“Then find out how much they are willing to offer you, and then make a decision.”
the whole point of the NPC’s is to make figuring out where you CAN afford to go the FIRST step- not the last. Colleges will rarely offer a LOT more FA $ to a student than their NPC suggests they will be offered.
Whoever told you to “apply first then see how much they offer” is living in the past, before colleges were REQUIRED to offer NPC’s, in order to eliminate the "apply first then find out later if you can afford to go " guessing game.
^This. Not uncommon for people who haven’t been very involved in college admissions in recent years, or people who aren’t the ones who will be spending the money to give the advice to worry about finances later. But none of these people are going to cosign or pay your loans off! Unfortunately, some high school guidance counselors still are living in the past and say this as well. Admittedly you need your the non-custodial waiver to be granted for them to be accurate, but the NPCs give you an idea of where you stand. They will give you the best case scenario, probably.
@intparent Okay. So… What can I do now?I mean I already applied. I guess I’ll come back here if I actually make it and ask about finance.
What would I do if I were you? I’d probably go run the net price calculators on all the schools just to see where I was. If your mom will help, it won’t take very long. Since a lot of your schools are UCs, too. (Heck… I have seen parents change their mind on whether to help or not when they are helping run those numbers – most parents really don’t realize how expensive college has gotten in recent years). Not saying that will help with your mom…
Save off screen shots of the results if you can. Then if a school comes in significantly worse than the NPC, you might be able to show it to them and ask why it is so different, and maybe they will adjust a little bit.
@geekysciencegirl You do not need to get UG in bio from MIT with a ton of debt. You will need to go MD/PhD route for you to work as a medical researcher. Medical research is mainly done by scientists with PhDs.
@geekysciencegirl you’re right in that at this point you may as well just wait to hear back from colleges before stressing about financial aid. It’s not like you’re going to withdraw applications if you use the npc and find you might not be able to afford it. After applying to so many colleges it makes sense to just rest, take a breather, and see what comes back. You can decide then what to do. You sound like you have a lot of opportunities in the future in front of you, regardless of where you go to college. A lot of the parents on this forum are advice rich,and what they have to offer is well worth considering, if a little overzealous sometimes, but it’s also ok to not feel like you have to explain yourself or take everyone’s advice. Your outlook makes sense to me. If you were bent on feeling sorry for yourself, or being angry about your childhood, I doubt you would have had the drive to apply to all these colleges and look to the future in doing so. It sounds to me more like you’re just processing it all, which is normal and healthy. I hope you’re excited about your future, and knowing you’re not defined by your childhood, and I’m wishing the best for you.
Thank you so much. This is what I needed. I have been stressing a little thinking of how I’ll react to acceptance or rejection or being waitlisted. (If I am waitlisted I will greedily accept and continue on with life until the time that I will once again wait to hear from them!)
What do you mean it sounds like I have a lot of opportunities? I’m not saying I don’t, I just don’t know exactly what you are referring to.
I know I am a very stubborn person and once I set my mind to something, I will pursue it to the ends of the earth… I realize I am like this and try hard to fight against it. That’s why I have been trying to absorb the advice (with difficulty) that these people have dedicated their time to giving me. I deeply appreciate it and try to fight against my innate reaction. It’s sometimes hard to explain myself, but I feel that if I do, the advice I receive will be more tailored to my perspective or situation or what I need. I don’t know…
My future is the very thing that keeps me going! If I remain in the past, stuck here wallowing in my pain, which I undoubtedly would succumb to should I remain here, I could never be happy. I see this as a climb out of a pit. It’s no use being angry that I am here in the first place. But don’t get me wrong, I am still immature in many ways, and do occasionally look at others and go, “why me?” I do have the drive. I think if anything that is what I have gained from my life. I have undying determination; it will only die once I am dead. I don’t know if I can handle the colleges in which I applied to (the 7 privates I applied to are the top in the nation), but I do know that I want to try.
God! I get so excited and happy when I think about doing what I love for a career! All my life I have done mini experiments and loved learning!! I can’t wait to do that in the future!! There is so much I don’t know! There is so much to discover! I can hardly wait!
