I am currently a junior at a mid-sized charter school in the Southeast. I have a 35 on act, 4.7 (projected) gpa, and some very unique ECs in engineering (university level teams). I have a passion for my sector of engineering as well as the industrial company that I founded and currently operate. I have published scientific research and an issued patent.
Is applying to 8 colleges enough? I plan on applying to Stanford, MIT, Princeton, UPenn, USC (SoCal), Carnegie Mellon, Northwestern, and NCSU. Are there any additional schools that are excellent in mechanical engineering that I should add?
No, I need enormous amounts of financial aid. Family below poverty line income. I’m worried that public universities won’t give me a good finaid package. @suzy100
You have good credentials and certainly a shot at the schools on your list but you don’t have any safety schools such as your state’s flagship or lower tier colleges as a back-up.
As the head of guidance at my d’s senior college night told the assembled group (which included an Intel semi-finalist, a Presidential Scholar and many very accomplished students- National Merit winners), my daughter included) the only true safe school for all of would be our local community college. Now they all ended up at many fine schools- Ivies, Tufts, Brandeis, Michigan Honors, Stanford, Georgetown, George Washington Universiy-but there aren’t any guarantees…
You are about to hear Alabama (and UAB &UAH), Mississippi,Louisiana Tech, one of the Arkansas, Northern Kentucky, and several others - many of which will be on a yolasite link.
Most of these will have full tuition and some will include room and meals. A couple will add $2k or so.
So try the big names, but remember you’re dropping nearly a benjy on each one. The schools I listed have automatic scholarships. Some may be near you, reducing travel costs too.
Congrats on your hard work thus far. Don’t panic, there’s hope.
You should probably apply to Questbridge if you are low income. You can apply to as many partners as you like without an application fee. If the partner schools are not you top picks, you can forgo the ‘match’ ear;y portion an just apply RD t them as a finalist.
8 schools are fine for many situations but may not be for you. Because you have too many super reach and not enough realistic colleges where costs are covered.
You need at least one safety that you are assured of admission and assured of affordability.
If there is no admission safety whose net price calculator indicates that it is affordable to you, then looking in the automatic big scholarship lists for safety candidates: http://automaticfulltuition.yolasite.com/
Michigan typically offers decent FA packages to students from low income families, so it may be worth applying to. Michigan may also give out large merit scholarships to students with your credentials, although that is not as likely. I think the same goes for GT. If you can afford the application, and/or qualify for a fee waiver, I think it is worth applying to those two universities.
Are you a North Carolina resident? If so, then NCSU would be an admission safety for you. Run its online net price calculator to see if you can afford the likely costs. If not, then you need another safety.
I have never seen the point of submitting applications to more than six carefully selected schools. To each his own. If you diligently search for colleges that have ample and quality offerings in the disciplines that interest you, you will find a place that will suit you fine; academically and culturally.
Did you get a new ACT score in the last two days? According to a previous post you have a 33 ACT. Don’t count your chickens on scores. That being said look at the list in Post #5. There are some good options there for safeties. Once you have a safety or two you would be happy to attend you can apply broadly without worrying.
Eight is sufficient. But, your list has 4 schools that what I would consider very selective, and two in the selective group. I would keep the number, but add another a pure safety and match. BTW, eight is the number that my middle daughter applied to…but her groupings were a bit different, Two Ivies and MIT. Two UCs. U of Washington. Amherst and a LAC. She got in, I think six of eight, and goes to an Ivy.
What state do you live in? Apply to your public flagship university there (or if there is more than one public university with engineering programs, apply to one or more of those also).
I think you need some match/high match schools that give out good aid.
Schools not yet mentioned – with Mechanical Engineering – that give out decent financial aid:
University of Rochester
Lehigh
Wake Forest
Tulane
These schools no longer meet 100% of demonstrated need – all of the schools with Mech Engineering programs that meet 100% of need are highly elite/reaches – but they give pretty decent aid.
If I were you, I’d consider applying to (at least one of) these as your matches. You might not get into any of the reaches, so you want some high quality matches as backup. You could treat the U of Alabama and/or NC State as a safety.
Finally, I second the choice of Cornell. It isn’t quite as big of a reach as the other Ivies/Stanford/MIT, it’s known for Engineering, and it meets 100% of demonstrated need.