Lots of good suggestions here. I would add Baylor to the list - they offer both the Getterman (full cost of attendance, fewer than 10 given) and the Invitation to Excellence (full tuition, slightly less competitive). There are specific deadlines and an extra essay, I believe. Based on what I’m told by friends whose students have received these, Invitation to E is a reasonable target for students with stats like your son. Also, U of Arizona offers merit based on GPA - a 4.0 amounts to essentially free tuition, which would get costs of attendance below 20k.
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Thank you. I will have him take a look at Arizona. He will not consider Baylor. He is fundamentally opposed to the religious requirement. 
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University of Rochester and Denison could be options - both offer merit (my daughter was awarded merit each) and financial aid.
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@Desertpalm11 Perhaps check out College of Charleston. He should get nice merit there and it has a good honors college. @tsbna44 may be able to add more details as his D will be attending this fall (I believe cost came within your budget without a competitive scholarship).
At this point, I believe we are all making suggestions almost solely based on the need for merit. Once your son does some research, let us know more about his preferences for more targeted suggestions. Since you said he likes SMU, the Wake and Tulane suggestions seem like other good options to try for competitive scholarships.
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Thanks - I was just in Charleston today dropping a “loaded” car at the airport and flew home. My wife and daughter fly in tomorrow and pick up the car and move in Saturday. Someone had to stay home with the dog 
- me.
So the tuition there was $34K and we got the most OOS which was $12K. But then the money started rolling - and by the time she accepted she had another $13K in scholarship - Honors, something else. And then after she accepted, another $9K taking her tuition to $0 OOS - if she keeps a 3.5.
Like others have said, if you go to - let’s say Rice since you’re from TX - and you’re a stud, well everyones a stud - so you’re not special.
But if that stud - who is just a regular person at Rice - goes to say a solid school like TCU - but their credentials are superior to 95% of the students there, they get paid.
So it’s not a penalty to go to a lesser pedigree/rank school. It’s actually the reward for working your tail off in high school, etc. So what I don’t understand is the 4.9. Is that out of 5 or a 4.0 scale.
But in addition to many fine choices mentioned above, I did not see U of Arizona on there. They base on unweighted - but if you had straight As, you get $35K of $37K tuition in merit. If you have a B or two, you get $30K. Florida State is another strong school. Don’t forget, many of these schools have wonderful Honors Colleges - such as U of Az, ASU, U of SC, College of Charleston. So you have Ivy caliber students going to many of these schools. Also, check out MS State and UAH - you can see up front what your scholarship will be. Or Texas Tech?
I’d also recommend Washington & Lee. They have the Johnson - which is a full ride + $7K one time stipend for research. 10% of the class - 44 students a year - receive the scholarship and they are looking for diversity. Not sure where you are from in TX but they also have a tuition only scholarship for students from Dallas (one winner per year). If you get on their email list, they won’t charge you an app fee.
There are a lot of great options out there - maybe not quite $15K but reasonable. Just realize - just because they don’t have the pedigree, etc. they are still “great” and there’s a trade off for spending $15K or $25K or $40K vs. others that spend $80K.
In the end, the student, not the school, will make their success.
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University of Miami has some full tuition and full ride scholarships.
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You bring up some great points. Thankfully, my son does not have a dream school, and he seems pretty open to considering a broad range. His weighted GPA is 4.9 in a 5.0 system. I am a strong believer that things always work out. Thank you for your feedback.
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If you are from Texas, he should have auto admit at any Texas public, including UT. There is a fair amount of merit available for Texas publics that could get your EFC down to $15k.
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There is hardly any merit at the big 2 - UT and TAMU. There is some at other Texas publics.
The Forty Acres Scholarship is full ride at UT. There are also a number of other University and Departmental Scholarships, which I believe can be stacked.
But yes, other campuses may have more, larger merit scholarships available.
Baylor and TCU are known to give big merit, but I think they just bring their private cost down to the public cost that the applicant would have had.
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This thread may be helpful Looking to maximize merit aid - looking for microbiology/biochem/biology programs - #17 by stacysmom21 in particular the Mercile J. Lee scholarship at Wisconsin.
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Agreed that UT Austin and TAMU don’t give much merit although I do know an honors engineering student at TAMU who received merit.
UT Dallas does give full tuition scholarships lowering costs below $15k. They have rolling admission so apply now and find out soon.
Just wondering if there are circumstances in which you would go over your desired cost of $15k.
Many of what are considered elite colleges and universities only give need based aid although their need based packages may match some other schools merit packages. Check the Ivy League net price calculators and see what you get. Elite schools don’t need to offer merit aid to attract students.
There are many very good colleges that do give merit. It all depends on what you mean by high ranking.
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I think this is the essence of the question - does it exist at the highest pedigree schools.
For the most part, given the question of limiting the contribution to $15K, the answer is no unless there’s a huge hook or a demonstration of need vs. a desire of need.
However, the group provided a lot of info on very solid schools that are inexpensive or can be given the OPs stats.
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I found a handy tool for this research, although you do have to do some digging. Collegedata.com. Type in the school you are interested in, go to the financial section, hit “see more” and you will see all kinds of info on aid. One of the things they list is the number of students (and percentage) that did not have demonstrated need but got merit and what the average grant was.
So for example, 152 (17.0%) of freshmen had no financial need and received merit aid, average amount $14,542.
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