Hi,
I’m at the end of my junior year now, and beginning to stress over the college search. I’m a black male and my parents can’t afford to pay that much of the costs for college. Currently I go to a private Catholic high school. My goal is to go to a college such as Fordham or RIT with a full scholarship. I’m looking for advice on what my chances are and what to do to improve those chances. These are my stats.
Objective
SAT: 2100 first time (670M, 680R, 750W)
ACT: 28 first time. I’m retaking next week and I think I have a good chance of getting a 33-34.
SAT II: none
Weighted GPA: 4.0 to 4.1
Rank: not given
APs: AP World History, AP Statistics, AP US History, AP English Lit
Senior APs: AP Calc AB, AP Chem, AP Micro, AP Computer Science, AP English Comp
I have taken almost entirely AP and Honors classes, but I have received a good amount of Bs in those classes.
No major awards
Subjective
Extracurriculars:
Played basketball and baseball as a freshman, played tennis as a junior
Worked as a cashier for 5 months during junior year
Volunteer:
60 hours during high school so far
National Honor Society member
Additionally, yesterday my school held “Book Awards” for the top 50 juniors to receive books from random colleges. Some of the awards came with a small scholarship to the college that gave you a book. I received a $7000 annual scholarship from RIT. I’m wondering if this is an indication of anything? The awards we received were somewhat random, but the top student in my class received an award from Harvard, so it wasn’t completely random.
Should I retake the SAT due to my low CR+M score even if I do well (33-34) on the ACT retake? Any advice/opinions are welcome, thanks.
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/1678964-links-to-popular-threads-on-scholarships-and-lower-cost-colleges.html#latest
Start by reading the links in the above thread (which is a pinned thread at the top of this forum…don’t know why folks can’t seem to find it).
Use the higher of the ACT or SAT scores. Your current SAT is 1350 CR and Marh…if you can get that above 1400, your merit aid chances will increase.
Your 28 ACT needs to bump up to 32 or so. So good luck.
You can’t retake the SAT until the fall so if your ACT is great then you can probably just use your ACT. Your SAT is good but a1400 would be great.
Google colleges that meet full need if you think your parents will have a low EFC. If the expected EFC is too high for them to pay, then you need to find scholarships. I am not sure you will get enough money from Fordham if you need a full ride. Talk to your GC about Catholic colleges that would be generous to you.
What is your UW GPA?
Look for financial safeties on this list. If your scores go up, then you will have quite a few of these for an option.
http://automaticfulltuition.yolasite.com
Howard University in DC offers full tuition plus room (not a full ride) for your current scores but not sure if you qualify with your GPA.
There is not much you can do to change your profile as a Jr. btw, you are a rising Sr now. You have this summer to do something interesting and work if you need to. Push hard your senior year first semester. Get your essays done early so you can keep grades up. Prepare to write thoughtful essays that develop your own words and not cliches. If your ACT really turns out to be 33 or 34 there is no need to take the SAT again. Does you school do UW gpa? That is usually what is used.
Book awards are decided by your school teachers and admin. So it just means that they decided how these should be given out. Mostly it isn’t meaningful for admissions and aid, but the RIT one is different, they should have told you.
http://www.rit.edu/upub/pdfs/High_School_Awards.pdf
You can get aid by merit and/or need. Be sure to run the NPC to see what they are going to expect your family to pay. Hopefully it is low enough. You can’t count on the competitive full ride/full tuition merit as those are insanely competitive and not many, if any are handed out. Plus your B’s and current score may be iffy. Your M+CR is usually the ones considered for merit, 1350 is solid for competitive schools but may not get those awards.
Since you know that these two are on your list and might be viable, now is the time to look for sure bets. Here is a list of automatic awards. Have these for backups. Do you know your EFC?
http://automaticfulltuition.yolasite.com/
Look at all the aid threads
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/1348012-automatic-full-tuition-full-ride-scholarships.html#latest
Did you parents pay the tuition for the private Catholic high school?
Yes, look at the scholarship links posted in previous replies. But note that some use you unweighted GPA.
@thumper1 Thanks for the link and advice.
@txstella Thanks. My school doesn’t give UW GPAs, but I think it’s around a 3.6
@BrownParent Thanks for the info. My parents and I have not discussed EFC yet but it’s less than $10k yearly.
@4kidsdad I think they are paying around $6k out of the total $14k yearly.
I forgot to mention I’m primarily looking for colleges in the NJ/NY/PA area.
The EFC is about 10k yearly, so you are not Pell eligible. the Institutional calculation for Fordham is likely to be about 20k. How much can your parents contribute a year? Even if you get full tuition somewhere you will still have room and board, books and personal expenses, could be about 12k a year-- more in NYC. You have to be prepared to walk away if you don’t get one of the big awards.
