<p>I'm currently a junior in hs, and have been looking into colleges for a while. Just now I'm realizing that I am gonna need a significant amount of scholarships since my EFC is high but we can't afford too much. I'm wondering what I can do right now, and if there is anything important I should know about now?</p>
<p>basically, what can juniors do about financial aid?</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Work on getting your GPA up-- that’s critical to merit-based scholarships (and to getting accepted at top colleges).</p></li>
<li><p>Ditto your SAT or ACT scores.</p></li>
<li><p>Run your income, asset, and tax numbers through the financial aid calculator at College Board to get an idea what your EFC will be under the Federal and Institutional Methodologies. If the EFC is significantly less than the COA (tuition, fees, room/board, books, and misc), you’re a candidate for need-based aid. If the EFC exceeds the COA for all your schools (and your family income/asset numbers won’t change much in the next year), you’re not a candidate for need-based aid.</p></li>
<li><p>Once you know whether you’re a candidate for need-based aid or not, your strategies differ. If you’re a candidate for need-based aid, get and read “Paying for College Without Going Broke” ($12 on amazon) for detailed strategies. Top strategies at this point for students who will be candidates for need-based aid:</p></li>
</ol>
<p>a. Don’t save in the student’s name, save in the parent’s name. Consider transferring any student savings to a 529 college savings account.
b. Keep student income under about $3500 per year.
c. If the calculator indicates a significant contribution to the EFC from parental assets, consider the strategies in the book to reduce the parental assets to below the parents’ Asset Protection Allowance.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>If you’re not a candidate for need-based aid, focus on scholarships and merit aid. FastWeb is a good source for scholarships. Work on getting your grades up and doing some SAT/ACT prep.</p></li>
<li><p>Use College Board to see which colleges are typically most generous for either need-based aid (what % of need do they meet?), or for merit aid (what is the average amount of merit aid given per student?), depending on whether you’re a need-based candidate or not. Use that info to narrow your college list.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>Some scholarships are available to highschool jrs. Make a list of all the ones you do want to apply to Sr. year using websites and other resources (some scholarship websites are available on CC’s forums). At least one or two of these should (?) be available to jrs and you can apply right now!</p>
<p>The better schools have the better financial aid. Like the first responder said, get your GPA and SAT/ACT up. You may find that need-based FA at a good school is better than merit aid at some other school. You may even find that need-based FA at a good school works out better than in-state tuition at a public U. Don’t eliminate schools with high sticker prices. A school that cost 50K turned out to be the most affordable for my son.</p>
<p>Consider using school holidays to visit nearby schools you have interest in. Most colleges are in session on president’s day, MLK day, etc.</p>
<p>Keep asking good questions on CC and good luck.</p>
<p>The most important thing for you to do right now, is to run the FAFSA and CSS Profile calculators (the ones at the College Board website are the most accurate). When you have those results, you need to sit down with your parents, and figure out what your family really and truly can pay for your education. Be brutally honest about this. This is no time to be soft-hearted or soft-headed. Don’t forget to account for the entire Cost of Attendance (COA). Include tuition, fees, housing, food, books, laundry, travel to school, travel around campus, toothpaste, midnight snacks, etc. etc. etc. Make up your own COA so that you include your real true estimated expenses. Lots of colleges and universities underestimate these things.</p>
<p>When you visit colleges and universities, find several that you like, but don’t fall in love with any of them just yet. Wait until you find out which of them will actually be affordable for your family once your applications are accepted, and you have all of those financial aid offers on the table.</p>
<p>And, do not forget to find one rock-solid true safety. This is a school that has to admit you based on your statistics (note that I wrote “has to” rather than “is very likely to”), that you can afford without any financial aid other than federally determined financial aid, and where you can be reasonably happy. Chances are that this is your local community college or in-state public University. Why do you need a true safety? Because every single year some students find out that everywhere else that they have applied to and been accepted at is no longer affordable for their families.</p>
<p>Along with learning about need based FA in general and the specifics of schools you’re interested in, take a look at some of the sticky threads about merit scholarships on this forum and the Parents forum. And here are a couple more good ones:</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/219357-usnews-top-100-liberal-arts-college-merit-v-need-only.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/219357-usnews-top-100-liberal-arts-college-merit-v-need-only.html</a></p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/219347-usnews-top-100-doctoral-colleges-merit-v-need-only.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/219347-usnews-top-100-doctoral-colleges-merit-v-need-only.html</a></p>
<p>You will be looking for schools where you are in the very top of the applicant pool based on your grades, test scores or any other qualifications that specific scholarships list. </p>
<p>You can also look for outside scholarships, but IMO, if you are hoping to fund a substantial amount of your college costs over all four years, looking for institutional scholarships makes more sense. Many of the outside scholarships that you have a better chance of getting are local ones, and these most often are for relatively small amounts (1k or less) and are usually only for 1 freshman year. Of course it’s great to do both, but it’s a matter of allocating your time (for applications, essays, etc.) to those opportunities that will produce the most likely results.</p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>thanks guys for all the great advice,</p>
<p>would you happen to know of any good scholarships for juniors?</p>