What state are you in and what do you want to study?
Have you visited any college campuses, and what kind of schools are you drawn to (besides U of Chicago)
With your stats, you might as well “shoot the moon” and try for Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Columbia (any or all of them) - they all have deep pockets, and might well provide you with a decent financial aid package. Harvard provides aid to families with 6-figure incomes. It’s worth running the NPC for any of them. Definitely look at Tulane: you will probably qualify for a nice merit scholarship from them. Tulane also has a non-binding Early Notification option, so that you can apply to them as a near-safety, and receive word (including merit scholarship announcement) by December.
If they have $30,000 for you, then that means only $7,500 per year at most. Adding federal direct loan ($5,500 in the first year) and some work earnings (perhaps up to $5,000 per year at most is a realistic expectation) puts your outer limit at about $18,000 per year (but cheaper is better in case you cannot work as much or some of the $30,000 gets pulled for a family budget emergency).
Since the merit at the unnamed state university is not assured for stats, you probably want to find a safety where the merit scholarships that bring the price within range are assured for your stats.
Tulane has both early action and single choice early action, as described at http://admission.tulane.edu/apply/instructions/ . Single choice early action means agreeing not to apply early action or early decision at other schools (with some exceptions for state schools as listed), and signals a higher level of interest in Tulane (which Tulane does consider in admissions, a concern if your stats are much higher than typical Tulane frosh, so that it looks like you may be applying there as a low choice “safety”).
@SOSConcern – I’m in Pennsylvania. Intended major is tentatively international relations/studies, but I’d like to study everything from astronomy to history to spanish in college, so curricular flexibility is important to me. I also like UChicago’s Core; even though they have a bunch of requirements, you’ve a set of classes to choose from for each category.
I’ve visited a lot of college campuses, mostly mid-sized private universities. I’ve also visited two state flagships and threeish liberal arts colleges. I know most people tend to be drawn to one type of school or another, but I think I could be happy at a variety. The small class sizes at LACs appeal to me; so do the research opportunities and student bodies at bigger schools. Schools that have a dedicated campus within a city (think Georgetown or American, not GW) are my favorites, although I’m not opposed to rural environments. The only campus I didn’t like was Boston University – didn’t seem to be in a good part of town, Brutalist architecture, etc.
@woogzmama & @ucbalumnus – so many people in this thread have mentioned Tulane! I’ll need to look closer at their programs & the fit, but I’m also wondering: how realistic would it be to get a full tuition scholarship there? It’s great that they offer 100+ – that’s a lot to go around in a big school with a relatively low admit rate. Does anyone here know whether they focus on stats, ECs, diversity…?
I am going to be a downer here. If your EFC is $35,000 and your budget is max of $20,000, you are are going to need to include realistic financial options. For example, Case Western might give $30,000. That sounds fabulous, except for the fact that cost of attendance is $60,000 which leaves you with a $10,000 gap. They offer a few full-ride scholarships, but they are only a handful. A “few” is going to be the scenario for almost every single full-ride scholarship at the higher ranked schools. They are much fewer in number than most students realize. I don’t know what the NPC would show for HYP, run them and see. But, statistically, these are all apply and hope for the best, but you need to be prepared for possible disappointment in terms of financial feasibility and/or admission (in terms of HYP) {Just room, board, books w/o tuition can run $10,000. So it is possible that 1/2 of your allotted amt won’t even be paying tuition.)
Believe it or not, there are probably more top students in your situation than not. Bc that is financial reality for so many students, you can find intellectuals who love talking theory and philosophy both inside and outside of classrooms on campuses that are affordable. Some of the lower ranked schools will offer not only you lots of merit $$, but plenty of other kids just like you, so all of those students are enrolled on those campuses due to the exact same scenario. These schools are not intellectual wastelands.
FWIW, I know the above occurs, b/c it is our kids’ reality. They have found their tribe and have loved their schools.
Look into honors programs within honors colleges. The program our ds is in focuses on research and he loves it. They accept 40 students per yr and they are offered fabulous opportunities. Our ds is the deep thinker type (loves physics, astronomy, philosophy, theology, math theory…and literature) and he has a great group of friends who are all as academically oriented as he is.
Your high stats can help potentially get you with a high merit award. However many of the smaller colleges want to have their best offers got to the students who indicate the school is one of their top picks (see the article and list of 20 best colleges for merit aid, Money Magazine, Jan/Feb 2015). Looking down that list and looking at the schools on-line, you can see if any are a ‘fit’ for you. The list of 20 is culled out of the 665 schools that are in Best Colleges ranking. Article also discusses where your grades and test scores put you in the top quartile of the applicant pool.
The benefit of going to a smaller private is you could fit many areas of interest (more flexibility IMO). However if you have a larger university with an excellent international relations/studies dept, that may be a better fit.
You also have to consider the difference in cost (so cost benefit) of a higher priced school. If your parents are willing to help pay the difference between a generous Ivy, only apply to the ones that are strong in the programs you are looking for or the ones you have a best chance of admission.
Are you thinking about graduate school? You may want to pay less out-of-pocket for UG. Also look at those graduate programs and see what kind of preparation you want in UG.
Some schools may have great career-building internships in your field.
There are some flagship public universities that are exceptions on higher merit for OOS (as article says, Alabama, North Dakota, South Carolina). UA has an excellent honors program - you will have to decide if they offer enough in your field of study, but they offer a lot of diverse education and there are a lot of high stat kids on campus (they have the most NMS of any public university, and I believe are ranked #4 behind 3 privates). UA has a special package for NMS which adds a 5th year of education. My dau is a student there (freshman with presidential and a few other scholarships).
My advice would be to research the advice on this thread, make sure you have looked at the smaller schools that offer what you are looking for and may have enough merit for you to attend. I agree with the magazine advice: if you are interested in a school, make sure they know it because some will not make a high-aid award to students they believe won’t probably choose their institution.
The more you have researched and pared down, the better for the application process. You want to put your best foot forward to your top choices at the get-go on the application process. If a school will not fit the budget, use your energy to the ones that will.
already posted.