Help me make my college shortlist??

College Search & Selection
1

<p>I am an International student from Bangladesh applying for fall 2013 and I am having some trouble deciding which colleges I should apply to.
My high school is only allowing me to apply to 6 colleges this year, so my shortlist is really constricted without much space for 'safety' schools.</p>

<p>I'm very flexible about location and type of college, but i would prefer a sub-urban environment, but rural or urban is fine too.</p>

<p>I am in need of a lot of financial aid so I am mostly applying to colleges which provide a lot of financial aid to international students.</p>

<p>My stats:
SAT reasoning: 2310 (CR: 800, MA: 800, WR: 710)</p>

<p>SAT 2: physics:800 Math L2: 800 Chemistry: 780</p>

<p>Not sure about my GPA but i have straight As in O and A levels</p>

<p>Class rank: don't know as my high school doesn't rank, but definitely in the top 5%</p>

<p>EC: Music, mainly vocals and a few unorthodox instruments. Sports like cricket, soccer, badminton, Although there are no certificates to show. Photography.</p>

<p>Volunteer work: worked with underprivileged kids for a good part of the year, also worked in other projects like city clean up.</p>

<p>Work Experience: Worked in 2 NGOs on violations against journalists.</p>

<p>College List:
Amherst
Dartmouth (as they are need blind for international students)</p>

<p>Tufts ( want to do ED2 here, I really like this university)</p>

<p>Grinnell
Bates a
Trinity College
Elizabethtown
Williams
Colgate
Vassar</p>

<p>Also i at least one to have one sure safety and I haven't listed any safety schools above, If anyone has any suggestions it would be really appreciated.</p>

<p>Also feel free to suggest other colleges that provide a fair amount of aid to int' students.</p>

2

<p>Williams ended their need-blind policy for international students a few years ago, but I’m fairly certain (based on what I’ve heard from my cousins in Korea) that they still give very generous aid to international students who need it. It’s also a phenomenal school. :P</p>

3

<p>Yes Williams is need aware but very generous to their intl’ freshmen, but i don’t want to apply to both amherst and williams, I need to apply to more safeties and matches.</p>

4

<p>I would recommend Pomona. It’s at least as academically as rigorous as Amherst and Williams, and they do meet 100% need of all acceped students with no loans. Spots for international students became less competitive than in previous years, though they are need aware.</p>

<p>You said you wanted to be in a suburban area. Pomona is about 45 minutes east of Los Angeles. It is also in the best designed college consortium in the country. Williams, Amherst, Grinnell, Colgate, and Dartmouth are exceedingly rural.</p>

<p>The problem is though that it is incredibly selective (only 12.8% got in last year). Since you can only apply to 6 schools, I’m not really sure I’m offering you a feasible alternative. But I think Pomona will be a better fit for you than some of your other choices.</p>

5

<p>Thank you debakianmj</p>

<p>Pomona is excellent, I actually considered it when i was looking through the colleges, but in collegeboard they said it took in only 37 int’l students who enrolled and received aid, whereas for amherst it is the number 141.
I can’t apply to both Pomona and Amherst because of the 6 college restriction. The rural setting of Amherst doesn’t bother me that much :slight_smile: I just have to be accepted with aid at a good university.</p>

6

<p>For an int’l student who needs a LOT of FA, there are no safeties. If there were, all the int’ls would apply to that school and then - poof - it would get so many apps it would no longer be a safety.</p>

7

<p>Yes exactly, but what I mean by safety here is a school that is “more likely” to offer me admission and FA based on my application and scores. Well it is tough to find a college like that.
I think I will apply to a state school with a low tuition, and hopefully I can finish my undergrad.</p>

8

<p>Your list is very heavy with Liberal Arts Colleges. Is there any reason you aren’t looking into National Universities?</p>

9

<p>Over the past few years I have seen a pattern where liberal arts colleges awarded the most aid to int’l students from my country, so my shortlist is leaning towards the liberal arts. DO national Universities provide as much aid?? and please name a few which does. I’ll look into it,</p>

<p>And thanks for all the help everyone, keep em coming</p>

10

<p><em>bump</em> any more suggestions??</p>