<p>(Forgive me for stating the obvious but I have been reminded recently how much finances dictated our actions and my D's school list in the UG process.)</p>
<p>If FA was NOT the biggest consideration......would your child's school list have changed significantly? I'm just interested. Not trying to set anybody up for an :eek:-whupping, most especially not myself. ;)</p>
<p>I've been thinking (after a query) about the differences between my D's 2 app processes (UG and Med School), and primarily the school selection process. Money was the 800 lb gorilla the first time , but not so much the second (while still a significant consideration). Nothing has changed in our FA picture, while the source of funding changes dramatically in med school (mega-loans for most kids in their names solely, not much merit aid available, grant aid at all but a few really sparse). While she had only 2 top research U's plus 1 top LAC on her long UG list, her still long (but only 20% over the AAMC average) med school list is littered with what are largely considered top schools. </p>
<p>Just speculating, but it is entirely possible (actually probable) that she would have done 2 "admissions" visits prior to app season, her top LAC and her top uni (we still would have done the preparatory visits to learn what she liked and didn't like) and applied ED (or SCEA) to one of those schools. She'd have been "one and done" (assuming her RD acceptances to those schools means she'd have been accepted early decision had she been able to apply early). </p>
<p>(FWIW, IMO she was a better candidate for admission to the most selective UG's than she is to the most selective med schools. )</p>
<p>If we didn’t have to consider merit aid options, my D’s list would be significantly shorter. In fact, she would go ED to her favorite LAC and hopefully be one and done. If she didn’t get into that school, she would have a list of 7 other schools, including one safety.</p>
<p>Instead, she has 15 possible schools on her list and we are trying to cull that down to a more reasonable number, without sacrificing potential scholarship/merit aid money.</p>
<p>After a year of agonizing and obsessing about this, I still am not clear about what our path should be. We fall into that no-man’s land of little to no needs based aid, but circumstances (husband with a brain tumor) that have significantly eaten into our savings. The practical side of me (the one that saved for a rainy day, but then had to spend the rainy day savings) says of course we should go the merit aid route. </p>
<p>But, this is my beloved D, who is a tippy top student, with the stats to get into a great school. Will we shortchange her in any way if she goes to a school that isn’t as challenging? Does even asking that question make me sound arrogant? I know that she can get a good education anywhere, but can she get the education that SHE needs and wants at a lesser school? She wants to go into research and/or academia eventually and for those fields where you get your undergrad degree can make a difference.</p>
<p>So, we go round and round here, looking for the “perfect fit”. The ideal school that offers top notch academics and scholarship money. Easier said than done, as everyone on these threads knows all too well.</p>
<p>Yes, my D would have applied to fewer than 11 UG schools if money were not a concern. Even though I’ve saved, we too are in that financial range where it’s uncertain we’ll get any need based FA at all. And like curm, professional school is looming in the future, making it imprudent to blow the whole wad on UG. As a result, her school list was split between schools with merit aid that would bring the cost down at least to in-state level and schools with very generous need only FA.</p>
<p>Even moi with 2 boys that applied to about 6 colleges would be affected. If finaid weren’t the gorilla, S2 would apply ED to his favorite and hopefully be done and with one application. Instead he is “stuck” with RD and applying to 2 rolling admissions and 2 EA schools, and one other RD that is his reach plus his favorite so unfortunately he has to wait until spring to find out. Its really quite a bummer situation for him I fear and I could see him bailing on his favorite for his #2 choice in the cold winter. My kids can quickly develop an "if they don’t love me I don’t love them"attitude. S2 is already POed at his reach school because they haven’t returned a phone call or e-mail re: interview.</p>
<p>I realized I should add a postscript. Yes, my husband had brain cancer but thankfully he is fully recovered. It was a long arduous recovery, including 3 years of lost wages, and we are only now realizing the full impact that episode has had on our D’s college choices. If that had not happened we would be much more comfortable biting the bullet to send her to her dream school.</p>
<p>On the other hand, she still has her Dad!!!</p>
<p>The other thing that makes it difficult if you need FA is how different the packages can be even for need-based-aid only schools. There are plenty of tales of the loan/grant mix being vastly different, and even the amounts. I was amazed at how much “need” my niece was assessed to have at the school that needed a player in her position in her sport.</p>
<p>Being able to pay full fare greatly simplified our lives.</p>
<p>I don’t know that the application process would have changed that much for us. We were definitely in the eligible for need-based financial aid category, and several schools offered merit money. D applied to one school that did not guarantee to meet full need for OOS with the understanding that she would have to obtain additional significant outside and/or competitive University scholarships to attend. When that didn’t happen, she opted for the best school with the best package. She applied to 9 schools total, I believe. </p>
<p>I admit to some future anxiety over educational financing, particularly for med school. We will be in a better position to help D then so hopefully she won’t need quite as many jumbo loans.</p>
<p>Most parents assume the kid is on his/her own for grad/professional school. List and paying off any debt will be up to kid–not that I won’t give advice.
