Match Rising Senior: TX resident with 3.94/1560, under $60K for Cognitive Science, Psych, Pre-law(?) [home school, no rank]

Chance Me / Match Me!
1
  • US citizen
  • State/Location of residency: Texas
  • Type of high school : Homeschooled
  • Gender/Race/Ethnicity : Male (Indian heritage)

Intended Major(s) - Cognitive Science, Kinesiology, Neuroscience, possibly pre-law (not sure)

  • Unweighted HS GPA: 3.94/4.0 (Grades assigned by outside providers, or DE)
  • Class Rank: N/A
  • ACT/SAT Scores: 1560

Coursework
Loves to read; enjoys anything related to psychology, philosophy, history, politics.
AP Classes:
AP Human Geography - 5
AP World History - 5
AP Psychology - 5
APUSH - Awaiting scores
AP Bio - Awaiting scores
AP Calculus BC - Will take senior year

DUAL Enrollment:
English 1301, English 1302, Biology 1406, Chem 1405; will be taking English 2341, Physics 1401, and few more 2nd semester senior year

Honors Russian - 3 years and will continue over the next year

*Extracurriculars

~Rehab Aide : Helped an adult volunteer with rehab activities for a stroke induced injury of a neighbor. (40 hours)

~TIRR MEMORIAL HERMANN Hospital - Volunteer (85 hours and counting)

~Online AP Psychology Class - Teaching Assistant (Since August 2022)

~ TEST PREP FOUNDATION Media Intern (12 hours)
Created YouTube videos that lead the students in a step-by-step
process of drawing colorful mathematical geometric motifs, incorporating
appropriate challenge while keeping in mind the needs of the population being served.

~ Church SPECIAL NEEDS MINISTRY Buddy (60 hours)

~Responsibilities: Provided support to a child with special needs during
bible story, craft and interactive play.

~Product Photography and creating marketing materials for our family owned Etsy business (ongoing)

**Texas Youth & Government Program:
~Legislative coordinator for the Youth and Govt. program - 3 years running. During COVID he ran the Zoom meetings to train delegates in parliamentary procedures.
~Distinguished delegates and Distinguished Chairperson Awards at District and State Conference
~Has volunteered time to promote the program in local private schools by doing demo/mock legislative assemblies.
~Has been nominated for the POSSE scholarship by the YTL program (YMCA)

Hobbies -
~Nationally ranked Rubik’s speedcuber
~Origamist since he was 9 years old
~Loves strength training, exercise physiology, movement
~Excellent with Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, Camtasia

~Essays : Should be well written; he is a good writer
~LORs : He is a TA for his online AP Psychology class and will receive a strong recommendation
Russian Tutor will also give him a good recommendation; his Youth and Government program director will provide a wonderful recommendation for him.

Cost Constraints / Budget
up to $60 K/ year

Schools

  • Safety * (Will happily go to these schools) University of Houston, UT Dallas, TAMU
  • Likely - UT Austin
  • Match. - U Michigan?
  • Reach - No idea

Suggestions/advise welcomed! :slight_smile:

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Not u Michigan. Not $60k. It’s well over $70k and it’s a reach. A UF would be a lower cost march as an example. Or UGA.

You could go to well respected privates for $60k - like a Miami or Denver.

Or you can go to publics like Alabama for under $20k or Arizona for under 25k.

Other publics as well under $30k.

You can try I for a top lac for free like Johnson at W&L.

You are quite impressive. You can apply anywhere but what do you want size /environment wise and what do you truly want to spend.

Given the degree the were likely won’t matter - especially if going for law. You could spend $60k but don’t need to - not even close.

Good luck.

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Thank you! This thread was started by me for my son. He wants to go to a good program with lots of opportunities to explore. Would love to go to the North east because he believes he will get good research opportunities. W&L is Washington and Lee, correct? Law is a maybe, he is not quite sure really. I will certainly look at UF, UGA and others you have mentioned. Many thanks!

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Any flagship is a good program and most every school has opportunities to explore.

