@sevmom yes I agree and we do factor that too. 
@twoinanddone no loans for us or kids - we plan to cover their coa’s and guiding them to find places where no loans would be necessary. They are out there!
@stacysmom21: $25K would barely cover tuition/room/board/books/transportation for in-state California students at any of the Cal states.
I think you will be hard pressed to find any college in California under $25K for everything? Or are transportation and personal expenses additional?
You could look at University of Redlands, St. Marys of Moraga, Cal Lutheran which are all private and may give some merit aid.
The private schools in California, Oregon and Washington might have more merit aid available. Since the public schools cost so much for OOS (about the same COA as a private), it might work out better to apply to the privates. With a $25k merit scholarship, costs could be about $35k at a private. U of San Diego, LMU, U of Portland, U of Seattle.
Check out Trinity University in TX and the other privates like St. Mary’s, St. Edwards, Incarnate Ward.
Check the financial health of all these smaller private schools.
Hi!
gently suggest using the website COLLEGE DATA and clicking on the MONEY MATTERS tab for each school that interests you. That tab often tells you whether a school gives MERIT and then on average how much. It’s very useful!
Another great resource for researching funding is COLLEGE NAVIGATOR. Click on the NET PRICE tab to find your income bracket and the on-average cost. Then you can run the NPC.
That being said, has she considered schools that are test optional? For her GPA and her interests, women’s colleges often have lots of money. Many people assume that women’s colleges have no men, but some do (and some have very few men).
She might like Bryn Mawr because it has great sciences, gives merit, and it is part of a consortium with co-ed schools. It also has a grad school with a top PREMED program–also meaning men will be in her program. Also it is a low stress school with high level academics – this is rare in this world. Women’s colleges tend to produce more STEM grads and Bryn Mawr is known for this. The consortium schools include Haverford, Swarthmore, and UPenn. She can attend classes at the other schools freely. Consortium schools. They are not in the middle of nowhere, but on a commuter trainline to Philadelphia, about 20 minutes away.
She might also like Muhlenberg. It’s a happy school with great premed and it’s good for merit.
Mt.Holyoke has fewer men but gives great merit and has great sciences. It’s consortium schools include Smith (women) and Amherst and UMass Amherst and Hampshire. (all coed).
Smith offers merit and it’s in a small town.
Haverford also offers excellent merit and is a low-stress school. It is a co-college with Bryn Mawr–they share schedules, campuses, etc.
Wellesley–top academics, excellent aid, and she may be able to take classes at MIT.
For a California school check out LMU. She might be able to get enough merit aid to bring the cost down to around $25k.
Also, if she can play up the Hispanic aspect she might want to apply ED to Vanderbilt. Run the NPC to see if you’re OK with the costs, but you did mention maybe more if it was the right fit…
Wow great responses tonight. Thank you everyone, we will be researching all of these!
@Dustyfeathers thank you for the other websites information. I will be checking that out as well.
Is Ole Miss an option for automatic merit?
@stacysmom21 - Ole Miss lists out their automatic awards on their website…
https://finaid.olemiss.edu/scholarships/#8
look under Academic Merit - there is a table showing you how much you get
Great Honors College and Oxford is a super town
@CollegeMamb0 thank you. I saw that and wonder if that chart is fully updated for the next school year? It is heavily reliant on test scores which many kids won’t have. And those that have them, like my daughter, they are from last year and could be improved if taken again. The GPA requirement is a generic 3+ for all applicants and this is the area where my daughter truly excels. Anyway… I don’t expect you to have an answer, I’m just wondering out loud here. 
Good questions @stacysmom21 - I’d call Ole Miss admissions and ask!
That’s a great suggestion, will do.
Application update for anyone interested:
She has been admitted to ASU (we saw this on their portal). We are waiting to see if they send any information on merit awards.
Also, her only athletic pre-read came in for Stevens Inst of Technology which gave her a very nice Merit Award but still puts us well over the $25K.
Stacysmom21, did you find that the Stevens merit award was similar to the figure in the Net Price Calculator? Also, how long did it take for pre-read results once materials were submitted? Thank you!
Has she considered a school like Colorado School of Mines? If she were to get a merit scholarship and an athletic one, it might bring her under budget. They really like female applicants and may find more money for a female.
There are several Div 2 tech schools and those athletic scholarships can really help with the COA.
