<p>Well you could try applying to Stanford or Princeton and see if you get accepted. *Some *parents get so starry eyed by prestige that they’ll cough up more money for schools they’ve heard of. You do run the risk of a big disappointment if they don’t though. I definitely think your primary strategy should be to look for merit scholarships. Good luck!</p>
<p>If your parents don’t own a business or have complex financial dealings, the NPC on those schools that do guarantee to meet full need, such as HPYMS and the other ivies, most selective LACs, etc are pretty accurate. They’ll show what you need to pay to go there. Show the numbers to your parents. THose are the schools without merit money or give out so few scholarships that no one can count on them (Duke, BC, UCh, etc) so if your parents say there is no way they can pay what is down there as what they are expected to pay, the money is simply not there. You can apply and see, but it’s a dry well. Better to put your bucket into one where there is something.</p>
<p>If you are a student with stats that put you in at least the midrange of those top schools, then there will be schools where scholarship money is likely. Start looking for them. If a school give zero merit money or very little, and their costs are high, you know the likelihood of getting anything there is just about zilch. </p>
<p>The important thing is to have some sure things on your list like local schools where commuting basically means your parents are providing addtional support as you aren’t paying room and board, and likely a lot of sundries as well. You can stretch what they are providing with your own work proceeds, the Stafford loans and hopefully some awards from such colleges. Once you have that base covered, you can buy whatever lottery tickets you want. Most of the more than 3000 colleges in the US, the vast majority of them have scholarships, and even half of the top 25 national universities have them. So start looking where the fish are lying there to be caught and not in the barren waters where you know that it’s not gonna happen. Then see what come up in the spring. Regardless, you will have your sure picks.</p>
<p>shacherry I was going to ask the same thing, I think SteveMA has the potential for some good income there :)</p>
<p>
Absolutely not true. My nephew received a full ride to Michigan State University on merit only. Parents make way too much for need based. His brother received the same at Wayne State University.</p>
<p>Look around.</p>
<p>OP,
then apply to colleges that would give you a good Merit award. There are many that do. My D. was on full tuition Merit award at one UG, whioe all of the UGs that she has applied gave her some Merit awards. The largest came from the expansive private college. Research, you will be amazed what is available.</p>
<p>Just want to comment on people questioning where the money IS going. We are not privy to the particulars of OP’s family. I cringe at the thought of OP ending up angry at/disappointed with his family for their monetary situation. </p>
<p>We used to live in a high cost of living area with a household income around 130k. We do not eat out, buy expensive cars, go on vacations, throw big parties, go to the movies, live in a lavish home, etc etc. We could not save much for retirement or college costs. At that time, paying for college would have been a struggle and it would not have been because we weren’t willing to forgo a new car (much less even buy a used Mercedes! Really?) It would have been because our base costs were high.</p>
<p>We now earn less but live in a lower cost of living area and are in a better financial situation to cover our EFC. </p>
<p>I do not find OP’s situation surprising. I do admit, though, that if we hadn’t already experience a similar living situation, I would find it hard to believe. </p>
<p>Good luck with your options! Also, please do not feel that your work in high school was a waste! It does not have to be a means to an end. I hope you grew and learned in the experience.</p>
<p>I could be living a couple of towns over in a more modest house and being paying 4 times what I pay in taxes and mortgage. Even here, I know from one message board conversation that we pay 10 times what people in similar houses pay in other parts of the country. We think we’re lucky how low are taxes are, but compared to other places they are sky high and eat up a large portion of our income.</p>
<p>You can’t compare what other families are paying for with similar or lower incomes. You don’t know their private situations. the parents may have lots of savings from a successful investment or from an inheritance. Their home mortgages may be a lot lower than yours.</p>
<p>With your stats, you’ll have options, but you must use a careful strategy since you have an unaffordable EFC.</p>
<p>1) Apply to the schools that give super aid…HYPS
2) Apply to the schools that give REALLY huge merit scholarships…at LEAST full tuition. You won’t be able to afford schools that give partial tuition scholarships…you’ll needs HUGE merit.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Try these to determine if Stanford and Princeton are financially realistic. You will need your parents to provide information to put into them:</p>
<p>[Net</a> Price Calculator : Stanford University](<a href=“http://www.stanford.edu/dept/finaid/undergrad/how/calculator/index.html]Net”>http://www.stanford.edu/dept/finaid/undergrad/how/calculator/index.html)
[Princeton</a> Financial Aid Estimator - Princeton University | Princeton Financial Aid Estimator](<a href=“http://www.princeton.edu/admission/financialaid/estimator/]Princeton”>http://www.princeton.edu/admission/financialaid/estimator/)</p>
<p>We have the same income as the OP. Son was given $40K in financial aid (no loans, no work study) from a top 25 LAC which doesn’t award any merit aid or even have extra scholarships which one can apply for. School also has a much smaller endowment then it’s peer schools. Our contribution is $16K a year but the school also gives a student contribution figure - his is something like $3000. We have chosen to pay his share but the money he earns from his summer jobs and over the holidays pays for his books, gas entertainment, etc. </p>
