<p>With those stats, your D could qualify for some significant merit aid at a lot of colleges. I’m not familiar enough with the Boston area to be able to suggest any - would Worcester (Clark) be close enough?</p>
<p>Actually if she’s young community college is a great option. My parents kept my younger sib home because she was young. She had great grades and everything to go with it but they preferred she have another year or two under her belt. The degree is from where you graduate not from where you start and kids get into med schools everyday from a variety of colleges. We just attended a party for a neighbor boy who failed out of his first college, attended a regional directional, went to med school and just got his MD almost without skipping a beat. </p>
<p>Figure out your priorities…is it keeping her close to home, is it an affordable college, is it name brand recognition…if she thrives, does well and does well on oher MCATs she can go to med school.</p>
<p>Alot of us are digging out after protracted layoffs coupled with a market decline. It helps to just figure out what the order of importance is with regard to the colleges only then can you begin the research and figure out a list.</p>
<p>Congrats on getting a REALLY good paying job. If you anticipate being a full pay at those pricey north east schools…you have gotten yourself one terrific job with great pay.</p>
<p>Since your daughter is a year younger…why not have her do a meaningful gap year? During that time, she could do something worthwhile and YOU could save some money from your new, high paying job…AND maybe the return on your investments will improve.</p>
<p>If your daughter has the stats to get accepted to those tippy top schools where you would be a full pay, it is very likely she could garner some merit aid at some schools.</p>
<p>Look into the Trustee Scholarship at Boston University…or even the Presidential Scholarship there. Trustee is a full tuition award. Presidential, is about $10,000 a year. </p>
<p>Agree with others…look at your state public university. If you are in the Boston area…and Massachusetts is your home state, check out UMass Amherst. They do offer merit aid to high achieving students. Plus you would have the instate costs to begin with.</p>
<p>Check out the SUNY schools. Even for OOS, their costs are somewhat reasonable.</p>
<p>And ALL of these schools DO send kids to medical school.</p>
<p>^^^And SUNY Geneseo is a great school, friend’s son goes there. There are a LOT of merit money schools in the NE (not talking a free ride per se). My D, without the same top notch credentials, got merit money at most schools (except the SUNYs). Yes they were a step down (or three) in prestige, but so very grateful and rewarded her with merit money.</p>
<p>UMass Amherst is a feeder school to UMass Med School…a great value all around. The honors college is becoming very competitive.</p>
<p>UVM has a solid track record of helping/sending kids get into Med school (and they give merit to high achieving kids). </p>
<p>Both schools send more kids to med school than many of the privates. Good luck!</p>
<p>I second the recommendation that she apply for the Boston University Trustee Scholarship - full tuition. It is very competitive and you need a nomination from the HS principal. Deadline to apply is 12/1
[How</a> to Apply | Boston University Admissions](<a href=“http://www.bu.edu/admissions/apply/costs-aid-scholarships/scholarships/trustee/apply/]How”>http://www.bu.edu/admissions/apply/costs-aid-scholarships/scholarships/trustee/apply/)</p>
<p>It covers full tuition (so rises with the increase every year). I would recommend “showing the love” if she applies for this scholarship.</p>
<p>OP, there are A LOT of schools in the northeast that give merit aid. We live in Mass and my second is starting school in a couple weeks … this past year he went through the college search with a 3.3 GPA and 1950 and received merit aid at most schools to which he was accepted. Given your child’s stats I’d expect much better merit aid results. </p>
<p>For my guy his academic and campus interests led to a school list of about 12 schools (without considering merit or not) … as it turned out he recieved merit aid at all the schools for which he was at least an average applicant. For us UMass (in-state) was the cheapest option however with merit aid other schools were much closer to UMass than to full-pay $50k privates … in particular other state schools were the next cheapest options after UMass … for Second-To-Go UDelaware and UVM (where he starts in a couple weeks). As it turned out he accepted the second cheapest choice thanks to state school prices and merit … the best part … his choice was not driven by price; we let him pick among his acceptances and he picked UVM … and I agree UVM was the best option for him among his acceptances (not the highest rated but the best fit for him).</p>
<p>In our experience once a student drops below the top 25 or so research U or the top 25 or so LACs then merit very much comes into play … especially if the applicants stats are in the top 1/4 to 1/3 of the applicant pool</p>
<p>OP, what kind of budget DO you have for her education? IOW, how much help do you see yourself needing?</p>
<p>I second (third?) the recommendation to look at UMass Amherst. My son starts there in two weeks (!) as an engineering major. Paying for college really has two components, the cost, and your resources. At this stage of the game, you may not have much control over your resources (though congratulations on the new job), so you may have to focus on the cost.</p>
