I can definitely handle undergraduate tuition (10-20k/year) by scholarship, little help from parents and fafsa. But medical schools cost like 40-50k/year, do med schools offer bigger financial aid because this is the only thing I can count on. my parents are poor med schools are hard so scholarships will be impossible. Thanks for the help!
Some need based grants are available but most likely it will be loans, BIG loans.
For most med schools you’re on your own for paying. Loans
Students who are admitted to combined MD/PhD programs are more likely to get aid because there will be money for the PhD part of their program. So if you do finish college with tippy-top grades that could be an option for you.
@happymomof1 so no good grades no loans?
So no good grades, no Med school so no loans.
OP, I wouldn’t worry about Med school tuition until you are accepted into an Undergrad program and excel in your classes there. If you cannot make the cut with your grades as an undergrad, Med school may be out of the picture.
"I can definitely handle undergraduate tuition (10-20k/year) by scholarship, little help from parents and fafsa. "
What does FAFSA have to do with it? It’s simply a form you submit to the college to see what they deem your family can afford. FAFSA isn’t a scholarship. Previously, you were talking about GW. Has this changed? You’re expecting a 10-20k/year scholarship? Already? That’s quite unusual
Not just tippy top grades. You need all the bells and whistles of pre-meds PLUS extensive research experience. The national MD acceptance rate is around 45%, for MSTP it’s 10%. Even if you go into MD/PhD with no desire to do research longterm, the 3-5 years of peak earning salary and investments that you forgo outweigh the savings - especially if you’re not in an MSTP where you could easily get 0 aid for medical school, just a stipend during the PhD (and the admissions rate including the non MSTPs is still only 33%).
40-50k is also usually the private school rate. Public school COA can be much lower. In fact the majority of public school COAs are below 40k with Texas A&M at the bottom with 16.5k: https://services.aamc.org/tsfreports/report.cfm?order_by=tot_res_fee_sort&year_of_study=2016&select_control=PUB
There is some merit and need based aid in medical school, but no where near as prevalent as it is for undergrad.
There are couple “free” medical schools. Also, there are rare but existing scholarships.
While MD/PhD is preferred by some, I do not look at it as free. You are loosing MD salary for additional years of schooling. I do not know how many additional years in MD/PhD vs MD, but if it is 2 - 3 years, then it is about $250 x (2 or 3) = $500k - $750k of lost MD salary. Actually, I do not see “free” medical school as being free either. At least one of the two I have mentioned, requires 5 years instead of regular 4 years. So, one additional year of school is a lost physician salary of roughly $250k. While there is no tuition, I do not call it exactly “free”.
In regard to scholarships that I also mentioned, they are very hard to obtain even if you are the top candidate. Actually, the adcom of medical school that D. eventually attended, called D’s pre-med advisor, expressing their wish that she choose their school despite of their inability to award the scholarship to her for which they apologized. There were just too many applicants with Master Degrees from top schools, PhD’s (including one from Harvard), lawyers,…etc. that simple college graduate with simple college GPA of 4.0 could not compete.
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My parents will not give me a single dollar to pay for my college education but I have a good GPA and a good SAT score. Is there a chance for me? I can just say my parents are nearly broke and Im living in my brother’s house hes a programmer so i guess he makes 60k/year with 4(sometimes 5) people in my family. I want to go to George Washington and I heard it has a huge endowment. Would I be able to get a decent scholarship and most of all a loan (GW costs 50-60k/year). And I wanna go to med school after 4 years of college. Thank you so much for your help! This is my future!
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Is it true that your parents won’t pay anything?
I think you may be naive about having enough funding for undergrad.
Most schools do not meet need.
Getting outside scholarships for all 4 years of college is extremely rare…extremely!
FAFSA is for federal aid and isn’t much money at all.
Are your parents low income? What is their income? Are they self-employed? Do they have any assets?
Your aid will not at all be based on your brother’s income, only your parents’ income and assets.
What schools are your financial safeties? These are schools that you know FOR SURE that you will have all costs covered by ASSURED merit for your stats and other assured aid or family funds??
@mom2collegekids my parents are close to going broke. I don’t know what colleges I’m applying to yet.
Op
Don’t worry about the med school now, it’s at least 4 years away for you. You need to concentrate on getting the best college with the lowest cost possible and when you get there you should shoot for all As.
@dafatdabook Do you mean that they’re low income or that they have a lot of debt?
Again…make sure you apply to affordable schools…not just ones that “might” be affordable. You need to identify SAFETiIES that are affordable.