@Geekysciencegirl. Based on your interests, bioengineering would be a much more worthwhile degree than biology. In addition to MIT, UCSD has an excellent program. Check in with us tomorrow.
Good luck today!
@stoccermom Really? Why do you say that? I really love all sciences though… it’s so hard to choose! I got waitlisted for UCSD.
@MYOS1634 Thank you!! I will definitely need it!!! Fingers and toes and everything else I cossibly can crossed!
Can you list the colleges you applied to, and
run the NPC on each? I’m sure you need something to pass time.
UC’s aren’t great for someone aiming for a MD/PHD (that’s what you’re looking for after college) because undergraduates are too many and the faculty /student ratio too high for professors to know undergrads personally or facilitate research opportunities. UC’s however are great for graduate school and of course they’re terrific public universities if you don’t get into your other choices.
If you get into UCI CHP that’d change things for you, for instance.
Sure! I can list them. I did aim terribly high. I don’t think I can make it into any of them because of how I look on paper. I mean, I applied because I think that I have the capabilities to succeed-- capabilities that my transcripts, test scores, and extracurricular activities (or lack thereof) fail to reflect. I just hope that they can give me a little benefit of the doubt (at least one… namely MIT). Sorry to babble on. Here is my list:
UCs-
Berkeley
Davis-waitlisted
Irvine
Los Angeles
San Diego- waitlisted
Santa Barbara - accepted (I think? My uncle says I did based off of the score I received in their process. He works for admissions and he looked me up.)
Privates (gahhhhhh)-
MIT
Stanford
Harvard
Johns Hopkins
Princeton
Yale
Brown
I actually, sounds weird, want to be consumed and suffocated with education as an undergrad, and absorb as much information as I possibly can, and then as a graduate work more on research using knowledge I have acquired!
oh dear… well if you are in a UCSB you can thank your lucky stars, because you aimed WAY WAY too high.
You must also think about something : if this round doesn’t go well for you, can you take a gap year? Apply to CityYear perhaps? (it’s VERY selective so applying as soon as you hear back from all your colleges will be essential. On the other hand, they offer a stipend, you do something good, it shows both strength and leadership, and at the end you get an extra scholarship for college.)
you did aim too high if you got waitlisted from ucsd and uc davis since those schools have much higher acceptnace rates than mit…i have near perfect stats and im still expecting rejections from the ivy leagues and other top 10 schoools i applied to. you need to have the high stats for your application to truly be considered thoroughly. did you apply to any safeties?
90% odds of rejection for MIT, even for qualified applicants.
To help with perspective.
Right now thousands of extraordinary kids are crushed.
Do we know your actual stats (unweighted GPA, weighted GPA, UCGPA, test scores, % students from your school who go to 4-year colleges, and if you add all honors and AP classes how many do you have over 4 years?)
@geekysciencegirl : guessing that, like 90% applicants, you didn’t get into MIT. Give yourself time to mourn.
What decisions are coming up next?
When do you hear about ucsb?
Interesting thread because OP is very determined, intense and captures that intensity in the way she writes. Let us know how decisions turn out.
Aiming high is perfectly fine as long as you have some safeties. From the above list, I don’t see any safeties. UC Irvine and UCSB are pretty difficult to get in even for someone who has 32 ACT and 3.8 unweighted gpa especially for more competitive majors. One good thing about UC system is you can always go to community colleges for 2 years and transfer to decent UC.
Sometimes, I think going to CC for 2 years (while working part-time) and transferring to a decent UC might be a lot easier, cheaper and better route for kids who want to have a well-rounded but stress free experiences in high school.
For our kid, he had just one dream/reach school (Stanford), two “match” schools and 2 “safeties” and 2 “for certain” schools. And in the worst/best scenario, he had a potential gap year activity. Two “for certain” schools were Honors Colleges at colleges ranked outside top 100 which gave 100% cost and free tuition. Lastly, he had a gap year activity as an option.
Im getting a loan for $28,500 for my freshmen undergrad year and for some reason I’m still scared about the debt yet I could choose a public or state university and still don’t . Is it worth it to go where you truly want to ?