Looking for suggestions (in 2019 college) for an math/science girl

College Search & Selection
1

Daughter wants to pursue math and/or computer science (may be engineering but not keen about it). She attends a very good public school. She has taken hardest course load. She has excelled in all subjects and maintain top 2 to3% in school She is advance in math, only a junior who is enrolled in BC calculus and doing well in it. Scored 770 in SAT in 7th grade in math. Will qualify for NMSF based on PSAT scores. Next year will be taking Multi variable Calculus. Family income is around 100K. We are located in NY. Looking for suggestions for Indian girl.

Daughter has published math papers in junior high. Extracurricular activities are great. Lots of research experience in summer @ universities or attended summer math camps. Multiple Leaderships positions in school. What suggestion would you recommend for her. And where we need to apply. Most importantly what mistakes to avoid when applying for colleges.

2

She is very math focused and sometime only girl in her math class (math team). Advance in Java, Python, and is enrolled in AP Computer science and AP Biology, AP language (school has allowed her to advance in math, science, foreign language). last year she took AP Chem and scored 5.

3

MIT, Carnegie Mellon. I would research at least a few SUNY schools and their Honors programs as with a $100k income she’d qualify for free tuition.

4

Free tuition means that we have to pay only room and board? That is very nice. Do you have any SUNY in mind that has a good computer science program. I am clueless.

5

Yes, NY has the new Excelsior scholarship. I think the income cutoff will be $110k or $125k next year but I’m not positive. If you make that, it would be room and board only but there are conditions as far as having to work in NY state for several years. If you google it, i’m sure You’ll find details.

I’m not too familiar with the SUNY schools now (I was raised in NY but a lot has changed since 1987!). I would start with Stony Brook (Long Island), Albany and Binghamton. Good luck!

6

I suggest you google “colleges that meet full financial need” and “colleges that offer generous merit aid.”

The former includes many of the most competitive schools, which are also often the wealthiest, for example Harvard, but also some that are more reasonable in terms of admissions. Note that “colleges that meet full financial need” might be “need aware” (and not “need blind”) in admission, so they may consider a student’s ability to pay in the admissions decision. Also, a school may, for example, calculate that a student can pay $20,000 per year and cover the balance. However, the student may feel that they can only afford $10,000 per year. Sometimes this can be worked out with the school.

The latter includes schools where her grades and test scores might secure her generous aid. Many schools now focus financial aid less on merit aid and more on need-based aid, but that is certainly not always the case. As an example, Miami of Ohio provides a nice chart that shows a range of merit aid that might be anticipated based directly on grades and test scores.

http://miamioh.edu/admission/merit-grid/

As an FYI, Miami of Ohio and some other schools will have a merit aid deadline that is earlier than the RD deadline. In this case, you can apply to Miami after Dec. 1 but must apply by then to be considered for merit aid.

I suggest for CC and in general that your daughter come up with some general preferences so that she can pare down her list. Is there a region she prefers (Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, South, etc.)? Would she prefer an urban school? A college town? A more rural environment? What about school size–small (under 4000), medium (maybe 4000-10,000), or large (>10,000)? Maybe you can visit a few small liberal arts colleges (LACs) in your area to see if that appeals. Maybe also an urban school or two. Rochester, WPI, Holy Cross, Albany, Hamilton, Colgate, St. Lawrence, and Union College might be some near you, where you can get an idea about her preferences. She doesn’t even need to be interested in the school–though going with an open mind is always helpful–just wanting to see what a school of a certain size and a certain location might feel like. By visiting some local ones, you can avoid investing too much money and time. Good luck!

7

Unless you are rather wealthy, it might make sense to start with a cost-management strategy.
For many middle income families, the easiest way to control costs is to focus on in-state public universities, which tend to have some of the lowest available sticker prices. If you also want to consider out-of-state/private schools, then I suggest you consider one or more of the following 4 types:

  1. Colleges that claim to meet 100% of demonstrated financial need: https://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/paying-for-college/articles/2017-09-21/colleges-that-claim-to-meet-full-financial-need This list includes all 8 Ivy League colleges and many other very prestigious/selective schools. It includes both research universities and small liberal arts colleges (LACs). Many of them have good-to-excellent math and CS departments. The research universities tend to offer a bigger selection of courses; the LACs tend to offer smaller classes and more personal attention.
    Schools I recommend you consider in this category include: Stanford, MIT, Princeton, Cornell, Williams, Swarthmore, Harvey Mudd (reaches) Macalester, Smith, Bryn Mawr (target schools)

Be sure to run the online net price calculators for any of these that interest you, since aid amounts can vary by thousands of dollars even though they all claim to cover 100% of demonstrated need…

  1. Colleges that offer competitive (not automatic) merit scholarships in varying amounts: https://www.kiplinger.com/tool/college/T014-S001-kiplinger-s-best-values-in-private-colleges/index.php https://www.kiplinger.com/tool/college/T014-S001-kiplinger-s-best-values-in-private-colleges/index.php?table=lib_arts These lists include most schools in the list above (#1), plus others that are somewhat less selective. Many of them may make good admission+financial "match" ("target") schools, especially if you can afford close to the full sticker prices (but would welcome a $10K - $20K merit scholarship discount). Schools I recommend you consider include: Brandeis, Case Western, St. Olaf (target schools)
  2. Colleges that offer competitive (not automatic) large merit (full tuition / full ride) scholarships: http://competitivefulltuition.yolasite.com/ Some of these would make good admission+financial reach or target schools, especially if you cannot afford the Expected Family Contributions for schools listed above. Schools I recommend you consider include: University of Southern California (reach for big merit / high target for admission) University of Rochester (reach for big merit; target for admissions) University of Buffalo (low reach/target for big merit; safety if you can afford in-state sticker price )
  3. Colleges that offer automatic large merit scholarships (full tuition / full ride) for qualifying stats: http://automaticfulltuition.yolasite.com/ Schools in this list tend to be less selective than the ones listed above (but may be good admission+financial safeties for a well qualified student). Schools I recommend you consider include: University of Alabama (safety)

Whether you focus on #1, #2, #3, #4, or some combination depends on
(a) your income and assets
(b) whether you’re looking for reaches, targets, or safeties.
Again, use the online net price calculators for any colleges that interest you.

