Ordinarily I would say that Purdue isn’t that generous with merit but they have a new scholarship for traditionally underserved populations:
https://www.purdue.edu/newsroom/releases/2020/Q3/purdue-draws-record-number-of-high-achievers-from-historically-underserved-populations-through-new-emerging-leaders-science-scholars-program.html?fbclid=IwAR20wB-UjAvoMi4yfm2OUkows204GEhzCsz_MEzpdeVh32bK8HMCSEJpH5U
PS. Let me know if your D has any Purdue specific questions. My D is a junior and having a great experience.
Thank you @PikachuRocks15 for the links - I was almost ready to throw out Wisconsin because I couldn’t find any merit aid info. I appreciate all the links you sent.
@Twoin18 I have mentioned Utah, several times but I think its not high on her list at this moment. But thanks for the reminder.
Thank you @momofsenior1 its also my alma mater <3
Love it there! Probably more than D21 at the moment 
GO BOILERS
OK, I am noticing that Wisconsin doesn’t seem that diverse based off the CDS. Could that be a benefit to my daughter? Are school always looking to up their URM ratios? I hope this question makes sense.
@stacysmom21 That’s probably a by-product of not being located on the coast, where state schools tend to be more diverse (CA, WA, NY, MA etc.) and being a state school that’s required to primarily admit In-State students (below article states the following: “Sixty-four percent of all undergraduates are Wisconsin residents or enrollees through the Minnesota reciprocity program, from whom the university receives in-state tuition amounts.”
However, UW Madison IS trying to increase their class diversity, as noted in a news article about the Class of 2023: https://news.wisc.edu/meet-the-class-of-2023/
Hope that helps!
Wisconsin lists ethnicity as considered in CDS C7.
Among state universities, ethnic diversity tends to be related to the ethnic diversity of college-bound in-state high school graduates. So it is not too surprising that University of Wisconsin looks different in this respect than University of Texas.
CU Boulder will cost about the same as Californoa schools. If she wants to be close to the big mountains for skiing or hiking check out Utah or Montana State. We live in Boulder and the ski kids generally go to one of those 2 or the smaller state schools like Mesa or Fort Lewis.
Oregon State might work in place of Oregon.
@AlwaysMoving Thank you. Is it because they have the same reputation of not giving merit to oos? Because stat wise she seems to be in a better place for Boulder than the CA schools.
Boulder gives little to merit - it’s a school for the well off OOS
Colarado State does give limited merit, but not enough to get down to Ole Miss/ ASU levels
Wyoming, Montana, Montana State are well priced to begin with, then also give merit
Utah also affordable as mentioned above
My D19 is a 2nd year biochemistry/psychology/neuroscience major at Miami OH. She is very happy there. Like a LAC, it has a pretty detailed core curriculum of humanities classes that everyone has to take but it also has an engineering school and research/science facilities that rival those at a big research university. It is a big enough school to have large departments with lots of professors doing different research, and because it doesn’t have a huge grad school, undergrads end up doing a lot of the hands on lab work that would be done by grad students at a typical state flagship. In her 2nd year, she is already working in a lab doing actual hands-on work (she assisted on a rat surgery last week) and she also has a paid job this year as an undergraduate TA for gen chem (again - few grad students mean undergrads get those opportunities that grad students would normally get at larger universities). While the school does have a lot of kids who just seem to be there for the greek life and parties, the ones who apply themselves and hustle have a world of opportunities thrown at them that they might never get at a larger or more prestigious/competitive school. There’s a reason Miami consistently ranks in the top 5 or 6 for “best undergraduate teaching.” I don’t know too much about the biology department specifically except for the fact that they offer a zoology major which is supposed to be one of the best zoology programs in the country and is a popular pre-med major.
Miami has a merit grid on their admissions page and while I don’t know how it works now that they are test optional, they stuck to it pretty well when my D applied. It is out of state for her but they gave her a total of 21500 in merit aid every year, renewable for 4 years , bringing her COA last year down to like $28Kish. Their on-campus room and board charges are IMO pretty steep and now that she’ s living off campus, I think she’ll be well under $25K COA for this and subsequent years. (Typically the school requires sophomores to live on campus, but this year they made a covid exception). Miami also has something called the tuition promise which means your tuition (and room/board rates if you stay on campus) are frozen for the whole 4 years you are there. That actually leads to a pretty significant savings over 4 years that I don’t think they advertise enough. I know the other schools she was considering all hike tuition every year and it is nice to know that her price will stay the same.
