset cost. Do you still think top privates are still of the list? Also, an MBA or MS costs between 100-160 and based on stats many students get financial aid for them.
Since you’re lucky enough to live in a state with one of the top 4 publics in the country, UNC should be your number one choice. You might get into some top-20 privates but since you won’t get need based aid, and they won’t give you merit aid, if you think you might do an MD or grad school, then save your money.
As others have mentioned, forget the UCs. For the same reasons, unless you’re offered in-state tuition or other scholarship, there’s little reason for you to chose UIUC, Michigan, Maryland, VT, Texas A&M, UT-Austin, or Purdue, over UNC or even NCSU (your safety).
I suggest you focus on:
merit scholarships at elite schools (i.e., Rice, Notre Dame, WashU, GTech, Duke, USC) - these are very competitive, but worth a shot (some on this list: http://competitivefulltuition.yolasite.com)
good privates that offer merit aid (look in the 20-50 rankings - a lot of colleges will offer good merit scholarships to high stats students to lure them away from the top-20; if you decide for engineering, excellent schools like Rochester, RPI, will offer good merit; excellent LACs will as well if you don't go for engineering).
I've heard Michigan sometimes gives in-state tuition to high stats students but I'm not sure. If that's the case, you could go ahead and apply there.
If you really want to go to Stanford or MIT, go ahead and apply, but bear in mind that besides the slim chance of acceptance, if accepted you’ll have to make the choice between spending the money on undergrad or saving some for grad school. If you want the latter, then forgot HYPMS and focus on ones where you might get some merit.
The tippy-top schools generally don’t grant merit aid, as others have mentioned, but the good news is that since you are leaning towards fields where your undergrad prestige is not overly important, that’s not a huge issue.
So pray for some merit at those privates that insanedreamer mentioned, but your best bet is to get big merit aid at solid publics like Pittsburgh, Florida State, Alabama, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Kansas, Kentucky. It’s quite possible you would be able to attend one of them cheaper than you could go to NC State.
Also, compare the wide variations in how many credits u will get at the various colleges based on your AP exams. (Each college’s web site has a chart showing which classes you get credit for based on the various scores on each AP exam.)You might have enough credits from AP exams to graduate in 3 or 3.5 years, which could save you thousands of $. The public universities are generally more generous with credits for AP exams than top privates, which is another factor in their favor. Also, some schools, like Alabama, would give you a huge merit scholarship for 4 years, & if you get a bachelor’s degree in 3 years, the fourth year of the scholarship can be used for grad school.
We all realize that it’s sort of a blow to your ego that so many big-name schools are bad financial fits for you. But you’re a classic case of being in that financial range where you won’t get need aid, but (like most of us) your parents can’t drop a quarter of a million bucks without feeling it.
Also, you’re leaning towards engineering…I thought UNC chapel Hill didn’t have engineering…?
Unc CH and NCSU are your best bets financially.
However if your parents have indicated they can afford 250k, which is huge.
If you decide to be an engineer, you can spend it mostly on undergrad since you won’t need grad school. If you manage to get into Stanford or MIT you’ll be a well-employed engineer.
If you choose MD then you’ll need to save as much as possible from that amount in order to help with med school costs.
Only choose gtech if you’re not interested in meeting school, due to grade deflation.
In addition, computer scientists aren’t engineers but aren’t lacking in job opportunities.
Talk with your parents some more and think it through.