Most schools will have strict general Ed requirements. Some will have open curriculums like Brown, Rochester, Grinnell, Kalamazoo.

If you are full pay, again a lot depends on what you want to spend. You budgeted $60k but knowing you could spend $20k, $30k, $40k, would you rather do that ?

Yes W&L is Washington and Lee.

You get research anywhere - that’s not regional.

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I agree with your thought about the cost. I think that having an older sibling studying at Michigan, has given him (and admittedly me) an impression that he must aim for brand names. Seriously though, I do realize that if this is not his one and only degree, we need to find a good educational fit within a good price tag.
We did look at Brown and Rochester and liked the open curriculum because he loves to dabble and that would be great, but the price is beyond our means, let alone that his GPA is not high enough.

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As is Michigan. Rochester has aid.

Lots of very fine names have aid.

But there are opportunities everywhere, including research. And great professor relations. It’s up to the student to take advantage.

But a UF and UGA would be affordable higher rated publics. Va Tech has a neuro college. Pitt is solid.

But great schools like ASU or U of SC have top Honors Colleges etc.

My kid goes to an unranked and has lots of extra opportunities and prof interaction That’s up to the kid. How about Trinity or in the NE - Trinity in CT or Connecticut etc. these type schools have merit but you’ll be in 60s. LACs like Depauw, Kalamazoo, etc. have big merit.

Your kid can go amywhere. But do you want to spend $240k or $120k if you can.

Otherwise if it meets price - anywhere works. So schools with no merit won’t work.

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Thank you. I am going to explore UF, UGA programs. We might even have an opportunity to visit Pitt over the summer. That would be great! :slight_smile:

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You need to find out how class rank will be calculated for a home school student, since class rank is critical for Texas public university admission.

It does look like a Texas public university may assign a class rank that is the average class rank of students with the same SAT or ACT score as your student. Perhaps you may want to find out from each Texas public university what class rank a home school student with 1560 SAT will have.

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In the past when my older son (HS class of 2020) applied to UT Austin and was accepted with 1540 score, I tried to find out what rank they would assign. But they have a certain algorithm that the 2 folks I asked, were not able to tell me. I will try again though.

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Your son has very impressive stats and ECs. I think that he is likely to do well.

UVM (Vermont) has merit scholarships for out of state students, and their NPC does predict merit aid (accurately in our case). I am pretty sure that U.Mass Amherst also has merit aid for out of state students. Either is likely to be below $60k with merit aid. However, I do not know why someone from Texas would choose either of them over UT Austin if accepted to all three.

We found some of the private universities and/or more famous LACs in the Northeast to be quite expensive. NEU, BU, Bowdoin, Amherst College, and Williams College all for example would have been way over $60,000/year for us (two based on actual offers, the other three based on NPCs).

At least in our experience there seems to be quite a lot of good research opportunities at a wide range of universities. Both daughters for example got opportunities that were relevant to what they wanted to do (and in both cases what they did while an undergraduate student is related to what they have been doing since graduating with their bachelor’s degree). The same is true for both parents, but that was a long time ago. :wink:

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Can you clarify whether your family is eligible for any need-based financial aid? (I’m a little confused because you sound like a full-pay family that can afford 60K/year, but you also mention the Posse Scholarship which I thought was for students with financial need…)

For example, have you run the Net Price Calculator for Rice U? It’s just an example school, but their aid is very generous, so if you don’t get any aid there, you’re probably not getting any anywhere. Estimate Your Cost | Office of Financial Aid | Rice University

I ask because there are some great schools for CogSci that meet need, but don’t give merit aid and would be well over 60K at full pay. Vassar is one example. URochester was suggested above; they meet need but also give merit, and could potentially meet your budget with merit alone. But the full-pay COA is up to 86K/year now :sob: so you’d be looking for >26K/year in merit which is unusually high for them, although not unheard of. (My D17 was offered 18K/year, and most merit awards I heard about were closer to that.)