Campus is gorgeous. My d had a few specific requirements for colleges (had to have neuroscience major, could not be in a big city, and had to have a marching band that had a front ensemble) and Miami checked all the boxes, so she applied without ever having visited or knowing much about the school at all. When they came back with a great merit offer, she went to an admitted student day and fell in love the minute she set foot on campus. And for the size of the school (~17K undergrads), it really has a lot of facilities - we looked at similar size schools that had maybe 3 or 4 dining halls or places to eat on campus – Miami has probably 12-15. None of the dorms are huge towers - at most they are 3 floors high - and all of the buildings (from the original ones built in the 1800s to the ones built 2 years ago) have the quintessential college campus ivy-covered-red-brick look - aesthetically it is an absolutely beautiful campus. For comparison, she also applied and was admitted to UMass, UConn, U Delaware, and Virginia Tech…of those, Miami had the lowest COA after merit (Virginia Tech gave her NOTHING!). UConn, UDel and MIami admitted her to honors program, U Mass and VT did not. Her stats, for reference, were 1460SAT, 4.0 UWGPA, 4.8 WGPA, 7 APs with all 5’s on the exams.
Things I don’t like about Miami OH- intro class sizes can be large and advising is somewhat impersonal unless the student puts some effort into tracking down the right people to help. It’s in the middle of nowhere and getting there and back is a pain (people who live near airports where Southwest flies to Cincinnati seem much happier about the transportation situation, but alas, that is not us.) And that area of Ohio (maybe Ohio in general?) seems very embroiled in political bitterness over what should be a public health issue - the parents’ facebook page is full of virus deniers and people who think that kids should not have to be quarantined for a virus that “is not dangerous to 18-24 year olds”…and those parents’ attitudes have trickled down to a lot of the kids - the school had a huge outbreak when the off campus kids returned to town because kids just could not get it through their heads that they shouldn’t gather in groups and party because no one they knew was actually getting seriously ill (Again, this is not limited to Miami though – Covid policies and compliance seem to be a hot mess at pretty much every college – and the school responded by cracking down so recent case counts have gone way down.)
Oh one last downside - the merit scholarships don’t apply to summer or winter term courses - only 8 fall/spring semesters. This summer, D19 took 11 credits at the out of state per-credit rate and the cost was actually more than the previous fall/spring semesters cost with the room and board included after the merit aid. I think their OOS rate is like $1500/credit. If your kid isn’t trying to triple major, you shouldn’t need to take summer/winter term classes so this won’t be an issue, but it was painful for us to write that check. (There are also ways to make it cheaper by taking the classes through one of Miami’s branch campuses, but they didn’t have the classes she needed. You can also transfer in credits from your local community college or whatnot and they are very generous with AP credits – but again, with D19 trying to triple major, the classes she needs during summer are typically higher level things that are only offered at the main campus and can’t really be taken at a community college. )
Thank you @zozoty for the detailed feedback 
Update: daughter got admitted to U of A with auto 35K award (4.0GPA) putting our COA at $15Kish. That will be very hard to beat!!! She has applied to ASU, UofSC, UGA, Wisconsin, CO Boulder, Tenessee and has a few others almost ready to submit.
@sbdad12 wanted to take a moment here to thank you. I had not heard of Mercile J Lee until you mentioned it. Tonight my daughter was accepted to UW Madison and granted this full tuition award!!! CC rocks!!!
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Oh, wow, @stacysmom21! That’s great news! Congratulations.
I’m so glad that CC played a role in changing your daughter’s (and your family’s) life! She’s attending there, right? Or are you waiting for other offers?
I hope she enjoys Madison. Great school!
@stacysmom21
I second Wooster and Ursinus. Ursinus is in a small town but is just outside Philadelphia. It’s possible your D could play Volleyball at Ursinus if she wanted to.
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You sure did!!! Wisconsin is now the top ranked and lowest cost option and an amazing school. It was just a shock because we thought it was such a long shot that we weren’t even expecting it. We are going to try to take her to visit here soon so she can properly make this decision soon.
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