We let kid#1 choose his preferred school with no FA. The rest of the kids are limited to where they can get scholarships. (The gorilla is still in the room–I thought he was only about 400lbs a few years ago, but I think he’s up to 1200 now. . .) </p>
<p>That said, curmie, unless your D wants to go into academics/research or is looking at something only available at a particular med school, I don’t think paying more for private/out-of-state med school is worthwhile. Look seriously at your in-state public med schools, where your D, an excellent candidate, will likely gain admission. Then, after 4 years, she can happily move on to the residency of her choice without too much debt. Your D may think she can handle big debt with a big income, but you never know what the future holds. (Maybe marriage–to another med student with big undergrad and med school debt? Family? Time off?) Less debt is better. </p>
<p>(BTW, do you know what med school your doctor went to–or what his or her class rank was? )</p>
<p>Most definitely. We knew we didn’t qualify for need-based aid, and we either needed merit aid and a school that was somewhat cheaper to begin with. Oldest D would probably be OOS at Michigan right now and both girls would have applied to reaches.</p>
<p>Well, my DD is applying to med school, when choosing the list one factor was an upper limit on the tuition costs. Once she gets in the net cost will be a major factor in her choice. </p>
<p>Net cost was also key in all UG options, we learned that we are a FAFSA family not a Profile family due to home equity. Not that we could afford to buy our house now if we were just starting out, but we have been in the market for 25+ years and have kept the appreciation earned along the way in the house. Of course when Mudgette and my DD were applying, few schools had the middle class guidelines and the limit of home equity to a % of income, so the numbers could be very different now. ;)</p>
<p>With Son, the only thing that would have changed is that he would have applied to one reach, instead of all matches that would have given merit aid.</p>
<p>With D who wants to go out of state-far out of state - it would absolutely different. Everything would change.</p>
Not necessarily. Most colleges are challenging to most kids. Sure some have the easy courses and easy majors but O-Chem is still O-Chem.
I don’t think it makes you sound arrogant - just wanting the best for your daughter.
This depends on her major and the program at the school. It is entirely possible she can get all she needs at a “lesser” school and be a big fish in a small pond.
