<p>I'm looking for matches currently. So many colleges, so little time.
Current reaches : Rice, Northwestern, Brown. --> will prob faint if I get in.</p>
<p>I'm looking for a school with a nice, large campus -- lots of green so I can frolic around. Not in the middle of nowhere though, civilization + malls please. </p>
<p>An eccentric student body with a sense of humor/outgoing personalities that don't study 24/7 and know how to enjoy college life. But at the same time, they can study and participate in semi-intellectual discussions. With a decent Asian population too. :P My HS is about 60% Asian so I've gotten used to the yellow. </p>
<p>A school that is generous with financial aid for a family that makes approx 48k a year. It'd be a plus if the school was relatively well known -- for my parents sake. </p>
<p>And last but not least, a school I have a reasonable shot at getting into -- 60% + :O </p>
<p>Asian female - NY. GPA : 92.6 UW, 93.9 W. (what is that out of 4.0?)
Sats : 600/700/640 (1940) - first time. Will make it my mission to increase to 2150 by Oct.
Class Rank : ___/1150. I have no clue, less than 250 for sure.
Mediocre ECs, no sports. NHS, beta NHS, orchestra, and a few others. Volunteer @ library and hospital. Approx 300 hours.
Major : biochem (prob premed) </p>
<p>*A school that is generous with financial aid for a family that makes approx 48k a year. It’d be a plus if the school was relatively well known – for my parents sake. *</p>
<p>It’s very hard to find match/safeties that are generous with FA, since lower ranking schools generally don’t have the endowments to help much with need.</p>
<p>What is your home state? </p>
<p>If you get your scores up, you might be able to get a good scholarship to a match/safety school.</p>
<p>However, finding one with a highish Asian community is also going to be a problem. Those aren’t usually match/safeties with good aid.</p>
<p>I live in New York. :] And I just want to have less than 30k in debt when I graduate. :o
Please don’t suggest CUNY, I would prefer leaving the city, the state if possible. o_o </p>
<p>Well it doesn’t have to be that high, just not non-existent. I’m content with 10-20% Asian. ;D</p>
<p>Stats very similar to mine, here’s where I got in: I’d recommend SUNY Buffalo and SUNY Binghamton. Maryland and Delaware are good options, but they don’t give much aid.</p>
<p>You can also check out Siena College, might be lacking in the Asian department but it’s a good school with a real solid bio/pre med program (you can get direct admission to Albany med). Campus is beautiful, and you’d qualify for the Presidential Scholarship, which is 8,000+ per year.</p>
<p>FYI, you can forget about Rice, Northwestern, Brown.</p>
<p>Unless you get your SAT or ACT up high enough for some good merit somewhere, your affordable match/safeties will likely be a SUNY…so you can get out of NYC. </p>
<p>With TAP, Pell, work-study, and a small student loan, you should be able to afford a SUNY.</p>
<p>Going OOS will be a problem for match-safeties because you’ll lose TAP and you won’t likely get the aid or scholarships to meet need (unless you get your scores up).</p>
<p>If you get your SAT up to the 2100+ range you will have more options. Take the ACT, too. The math on the ACT is said to be easier. :)</p>
<p>Because your reaches will be big reaches as an Asian female from NY not in the top 10%, even with a 2150, I think your match schools will be extremely important. The women’s colleges like Smith, Holyoke, Bryn Mawr, may make a lot of sense here. They will work with a 2150, they offer good aid and don’t have a slew of Asian women from NY applying.</p>
<p>It will be very hard to impossible to meet your requirements for match schools. Given that financial aid is essential, getting what you otherwise want is improbable and it would be a good idea to get your hands around how few schools meet need and decide within what’s possible what is really important to you.</p>
<p>Or you can follow the advice above and seek merit aid, but the schools will be lower ranked.</p>
<p>I know my reaches are very high, but Rice is the only one I really want to go to. I don’t really wanna forget about it, I’d rather try and get rejected. lol. </p>
<p>@redroses, oh women’s colleges? hmm, I don’t know if I could handle being in a school of all girls. Sharing the bathroom, and PMS time. <em>shivers</em> </p>
<p>And I KNOW I can get my SAT score up. Positive it will at least pass 2100.
I definitely need more research in this area then. What a stressful time. :[ </p>
<p>Thank you for all your help! it’s always nice to get a reality check. :O</p>
<p>If you really wanna go there you have nothing to lose by applying. I was just going by my stats because they’re very similar to yours and I know I wouldn’t have had any shot at those.</p>
<p>If money is an issue then it looks like in state is the way to go. It’s depressing, but I was forced away from my top 2 because of money and I’m happy with my decision. My suggestions still stand: Buffalo, Binghamton and Siena, and I’ll also add New Paltz and Geneseo.</p>
<p>Not sure how it is for OOS, but it sounds like Rutgers could be a match or safety if you aren’t that receptive to SUNYs (although a SUNY would be a much better deal financially). Rutgers has a large Asian population and a big greenish campus.</p>
<p>If you need a lot of financial and merit aid, you need to go somewhere less well known, that doesn’t have a lot of Asians and/or may be rural. Those are the places that pay up for talent.</p>
<p>Example: Asian son got excellent merit aid at Grinnell-rural, 8% Asian, and everyone asks “Cornell?” But they have a lovely campus, outstanding sciences, excellent mentoring, small classes, a huge endowment and he’s loving every minute of it.</p>
<p>Go ahead an apply to your dream schools-but figure out what compromises you can live with in order to get the $$$.</p>
<p>The women’s colleges are an excellent suggestion; also, definitely apply to Rice if that’s your dream…you’ve got to be in it to win it.
Tulane might be an option and they are generous with aid.
Penn State
Towson
UMaryland
American (also generous with aid)
George Washington</p>
<p>Good call with Tulane, college4three. I am going to second the Grinnell and in that light also throw out Macalaster and Carleton. These are phenomenal LAC (that you can tell your parents are highly selective), but are also generous with aid. This is a tough situation since you don’t want to go to a local public. Maybe even look at Richmond.</p>
<p>Have you looked into Questbridge? I think it may be too late to apply to that, but that would of been a huge help.</p>
<p>Might want to look into various tech schools (RPI, RIT, etc.). They tend to have decent asian populations, so you’re good there. Also, many tend to be well more than half male, so a women studying biochem is desirable and may have a good opportunity for aid.</p>
<p>Thanks everyone! I’ll definitely start looking into those schools. :] <em>wiki</em> </p>
<p>@mom how much would I need to pull my scores up for “big merit”? And how much on ACT would qualify for merit aid? </p>
<p>And at a co-ed school, even though I’d be living with females, outside of my dorm I wouldn’t be fully surrounded by them. Since I grew up with all sisters, I’m not really a big fan of all-girls. :O</p>
<p>To get about a $25k per year scholarship to Tulane (which doesn’t cover half of COA), you typically need to have about a 2130+ SAT or around a 32 ACT </p>
<p>Since the COA at Tulane is $54-55k per year, you can see that you’d still need to cover the other $30k per year.</p>
<p>For some other schools, the needed scores for big merit can range from 1350 SAT (M+CR scores) to 1450 (M+CR scores) or higher (or ACT 30, ACT 32, or higher). </p>
<p>Of course, you have to look at each scholarship offer in relationship to the cost of the school. </p>
<p>A school that only costs - say $35k - per year to attend will be cheaper to attend with a $20k//year scholarship than a school that costs $55/year that gives you a $25k/yr scholarship.</p>
</p>
</p>