Hey everyone
I am a high school sophomore and all my teachers are telling me to think about colleges to go to…and I’ve got no ideas.
What I want: big state school with either a good football team or basketball team, a good college town, a school that is not totally based around partying, and good academics
I have a 4.38, and haven’t taken the sat yet. I have been researching school for awhile, but nothing sticks out.
What state are you from, and what major(s) are you interested in?
Clemson, UGA, UMD, Ohio State are just some suggestions
I live in florida, but I kind of want to go out of state…
One thing to think of is to look at the honors program/college for those type of schools. It is the best of both worlds. My S went to Ohio State and loved it. Honors gave him special opportunities like early registration. He always got his classes, could have graduated early and they took all his ap credits.
Factor in money, if it is not an issue great. If it is an issue then work on your Act/Sat and keep up your grades. Really research merit opportunities. Schools like Ohio State, Mizzoui and Alabama are very generous with merit for OOS. Others like Penn State, Georgia Tech are not. Most importantly apply early, it matters for merit and you have better chances at acceptances.
University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill meets all of your stated requirements. You would have to do quite well on your SAT, show solid extracurriculars and keep your GPA high. Apply early.
Of course you’d want to apply at several schools, because UNC-CH is very selective and gets a lot of OOS apps. Georgia and Clemson aren’t as highly rated, but are both good schools that meet your criteria, and are OOS but not too far from home.
What about Butler, Creighton, Villanova,Saint Louis University, Gonzaga, Lafayette, UDayton? Being private, these universities would give you financial aid if you qualify (have you looked at your EFC?)
Add Tulane, Emory, Vanderbilt, USC (CA), Case (CWRU) - those would be for your “reach” category.
All of these are private universities so your OOS status would not impact your ability to receive FA and may in fact increase it since you’d bring geographical diversity.
Most public universities do not have financial aid, however they do have merit aid sometimes.
Of course you have U Cincinnati (great merit), UAlabama (great merit aid), Penn State (basically no merit aid), U Maryland (some merit aid), Ohio State (merit aid), Pitt (great merit aid), Temple (great merit aid), UMichigan (no merit aid), UWisconsin (no merit aid), Cal Poly SLO (no merit aid), NCSU (merit aid), UNC-Wilmington (merit), USC Honors (Carolina - good merit).
Run Net Price Calculators for 2 in the first category, 1 in the second category, 1 in the third category where I indicated “merit” and one where I didn’t. Bring the results to your parents. Have them sit down first, and listen to what they have to say wrt budget. Recraft your list with that budget in mind.
If your EFC is low (ie., your parents can’t afford very much at all, up to 8k max) then you should aim for 100% need colleges; those are very selective. If your parents can supposedly afford a lot acording to EFC but don’t have the budget in reality, you’ll be looking for merit aid.
Thanks everyone for being so helpful! 
I have looked at some of the schools and they’re awesome! I always liked clemson but they give very little financial aid. I have received a lot of mail from private schools like vanderbilt, so I will look into them too!