<p>I'm a second year Grinnell College student with a 3.7 college GPA, 1580 SAT, top 10% high school rank and lousy extracurriculars. My EFC is close to zero. I'm looking for the best school with the lowest cost for transfers. Warm weather is a huge plus. I do not care about academic/teacher quality as I mostly teach myself (even here).</p>
<p>Some schools I'm looking at:
University of Texas at Austin
Emory or Vanderbilt
University of Hawaii at Manoa</p>
<p>Any other suggestions?</p>
<p>Join the Big 10/11, and become a Hawkeye! I love watching Iowa Hawkeye football, they're great!</p>
<p>How come you want to transfer? Just curious.</p>
<p>I don't want to pay for Grinnell College. The college is not covering my abnormally high transportation costs (it costs $1400 per year for the cheapest plane tickets to home), nor insurance, nor books, and has doubled my self-help from last year. My EFC is near zero. Also, they offered me work-study this year, but I found out when I got here that it wasn't federally-funded work-study; I was just supposed to scrape together $X on my own and hand it over to the cashier at the end of the semester, a rather backhanded way of offering me financial aid, eh?</p>
<p>An overall lousy financial aid experience, combined with lousy course selection, isolation and crappy Iowa weather is driving me out. It sucks because I made some very good friends here.</p>
<p>I forgot to mention that my financial aid package got worse, and that it's probably going to get worse next year and the year after that. I've asked upperclassmen how their packages have adjusted over the years with the massive tuition raises going on and many of them have told me that their packages have stood frozen, which is a real crappy thing for Grinnell College to do.</p>
<p>UT will be difficult, even with the stats you have. Almost 90% of accepted transfers are Texas residents. Plus, you'll be paying out-of-state tuition until you become a resident.</p>
<p>I do know that Tulane gives a good scholarship & fin. aid package for transfers above 3.25 GPA, but it may still be very pricey. Emory as well has a good transfer rate, but being private means they may not offer you very much aid.</p>
<p>Your best bet is probably an in-state public school where you can get a good scholarshipand cheaper tuition. They may not be as "great", but it'll def. be much more cost effective.</p>
<p>Military is also another option.</p>
<p>
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I do not care about academic/teacher quality as I mostly teach myself (even here).
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<p>I would go to a reputable state school, like Iowa or ISUST. Are you residing in Iowa now?</p>
<p>why do ppl go to grinell college in the first place, i mean what is the attraction after Iowa lol?</p>
<p>No, I'm a resident of Hawaii. I'd rather not go to UH mainly because my scholarships far outstrip its in-state tuition.</p>
<p>omgggggg, u came all the way from Hawaii to go to a small school in Iowa, what were u thinking? (no offense to grinell, but to my opinion, it isn't worth 40,000+ in tuition dollars when the general population has never even heard of it)</p>
<p>To tell you the truth, I have never heard of Grinnell until you said something in this thread. Is it supposed to be "well-known"?</p>
<p>Plus, do you have a scholarship that is separate from Grinnell, that you can apply towards wherever you go?</p>
<p>Yes, I have a ridiculous amount of outside scholarship money, which is why I feel sick that I'm paying what I am for Grinnell.</p>
<p>Since I'm so poor, a Pell Grant ($4,050) will follow me around, too.</p>
<p>Then try to find a place that is more well known, but costs less than Grinnell, and you'll do yourself a favor. Places that have good weather, cheaper than Grinnell, and are well known:</p>
<p>U of Arizona
ASU
San Diego State
UCSD
UNLV
Texas Tech
Texas A&M</p>
<p>I'm not sure if you're polynesian, but if you are, I know that there is a large sub-culture of polynesian lifestyle at the Arizona Schools, as well as the following schools:</p>
<p>University of Utah
University of Oregon
University of Washington</p>
<p>You know I was at a LAC similarly-ranked to Grinnell, and I said "oh bah, I do most of my teaching myself" but when I sat in on classes at a university, I realized I didn't have a clue. So try visiting some universities and sitting in on classes, before you're sure that's what you want. With great test scores and grades like that, you could maybe get into a higher-ranked college that would give you better money. I wouldn't think it could hurt to try. Best of luck in whatever you try to do, though.</p>
<p>I'm suprised most of you have never heard of Grinnell, its well know with the grad schools. Griff, none of those schools even come close to the academics that Grinnell would offer. I'm not in college an I'm still a senior and plan on going to Grinnell. I've only heard great things about the college especially with the financial aid. Average loan debt around $14,000. Seems like a nice deal??? If i'm completely wrong let me know</p>
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none of those schools even come close to the academics that Grinnell would offer.
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<p>comparing apples to oranges here... I don't think Grinnell has the same carnegie classification (most, if not all of the schools I listed are research universities), so there's no way to compare the schools with a tiny little LAC (Grinnell is an LAC right?). Therefore, your opinion has no validation. Correct me if I'm wrong.</p>
<p>Actually, average debt, according to the college, is $16,744, NOT counting loans parents take out. I really don't know how the college came up with that figure as some people seem to be taking out $50,000+ in debt (a new feature was recently added to GrinnellPlans, the school's blog system, where users could post secrets: some people have posted their financial aid packages and they seem to be going into tons of debt).</p>
<p>Grinnell has been steeply raising its total cost (almost 6% last year) and passing on the raises to students. Your financial aid will not go up with the tuition, which is slated for another raise next year, so expect to pay at least $6,000 more over the course of your Grinnell education.</p>
<p>Griff, classes taken at LACs are comparable to classes taken at virtually every other school. For example, calculus at Grinnell is comparable to calculus at any other school, and is almost certainly harder than the offerings at the mediocre state schools.</p>
<p>exeuntsl, how can you say this?:
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For example, calculus at Grinnell is comparable to calculus at any other school, and is almost certainly harder than the offerings at the mediocre state schools.
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</p>
<p>I can agree that calculus is similar at both schools, because calculus is calculus, but how would you know if one school's calc is harder than another's? Seems like a very tough thing to evaluate given the different circumstances at each school (i.e. professors differ, class size, etc.). Just because USNWR gives one school a higher rank than another doesn't automatically qualify its classes as harder. </p>
<p>My point was that a large research university has different goals and objectives than a tiny LAC, thus the academic comparison between the two schools is not very fair. Research universities have far more majors, far more students, and far more professors.... so how does one possibly compare the two?</p>