Don’t overrate the undergrad degree. I think mentoring is more important.</p>
<p>Absolutely. A good reminder of what really matters in the end. </p>
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<p>No, but he would be applying to few more schools. A change but not a significant one. </p>
<p>For example, if money had never been an issue, I know he would have looked at more LACs that only do need-based aid. However, he also would have wound up looking at most of the schools on his final application list based on interest, geography, etc. </p>
<p>It’s an interesting question. I’ll ask my son what he thinks.</p>
<p>I’m gonna be the odd woman out here and am not suggesting what we did for ANYONE else. It is not more right or wrong. But it is what we chose to do. </p>
<p>No, if money was not a part of college admissions, our kids’ college lists would not have differed one bit, nor the number to which they applied. </p>
<p>Both my kids were FA applicants and qualified for need based aid. Most of D1’s schools don’t offer merit aid (two of her easier schools on her list did but we didn’t even know it until she won it). She got FA at all schools but it was NOT a factor in choosing where to attend. D2’s schools also all offered need based aid and we didn’t even know they also had merit based aid. She got very good need/merit aid and scholarships to each school, though it varied from school to school. We did not use that as a factor in her picking which one to attend. </p>
<p>D1 is now in grad school. Our choice is to pay for ALL of our kids’ education (and but not support them after the finish their schooling). So, we are paying for a 3.5 year graduate school. She applied to 10. Hers are professional schools like going to Med School where you pay to attend, unlike PHD programs that pay you, LOL. Got into six of the top grad schools in her field. Five of the six offered some scholarship. One offered NONE (and did not have need based aid). We allowed her to attend that one (we may sound crazy to all you folks I am sure). D is now one year into the program …nice shocker over the summer, she applied for Fellowship and won it and so after all, this school’s scholarship is as good at the ones she turned down but we didn’t know it and were prepared to fund it sans any scholarship. The scholarship doesn’t cover everything but it sure is gonna help. We are willing to borrow money to finance our kids’ schooling as we are not in the income bracket to pay it all out of pocket. </p>
<p>This approach is not for all. We did not use COA or the FA package to dictate the college list or where they enrolled. However, both got very nice aid and scholarship packages in the end.</p>
<p>Yes and no. The problem with a big time college is that she will be competing with her classmates for precious few slots. I once looked up Harvard Medical School and they had accepted students from over 100 different colleges for that years class. </p>
<p>My neice knew grad school was in her future, so she accepted a full ride (tuition, room, board, computer, etc.) at one of her state universities. It’s not the flagship, although she was recruited into the honors program. From the start we have been blown away with how much individual mentoring she has recieved and the quality of her education. </p>
<p>Now that she is applying to grad school, her professors are making contact with professors in well known grad programs on her behalf. All along they took her goal seriously and helped her position herself well. It remains to be seen what will happen, but so far, so good. </p>
<p>With our son, we have a fixed budget and then he has to make up the rest with merit money (we won’t co-sign loans) because he wants to go to grad school and research shows that to be the better investment.</p>
<p>If FA were not a big issue, there would be no conflict in our house My D’s fondest wish is to apply ED to her favorite LAC, with coach support that makes the odds of getting in very high. My H wants to spend whatever it takes to send her there, even though she’ll get very little need-based aid. My fondest wish is for her to apply to schools that offer great merit aid (she’s been offered nominations for some top scholarships at very good schools), and to apply to one or two major reaches such as Yale or Princeton. (Turns out that they are the best fit for us financial aid wise, because we’re middle class earners with upper middle class assets. The difference in cost between YP and the LAC of choice would be about $30k per year.) </p>
<p>So I feel like I’m suggesting two long-shot but potentially very attractive paths that would be precluded by applying to the ED school. The gut-wrenching part is that if neither of those paths pans out, and the RD app to the favorite LAC is unsuccessful, I’m going to be the bad-mom-of-the-century. My D worries that the coach support will not be as helpful during RD, and she’s probably right, but I think she will get in RD nonetheless. Still, it’s a gamble.</p>
<p>That’s a long way of saying I HATE EARLY DECISION!! It puts so much pressure on kids who want to maximize their chances, and avoid a long slog through many applications. And if you’re in the high EFC camp, but can technically “afford” the chosen college, family conflict is almost inevitable. Does anyone have a magic solution? Force D to gamble that some sort of optimum outcome will result from RD, or let her follow her bliss?</p>
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My D’s fondest wish is to apply ED to her favorite LAC, with coach support that makes the odds of getting in very high. My H wants to spend whatever it takes to send her there, even though she’ll get very little need-based aid. My fondest wish is for her to apply to schools that offer great merit aid (she’s been offered nominations for some top scholarships at very good schools), and to apply to one or two major reaches such as Yale or Princeton. (Turns out that they are the best fit for us financial aid wise, because we’re middle class earners with upper middle class assets. The difference in cost between YP and the LAC of choice would be about $30k per year.) </p>