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@MAtofuturedoc I never ran the stevens npc but the amount was on spot with the published average cost after aid that you see on Google etc… The early read took about 2 weeks. She is a recruited athlete.
@twoinanddone yes, unfortunately the coach never responded to any emails etc.
The Stevens merit is generous enough that we are strongly considering it now as it will allow her to continue playing volleyball and that is something she really wants to do - whether it is varsity or club.
Update: I feel like a lot has changed and wanted to provide an update in an effort to receive more feedback from the cc community.
We have been successful at getting D21 to be more open minded about school locations anywhere in the country and now she has some southern and midwestern schools on her list.
We have been successful at getting her to write off the CA schools due to high COA.
She has been digging deep on what type of school experience she wants and is now looking for large schools and diverse campus culture. Small schools out of the picture and being near a city not as important anymore. Im a little bit sad she may turn down her offer to play vb at a d3 but she doesn’t think now that she will be happy at a small school. (Ugh, this is a hard one to swallow and can totally be its own thread about whether to choose a school for your sport or not…)
I don’t know if this is typical teen flip flopping but at least we are getting her to think about what is most important to her. Obviously good academics and lower coa is part of the criteria.
Her new list includes: UofSC, Miami of OH, Ole Miss, Arizona, and ASU for the possibility of scholarships that could potentially reduce COA.
Still on her list are: Purdue, Colorado Boulder, Washington Seattle, Oregon but we are unsure of scholarship potential at these. Willing to apply and see what happens.
Her instates: UVA (reach), JMU, VT
She has added these to her list but I’m not confident she can get any money at any of these: Wisconsin, Northeastern, UofMiami, Syracuse. Pretty sure there is not enough merit here.
I realize our list is too large and we plan to trim it down with more info.
Given her interest for biology or biochem/molecular biology I’d appreciate any feedback on any of these. The more we research the more we realize that $25K COA will be a stretch so we are ready to spend a bit more for the right fit.
UW Madison primarily has scholarships that you have to apply separately for and are not awarded via Undergraduate Admissions. Few of these are likely to be for full-tuition, so you’ll need to apply (and receive) quite a few of them in-order to bring the COA down to 25K.
However, UW Madison does offer a full-tuition scholarship program for IS/OOS students who are URMs:
URM Scholarship Listing: https://wisc.academicworks.com/opportunities/34810
URM Scholarship Info: https://cspks.wisc.edu/
UW Scholarship Website: https://financialaid.wisc.edu/types-of-aid/scholarships/
UW Scholarship Search: https://wisc.academicworks.com/
Purdue does offer merit scholarships but again, you would need quite a lot to bring COA down to 25K from ~40K.
Purdue Merit Scholarships: https://www.admissions.purdue.edu/costsandfinaid/freshman.php
Purdue COA: https://www.admissions.purdue.edu/costsandfinaid/tuitionfees.php
Northeastern provides merit scholarships to the top 10%-15% of their applicant pool ranging from 10K-28K, which still leaves your COA at ~40-50K. However, the school does offer some other merit scholarship programs that your daughter might be eligible for.
NU Scholarships: https://www.northeastern.edu/admissions/cost/scholarships/
Don’t worry too much about the constantly changing school choices; I did the same throughout high school and I don’t think I had finalized my school list other than Brown until the summer (and even then added a ton more during RD after being deferred.)
UMiami offers multiple full-tuition scholarships, although these are likely extremely competitive.
Miami Scholarships: https://admissions.miami.edu/undergraduate/financial-aid/scholarships/freshman/index.html
Syracuse has a ton of merit scholarships based on different criteria; you’ll have to take a look at each listing to determine which you are eligible for.
Syracuse Scholarships: https://financialaid.syr.edu/scholarships/su/
Hope that helps!
CU Boulder, Oregon and UWashington are extremely unlikely to be affordable for an OOS student, probably more like ~$50K per year. I don’t think these are even worth applying to.
Did you rule out Utah? Her stats aren’t good enough for the top merit scholarships, but she’d get something in year 1 to offset part of the OOS premium and then with instate tuition you can hit the $25K target in subsequent years. It’s no less ethnically diverse than CU Boulder and not strikingly different to Oregon either (and has more socio-economic diversity amongst the OOS students, both Boulder and Oregon are full of rich Californian kids).