There are some great schools in the Northeast, but I don’t think they’re cornering the market on research opportunities. Some of the strongest research in CogSci is at UCSD, but that wouldn’t be in budget. The Claremont Colleges are excellent for CogSci too, but I don’t think there’s a path to under-60K on merit alone there for a guy. (A woman at Scripps can get up to half-tuition merit, but even that is creeping up on 60K out of pocket.)

My sense is that the TX public U’s will be hard to beat for you. UT Dallas is a great option. It’s a very strong school for STEM and CS; I’m not personally familiar with the CogSci program, but I’d expect the CS side of it to be very strong (and weakness on the psychology side isn’t typically a worry at any reputable school). Cognitive Science (BS) - UT Dallas 2022 Undergraduate Catalog - The University of Texas at Dallas

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A pretty similar substitute for the U of Michigan, which would fit just under the $60k budget, is the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

UW is really strong in the sciences (and most everything else…) and, like UMich, there would be a lot of research opportunities.

Here’s their COA page:

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Congratulations to your son on his strong academic profile. He sounds very interesting, and I look forward to hearing about his college journey.

As others have mentioned, research can be done anywhere in the country. Oftentimes, research can be even easier to access at a smaller school where one doesn’t have to compete for the best opportunities with grad students.

Some schools your family may want to consider include:

Binghamton (NY)
George Washington (D.c.)
Ohio State
U. of Arizona (with a very well-reputed honors college)
U. of Minnesota-Twin Cities
U. of Wisconsin-Madison

Does your son have any interest in smaller programs, like these?
Brandeis (MA)
Connecticut College
Dickinson ( PA )

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If the school might be affordable, you may want to look into the oldest cognitive science program, Vassar’s.

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Good suggestions as always!

OP may want to consider Oregon St as more of a safety and Rice (as mentioned above) plus Swarthmore as two excellent CS options that are more reachy.

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Rice has merit. Swat does not.

It sounds like - but not 100% sure - that the family is full pay but with the $60K budget.

Also, sounds like they are looking at bigger schools.

They can certainly find under $60K in LACs or schools like Trinity. Of course, Rice as well but would be less likely both admission and merit wise.

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Maybe misleading but Niche made it look like that they/Swarthmore are pretty liberal with financial aid and the cost seems to be at budget before any financial aid.

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Swat is $81K. Budget is under $60K.

Now a school - and it’s more regional - like Kalamzaoo has an open curriculum, has neuro, and would be under $40K.

Tuition, Housing, and Food Fees :: Student Accounts Office :: Swarthmore College

Neuroscience | Kalamazoo College – Academics (kzoo.edu)

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For a cognitive science degree, you might want to check out McGill. They have a great international reputation, love high-stats kids, aren’t holistic, are an easy application (no essays, no ECs) and for some degrees are surprisingly affordable – and Cognitive Science is one of those degrees. That’s because they charge different tuition depending on the degree, and Cog Sci is considered a joint “Bachelor of Arts and Science” degree which comes in with a tuition of 44k Canadian, which is 34k US right now. Room and board tend to run about 17k Canadian which is 13k US. I have heard it can be cheaper than that to live off campus which is allowed after the first year.

They have a high acceptance rate, but that is because most Canadians self-select when applying because they have minimum stats for acceptance so students who don’t meet those criteria don’t apply.

Plus, Montreal is a great city to be a college student in. And McGill gives a lot of AP credit, so it is possible to graduate in 3 years. However, it is a large university (may be too large for some) and I have heard that there is very little hand-holding in terms of navigating the system. (For all that, I have found them to be very helpful when I reached out to them as a parent when my son was applying a couple of years ago).

They also have some merit scholarships, and I think that US student loans can also be used for McGill, but best to double-check that.

| Student Accounts - McGill University

Undergraduate Fees 2023-2024 | Student Housing - McGill University

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Is there a reason Rice is not on your list as a reach? As someone else suggested I would run the NPC and see where it falls cost wise. With the Rice Investment they have very generous aid. Your child sounds like sort of the “quirky” types (i.e. interesting and different activities and interests) that Rice seems to like.