8

Thanks for the info

9

But each college’s definition of “need” can vary, sometimes substantially. Use the colleges’ net price calculators rather than making assumptions about “meet need” claims.

This is an older list; a more recent one is here: http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/21015126/#Comment_21015126 . All scholarships should be checked on the college web sites.

10

@tk21769 I like your approach, but it should be noted that the first three categories are not mutually exclusive.

Rochester, for example, fits into categories #1, #2, AND #3. It meets full need, offers substantial but not full-tuition merit aid as part of the initial financial aid package (from $2K to $20K per year) to top applicants, and has a limited number of full-ride/full-tuition competitive scholarships that are part of a separate application process. I’m sure there are other schools that bridge those categories as well.

11

I agree in principle that there is some overlap among these categories.
However, I’m not sure URochester in particular falls into all 3 categories. It does not seem to publish a Common Data Set, so it’s hard to verify whether it claims to cover full need. According to its entry on the US News site, it does not (it meets full need for < 90% of n-b aid recipients). Maybe it comes close in many cases, though; for some students it may even offer a lower net cost than some other school that makes the “full need” claim. So run the NPCs on the schools that highly interest you (rather than taking all these claims at face value for anything beyond a first-pass filter).

Duke and UChicago are examples of alleged “full need” colleges that also (unlike the Ivies) offer merit scholarships. However, a student may benefit most from one or the other (merit or need-based). For example a very low income family can get a very low price from n-b aid alone; a high income family won’t qualify for any n-b aid at all, but may be incentivized to choose Chicago/Duke over an Ivy based on a merit discount. Merit grants usually reduce the amount of need; the 2 kinds of aid typically don’t “stack” to generate a lower bottom line than you’d get from either one alone.

12

collegedata.com appears to include many pieces of CDS information (presumably, they get CDSes from colleges, even if the colleges do not make them public on their own web sites).

https://www.collegedata.com/cs/data/college/college_pg03_tmpl.jhtml?schoolId=117

Rochester claims that 90% of FA applicants had “need fully met” with 93% as the “average percent of need met”. Of course, how “need” is determined makes a big difference in what actual FA offers are like. It is best to use Rochester’s net price calculator to get an estimate for its financial aid, rather than guessing or assuming based on “need met”.

https://enrollment.rochester.edu/financial-aid/estimator/

At some colleges, merit scholarships first replace expected student work/loan amounts before replacing grants. Duke says that it uses this methodology for outside scholarships, but does not say anything about how Duke issued scholarships are handled in terms of FA.

https://financialaid.duke.edu/awarding-and-policy

Chicago says that it reduces institutional aid by half of the amount of outside scholarships, but does not say anything about how Chicago issued scholarships are handled in terms of FA.

http://financialaid.uchicago.edu/undergrad-students/types-of-aid/scholarships

13

My suggestion, anywhere that offers her a scholarship. I’ve discovered that MIT’s generous financial aid packages are actually parent loans. Yeesh!

14

^ MIT, like many other prestigious, selective private schools, does not offer merit scholarships.
Their FA is all need-based. According to their 2016-2017 CDS, their average need-based loan to first-time full-time freshmen was $2,608.

Someone in the OP’s income bracket, with commensurate financial assets and 1 child,
might expect to pay around $15K-$20K/year to attend MIT (after need-based grants).
The estimate I get is $16,562 (before applying “self help”, i.e. loans/work-study) based on the following assumptions:
$104K annual income, $52K cash savings, $52K investments, $52K home equity; $0 assets in child’s name;
NY resident;
Sources: online net price calculators.
YMMV. Run the online NPCs for any schools that interest you.

If your family income is double-triple that amount, then no, MIT probably won’t offer you any aid.

15

Here are some net cost estimates I get for my family in NY:

$16K… Stony Brook (in state)
19K Stanford
20K MIT
25K Amherst

$26k … RPI, Haverford
$27k … UPenn
$28k… Columbia
29K Williams, Smith
30K…CMU, Chicago, Harvey Mud, Wellesley
31k Dartmouth, Rice
32k Cornell, Duke
33k Caltech

36k UUIC
41k Georgia Tech
45K Maryland

16

Check out Case Western reserve, , Worcester polytechnic Institute, Emory, Vanderbilt, John Hopkins. Many of these are excellent schools and meet full need (although I don’t think WPI is a full needs meet school). Run som FAFSA estimate calculators to get an idea of your EFC. Many of these schools also use the CSS profile which is more in depth financially. If you can afford your efc then you should be good with a full needs meet school unless there are assets not looked at in the FAFSA. If not, a strategy chasing merit aid would be a better option for your family. Most schools look at GPA and test scores 1st then EC’s and all the other things that make a well rounded candidate. Good luck to your daughter!

17

Check out the University of Michigan - run the NPC and see what you get.

18

UM is too high EFC :frowning:

19

So you ran the EFC. What can you afford?

20

If we stretch 20-22K