<p>None of the schools which offered merit aid came close. The highest was $30K/yr but his stats weren’t nearly as high as the OP’s. </p>
<p>We also drive used cars, don’t take vacations, and only eat out occasionally. Almost all our extra income has gone into retirement savings and sending our son to private high school. </p>
<p>I wouldn’t dismiss the highly selective only gives need based aid schools as being unaffordable if I were the OP. </p>
<p>Also, like the OP’s father, my DH didn’t start earning his present salary until a few years ago. It was a slow go to get where he is today (works in state gov’t.)</p>
<p>“Is this just high schooler ignorance on my part? It just doesn’t seem plausible to me that they could only save 20k with their income over the past 20-25 years or so.”</p>
<p>It just doesn’t matter whether they could have or couldn’t have – they didn’t. Try to abandon this line of thinking altogether, because it will just create friction in your family without getting you any more financial support. They are offering you $5k per year, so you have to make your plans based on that.</p>
<p>UW is indeed an excellent school where you can get a great education in almost any field. I agree with all the terrific advice in post #7. You can potentially have a lot of good options.</p>
<p>
I don’t disagree, but I do wish parents would be a little more open with their kids about where the money goes. At some point in high school we had a pretty casual dinner conversation about why we weren’t rich despite earning a pretty good income. They had no idea what was left over once we paid the mortgage, real estate taxes and federal and state income taxes.</p>
<p>OP,
If you set your sights a tiny bit lower, USC offers hundreds of Full Tuition Scholarships to tip-top students. They also offer lots of FA. You WILL have to apply no later than Dec 1 , in order to be considered for the scholarship and realistically, the chances of winning a full tuition scholarship there are about the same as getting into HYPS, but its worth giving it "the old school try’. It helps to let USC know the reasons[ other then financial, of course] that you would be excited to go to USC . So do some research into the programs USC offers, and “Show the Love”.
There are lots of other Universities that offer Full rides to students with your stats, so spread a wide net.</p>
<p>I would be bothered by them telling you not to apply for scholarships and such. That was not a good thing. Why did they tell you not to apply for any scholarships? Is it a pride issue or something? Most parents would want their children to apply for scholarships, even if they could afford to pay 100% outright. Do they have a habit of overspending and just assuming they can afford everything? I am just asking, not trying to offend. But the few people I know who told their kids not to apply for any sort of scholarships are the same ones who I have known to like to wave their money around and spend it, and now are far in to debt and struggling to keep up the image. So I wonder if it was an image thing.</p>
<p>Honestly, while they really don’t have to spend a lot of money if they don’t want to, we make less than that, have 6 children, have a child with a disability that costs us a lot of money, and we still plan to pay more than $5K a year per child. And we will have 2 children in college at the same time. So yeah, things cost. But they really cost when you are trying to keep up with the Jones’s or at least be the “big man.”</p>
<p>It won’t hurt your career in the long run to start at a community college or whatever else. I know it completely sucks. But, this perhaps will be a lesson so that when you get out on your own, you can be more of a saver and less of a spender.</p>
<p>In addition, it is not just about the savings. With their income and just one child going, why can they not afford even as much as they would have paid if the child were just in preschool? Daycare costs more than that. You are talking about less than $500 a month. They should be able to pay that much with no savings at all. Plus, do you have a job? Have you been saving up?</p>
<p>Attempts to shame strangers into paying more money for college than they think they can or should are unlikely to be successful. Plus, none of us really know this family’s situation. The OP may not really fully understand it either. Most high school kids do not understand their parents’ finances. The OP has gotten some good advice about pursuing merit aid and financial aid.</p>
<p>“I don’t disagree, but I do wish parents would be a little more open with their kids about where the money goes.”</p>
<p>That’s fair. I would draw a distinction between educating the child about the cost of living, how adults make budget decisions, etc., vs. having to justify one’s priorities to the child. The first is great; the second is more than a teenager is entitled to. At the end of the day, one of the biggest financial lessons a kid has to learn is that the people who earn the money get to decide how to spend it, even if others find their choices shortsighted or foolish.</p>
<p>I agree, we don’t know the OPs family and their financial circumstances. If they say that can only contribute $5000 a year, then that is that. They could have some day to day overhead that far exceeds what we can imagine.</p>
<p>Plus as noted above someplace, it is the parents’ choice to fund college at any level. The student will need to look at options that can meet the family financial guidelines.</p>
<p>This student has a decent GPA and very high SAT score. There are plenty of merit awards out there for this student.</p>
<p>I believe the most generous USC scholarships go to NMS finalists.</p>
<p>My H is also a machinist @ Boeing where he has worked for almost thirty years & he doesn’t make what OPs dad supposedly earns. So I wonder if the recent income is aberrant, certainly it would require significant overtime, which can disappear just as quickly as it appeared.
Additionally since he doesn’t have seniority he will be first in line for layoffs, so signing up for much debt isn’t wise.</p>