<p>Due to some ups and downs in my job history, I had not been able to save as much as I would have liked, so full-pay privates were out of the question. I was fortunate that my parents had put some money in a 529 plan for my son, so we had that going for us, plus what we had managed to save. Like 3togo, we focused mainly on state schools (UMass or OOS) plus some privates that were known for merit aid. It came down to UMass or UDel and he decided he wanted to be closer to home. This worked well for all of us because he will be able to graduate from UMass without loans (barring the unexpected). UDel would have necessitated taking out some small loans, and the private u he was accepted to would have required larger loans (although he did get some merit aid there too).</p>
<p>UMass is really a great opportunity, and with your daughter’s stats she should get into Commonwealth College, the honors college. With med school on the horizon, the consensus on CC seems to be “don’t go into big debt for undergrad if med school is the plan”. As a UMass student, she can take classes at Amherst, Smith, Mt. Holyoke and Hampshire Colleges as part of the Five College Consortium. I have a couple of friends with kids there majoring in the sciences and both love it.</p>
<p>"How do you afford College with no Aid ? "</p>
<p>-D. did not apply to UG’s that would not offer her Merit awards. We did a lot of research. She got Merits at every UG that she has applied. She went to the one that covered her full tuition+. However, it was not the main criteria, it just happened this way. Now, Medical School is a different story. Since we did not pay for UG, we told her not to consider price tag. She is at the very expansive one (one of the most expansive in the country) and we are paying to show appreciation for her being considerate when choosing her UG. However, we are old and can withdraw from 401K w/o penalty (if it still exist when we need to do so, with current events, nobody can tell what happens tomorrow), we are also both employed (very thankful for that) and have no plans to retire.</p>
<p>BTW, saving for college can backfire, I would not advise doing so. Saving in 401K might be benefitial depending on relationship of your age/kid age.</p>
<p>Encourage her to look past the NE. There is a lot of merit money available at a lot of wonderful schools.</p>
<p>Since she won’t be a NMF, that does cut out some/many better schools in the NE that give large merit.</p>
<p>What is your undergrad budget “per year”…that will tell us how much merit you’re looking for. </p>
<p>For instance, if you say that you want to only spend about $12k-15k per year, then you’d need a full tuition scholarship so that your $15k will pay for room, board, books, fees, etc. NE schools “tend” to have higher R&B costs than other regions (not 100%, but a higher R&B trend is there)</p>
<p>Unless your D is rather needy (and I don’t mean that in a critical way), I wouldn’t worry about her going further away. I know 2 girls at my son’s school (both are pre-med) who skipped grades and are younger than their classmates, but they’re doing fine. The honors college at Alabama is very “hands on” and the staff is like having extra parents on campus. </p>
<p>These girls goals (and my son’s goal) are to spend as little as possible on undergrad because of high med school costs. All will graduate debt-free from undergrad, and parents are able to help with med school since undergrad has cost so little.</p>
<p>It’s not a great idea to do a CC if med school is the goal. Med schools don’t like it when pre-med pre-reqs are done at a CC. Plus, it’s harder to get the merit when you transfer.</p>
<p>Although it’s another thread, I think a conversation about pre-reqs for med school would be an enlightening conversation. I haven’t looked in a few years, but last time I looked the two undergrad degrees with the highest med school acceptances were math and philosophy. Another possibility for this mom is Hobart…I think they had a scholarship that included an admittance to med school and they had pretty good merit but I’m not sure if they used it for geographic diversity or if it was “stats based and geography blind.” There may be other colleges like that…</p>
<p>“What do people do ? My daughter would qualify for Merit $, top in her class , strong SAT scores, extra curricular, interviews well… BUT there aren’t many schools in the Northeast offering Merit $”
I havent read all 3 pages but here’s my suggestion-
You spread a wider net and look outside your own geographic area, ESPECIALLY if Med school is a possibility.
Great U’s such as USC., where my son graduated after receiving a full tuition scholarship,[ he was also accepted at 2 Ivys, and many other tip- top colleges] are attracting many very smart students with merit $$. He’s now a Cal Tech for his PhD, with a fabulous fellowship. Another poster’s D was accepted at Yale, and because the $$ wasn’t there for both UG and grad school, she decided to go to Rhodes, a fabulous LAC, after receiving a free ride ++ scholarship. She is now in Medical school at… Yale.<br>
If you are a tip tip student, whose eventual goal is graduate school, there IS a way to accomplish both without breaking the bank.</p>
<p>Have your D complete her application to USC no later than Dec 1, and she will be considered for either their 400 1/2 or 150 Full tuition scholarships[ interviews are required]. Students who apply early AND are offered the opportunity to interview for a scholarship [ which means they are accepted] usually find that out in late Jan or early Feb.</p>
<p>and have her take the SAT again, in hopes of boosting her scores, especially math to the 750+ range. If she is taking more math her SR year, that should not be to difficult to achieve and will improve her chances of landing merit $$.</p>
<p>
That’s interesting … does that only work after 62? Or can anyone withdraw for their kid’s educational expenses without penalty?</p>
<p>^59.5…</p>
<p>“Since she won’t be a NMF, that does cut out some/many better schools in the NE that give large merit.”</p>
<p>-My D. was not NMF either and she got very large Merit awards at all schools that she applied (publics and one private - gave her largest of $27k/year out of $33k). NMF is not important at all schools, only at some. Research is a key. I mean research way beyond CC</p>