Which one is your home state?
edit: just to add the students looking for the larger awards should think about expanding the geographical area, unless you have a local safety public your family can pay for.
Your current stats are a little below Temple’s automatic full tuition + scholarship. The area you are looking in has fewer automatic full rides/full tuition schools than you might find if you broadened your search to the South and West a good bit. Good luck in your search!
@Skates76 thanks!
@BrownParent NJ is my home state. I’ve been looking into the list of automatic scholarships, and I didn’t realize that tuition was only half the cost of attendance. I’m looking at colleges in other states for the first time now, and I am eligible for North Carolina Central University’s Soaring Eagle Scholarship (full ride). However, I’m not sure if it covers just in state tuition or out of state tuition. Here (http://ecatalog.nccu.edu/content.php?catoid=3&navoid=871) it says in state tuition, but here (http://www.nccu.edu/formsdocs/proxy.cfm?file_id=1096) on page 7 it just says tuition. Is there a way to clarify?
Did you have any majors you were thinking of?
NCCU (HBCU LAC) - yes that is weirdly unclear but I can’t actually find an OOS tuition. Instate tuition+fee is only 7,400 a year. You could write the admissions office and show interest and ask them to clarify. I suspect it is full ride
Howard (HBCU) you would get at least tuition and room, MUST apply early, first come first served
You are close to a full ride at Louisiana Tech if you get a 32 ACT
University of Alabama - You would get 2/3rd tuition - 32 ACT gets you full tuition (I believe they use weighted gpai if that’s what your school reports) Alabama has a huge amount of OOS students on these scholarships:
–A first-time freshman student who meets the December 15 scholarship priority deadline, has a 30–31 ACT or 1330–1390 SAT score (critical reading and math scores only) and at least a 3.5 cumulative GPA will be selected as a UA Scholar and will receive the value of two-thirds tuition or $66,864 over four years ($16,716 per year).
I remember an African amer student with stats near yours wanted Howard but didn’t get the application in on time for the scholarship but got a surprise huge package from Brandeis in/near Boston, worth applying if you like the school, it is a good one.
If your parents can continue to pay the 6k a year you can also take your student loan for 5.5k and cover room/board somewhere with just a student job.
Look at the Ohio State University’s Morrill Scholarship. It’s a diversity scholarship and not really based on stats, so you’ll need to write a compelling essay on promoting diversity or overcoming adversity.
OP, what was your PSAT score? Did you make National Achievement Scholar qualifying score? There are some schools out there that give very good scholarship to National Achievement Scholar. Google it. Also I’m thinking that you should consider LAC’s where an AA male will add diversity and meet demonstrated/full need. Have you looked at Juniata College, Bucknell, and Franklin and Marshall?
Yes, National Achievement opens up a lot of possibilities if you made that.
I read the National Achievment Program has totally changed for 2016 and is now for college students.
What was your PSAT? You are a very solid student.
What about one of the Service Academies? Do you have any interest in the military?
@BrownParent @mrice1519 thanks so much for your help, I’ll check all of those colleges out.
@goingnutsmom @txstella Unfortunately I didn’t qualify. I got a 198 on the PSAT. Thanks though.
I haven’t thought about the military, I don’t think it would suit me but I’d be open to learning more about it.
I think you can get admits, but making the money work is another story. Hence the ‘sure things’ with guaranteed aid to fall back on and take the sting out. And keep looking at colleges in your zone but where you might get money. Look for schools with a low amount of minorities that would be eager for the diversity. Likely it is easy for Fordham to get diversity but other Catholic schools may be seeking.
NCCU’s in-state and out-of-state tuition are given here:
http://www.nccu.edu/formsdocs/proxy.cfm?file_id=894
Looks like the out-of-state tuition is $6,019 per semester higher, or $12,038 per year higher, for a full time student (12 or more credits per semester; 16 per semester is the normal load to graduate in 8 semesters).
Yes, ask the school directly to clarify whether the Soaring/Rising Eagle scholarships cover out-of-state tuition. (If it does not, then the Soaring Eagle scholarship would be approximately full tuition rather than full ride for out-of-state students.)
@thereadystudent also look into Miami University (Ohio). If you can, participate in the Bridges program (it’s free, the only requirement is spending an evening on campus) which will get you $2,500 to $4,000 per year and stacks upon your merit scholarship. And if you can get a 32 on the act, this would be half to full tuition.
Try looking at the University of Scranton and some of the other Jesuit schools. While Fordham is an excellent school, you would probably be offered more money at some of the lesser-known Catholic/Jesuit schools.