I love it. Great idea. I seriously think the Op should do that. Maybe it will shock the parents into reality.
Almost $200k income is not “upper-middle class”.
You won’t get any aid from UW-Madison. Tuition is about $11k and dorm, food, books about another $11k-$12k.
Do you live in the Madison area where commuting is a possibility?
You may want to see if the automatic full rides for your stats at Howard, Tuskegee, Prairie View A&M, NC Central are still available.
Let’s not throw the parents under the bus when we have one side of the story and much of that is UC’s out of state. I won’t pay that for my kid either.
@5amwe5t, have you been to California?
If not, you should visit. A lot of young people dream about moving to New York or California, and when they get there, they realize it’s nothing like they thought it would be.
Just something to consider.
@5amwe5t, something else to consider. You might be able to do a semester or two in California as a visiting student, while attending a college in the Midwest.
I took a few courses at an out of state school while I was a student in NY. I got the classes approved in advance, and they transferred back to my school in NY. It wasn’t an official exchange program. I just showed up and took the courses as a non-matriculated student. Just make sure that it’s realistic to get into the classes before you commit to something like that.
Others on here will know better than I do if classes at UCLA and the other UCs typically have room for non-matriculated students. It might not be doable in certain majors like Computer Science.
“You are fully aware that your parents will pay for you to go to college instate, but you want them to pay for UCLA. That is a very expensive school given that you are OOS.”
What are you doing, OP. Go to school in-state. Out of state schools are a luxury and privilege, not a right. There is 0 way to put yourself through UCLA without parental support nor financial aid. And Wisconsin has one of the best public university systems out there (rivaling California). Stay. Move later if you’re still so jumpy to.
I’m not sure what the intended major is, but your stats won’t make the cut at UCB or UCLA if you’re looking to go for computer science. Harsh but true. I suspect the same is true at UW-Madison, as it’s a highly competitive school.
I am looking at a business major. Also, my parents told me they can’t help me pay for college in any state for whatever reason including Wisconsin. I am hoping this is their way to put the pressure on me to find a more affordable option than California, but so far they told me they can’t afford to help me pay for college at any school. Also, I live 2 hours away from Madison, so commuting isn’t really an option either unfortunately.
Thanks to some of the helpful suggestions on this thread, I am looking at merit-based scholarships.
Please sit down with your parents, and have a nice discussion with them about what they would like to see you doing when you graduate from HS. If they hope to see you attend college, please share with them the costs to attend your instate publics…and not just Madison, but a couple of the less costly ones as well. Maybe they don’t realize how much college costs.
Or maybe there are other expenses your family has that you don’t know about.
See what they say. If they say they can’t support you at all,after HS, and you need to move out and get a job…that will mean a different path than if you all,share the same idea of going to college.
Your GPA is too low for UCs you applied to. I hope you have a good and affordable match schools on your list.
If your parents really won’t pay anything for your college education, then you don’t have a lot of options. One option would be community college - is there one near your house to which you could commute? You should be able to pay the tuition of a WI CC by working, and you could also take the maximum federal loans and save any excess to use after you transfer. Presumably your parents would be willing to allow you to live with them and also feed you, insure you, etc. Are there any UW system schools within commuting distance? Another option would be to find a full ride somewhere. Full tuition won’t do it because your other costs would be more than you alone could borrow. I doubt there are many full rides for your stats, but you can check the pinned thread on full rides. Finally, you could work full time to save up money for school. Unfortunately, the days when a student could pay for his or her state flagship with federal loans and a minimum wage job are long past in many states.
I hope your parents will be willing to help you with college expenses, because it is incredibly difficult for a student who cannot qualify for any aid and has no parental support to pay for college.
In other threads you said your parents want you to go to Madison. However, if your parents won’t pay you have the federal student loan (~$5500/year), summer work earnings (~$3k/year), plus whatever you can get in merit aid. For most students that means commuting to their local public or a community college, but if your stats are high you might be able to get some merit. There’s a thread pinned to the top of the financial aid forum with a list of schools that offer grants. Start there.
I think it’s dangerous for this student to assume that his flagship will work out. He doesn’t have the funds to pay for it and he can’t commute.
I think the parents are “in over their heads” with consumer purchases and maybe home mortgage/HELOC stuff. The idea of paying $25k-55k per year scares the life out of them because they may be living almost paycheck to paycheck now. Or they may finally be in a situation where they can begin contributing to a retirement account…or play catch up with a small one.
That said, I’ve seen a number of high income parents with similar claims end up “helping a LITTLE” once the time comes. They may not be able to write tuition checks and they may not be able to commit to monthly payments to a school, but they can help buy books here and there, buy a plane ticket home for Christmas (if they want you home, they’ll have to pay…lol), and help buy stuff for your dorm. Obviously, can’t say that any of this will happen for you.
You can’t count on them coming thru with $5k or $10k per year to help you with UW’s costs. You can only borrow $5,500 per year. You might be able to work/save another $5k per year.
Do NOT plan on going to UW unless you are CERTAIN that you have ALL costs covered. You will be in a huge pickle if you start at UW and then find that you can’t continue because of costs. You will have ruined your chances to transfer with big merit at that point. Big merit is for incoming Frosh only…not for transfers.
“if they want you home, they’ll have to pay…lol”
Wish this was true but it ends up being the student a lot of the time (hi). A surprisingly high number of students have to pay the prorated dorm fee for the entire winter semester because they can’t afford to go home (at my school).
Most students can’t pay for a residential college on their own. You won’t get need based aid at most schools and the ones that do give aid for your parents’ income don’t give merit aid because everyone has stellar stats. I don’t know if any give full rides for your stats. You’d have to look in the automatic merit aid thread to see.
The majority of students who are paying for college on their own either start at a cc or commute to a local 4-year school. If you don’t have any 4-year schools within commuting distance then you may have to look into community colleges. Are there any near you? Ask your parents if they’ll let you live at home and commute there. You may have to work full-time the first 2 years you’re in college so you have money to put toward your last 2 years.
You may want to check [url=<a href=“http://www.wtcsystem.edu/colleges%5Dhere%5B/url”>http://www.wtcsystem.edu/colleges]here[/url] to see which community colleges are closest to you.
“I don’t know if any give full rides for your stats”
There are some schools because luckily OP is above a 3.5 and has a 32 (which is like a 1400 equivalent). But, probably not going to be the schools OP wanted. Beggars can’t be choosers etc.
This is all just pure speculation, and serves no purpose. It might be fun to make up reasons why parents won’t or can’t pay for college (if that’s even true; all you’ve heard is one version of events from a high school student), but until you hear an explanation from the parents, you’re just guessing.
I totally agree with @BelknapPoint as we don’t know what the parents situation is
Op also stated s/he believes it might be that parents sneaky way of making sure op chooses a more affordable school. I am not mad at parents if they feel that the can’t or won’t pay the whole $55k with no aid (EFC is almost $50k which is nothing to sneeze at) because their child has a California dream.
It could have been in the heat of the moment when parents said they have no $$ to pay. Regardless of how much the parents make they get to chose how much they want to pay/borrow for for college. As a parent I would be mad if my kid
Op is a kid who really has no concept of money just by the statement that s/he will be paying fot it by them self. I think the conversation might have gone along the line that the UC is $55k and if your EFC is 50k it is only a few more $$.
The parents are saying they don’t have it and can’t pay; we don’t know if that means they can’t pay anything (op already said parents will pay in state) or the $50k.