D wants to go away for school, in state school is U of Wisconsin Madison. She has no interest in going there because she doesn’t want to go where tons of kids from HS are going. She’d like to go to Northwestern, WashU, Notre Dame, did a summer session at UChicago and loved it, still looking at others. We won’t qualify for any need based aid but we can probably swing about 45-50k a year. 70-75k just seems absurd for tuition and that is what most schools are projecting we will pay. She’ll probably go on to school in some capacity so I’d hate to have her crippled in debt out of undergrad. Her stats are: 4.1 gpa, 31 act lots of good EC. Any suggestions? This is our first time through the process, any help is greatly appreciated.
Your D may get some merit to Uconn, TCNJ, the SUNYS, and Ohio State. She may also want to check out Clemson, Delaware and the U of South Carolina. Although these are all great state schools, I am not convinced it’s necessary to go there in order to avoid running into a few HS classmates at Wisconsin ( many students feel this way). UW is big enough where she will meet lots of new kids, and it’s a very, very desirable school that attracts many from out of state.
The private schools on her list are very big reaches for acceptance unless she offers something very unique and sought after that you did not mention. You can visit Tulane and Syracuse- they may offer her some merit ( not sure). In my opinion if you need merit money to private schools, she is going to have to research some that are much lower in the rankings than the schools listed. Good luck!
I would see if she can bring her ACT score up. Agree with @twogirls, those schools on her list are very big reaches. What is her unweighted GPA? What does she want to study?
There are LOTS of colleges that cost less than $50,000 a year.
- The schools you listed in your OP don't really give much for merit aid. Chicago gives some...but really...those schools give need based aid only. Any merit aid they give is highly competitive.
- University of Wisconsin has TONS of undergrad students TONS. There will be tons of students there from other states and NOT from your daughter's high school. I went to a large public Midwest university where lots of kids from my HS attended...and I NEVER saw those folks...unless I wanted to. I keep in tpich with several friends from undergrad....and none of them went to my HS.
Does your daughter realize how BIG UW-Madison is?
- She should take the ACT again...or take the SAT. A 31 ACT score is a fine score...but it's not going to Net her significant merit aid at most competitive colleges...which seem to be what you are looking at.
- The best aid comes directly from the colleges themselves. So...look for places where she would,be competitive for merit aid (but really...a higher ACT would be a good thing in this regard...).
- No one has to attend a college that costs $70,000 a year or so...and there are plenty of fine colleges with a price tag that is MUCH lower.
- You have a $45,000 to $50,000 budget that you can pay....plus your daughter can take the Direct Loan each year. Your daughter is VERY lucky that you have this high amount to contribute to college costs.
Look at the SUNY schools. Even at OOS costs, they are close to your price point.
Look at Miami University, Ohio.
Look at the Colleges that Change Lives. Most of those will be in your price point.
There are schools in the south where your daughter would perhaps garner some merit aid…or where costs are lower anyway. University of Alabama, University of South Carolina, for example.
Does Wisconsin participate in an academic common market? If so…what about Minnesota?
There are some competitive private universities that DO gove merit aid…but in my opinion…her ACT would need to be higher to be competitive for these awards.
What does she want to study?
You are potentially looking at paying a large premium so your daughter can avoid a very fine university for the simple reason (according to you) that she “doesn’t want to go where tons of kids from HS are going.” From my outside perspective, this just doesn’t make sense.
Lots of good advice here. Is all of Wisconsin off limits? Lawrence and Beloit are good for merit aid close to home on the CTCL list. The College Solution book and website will help you find good choices for merit aid as well.
Is there a major or area of study in mind?
She’s currently undecided in the area of study. She’ll be taking the ACT again in September, hopefully she’ll pick up the score some. I’ve probably over simplified the aversion to Madison. There are lots of factors involved, not just classmate avoidance. I appreciate all the information and suggestions, it’s very helpful. Thanks so much. Please keep weighing in if something else occurs to you.
Confusing… OP (a parent) comes back with a different user name, which had previously been used to post as a student.
@BellnapPoint nothing sinister, just don’t have 100 different personal email addresses, we do share an account. Just a parent asking questions. Thanks for pointing it out though.
Not saying it’s sinister, just confusing. But you are using two different accounts in this thread: TREKfam (original post) and kythan. It would make sense for the parent to use one of those and the student to use the other.
I don’t think that two people or more sharing an account is allowed by the terms of service, and it certainly does make it harder to figure out who is saying what. And you don’t need 100 different personal email addresses to have two separate accounts here.
Ok, I jumped on using a different device not realizing it was logged in as my D. Mea culpa. Your vigilance is noted. Back to my original questions/concerns please…thank you.
you may want to schedule an overnight at U of Wisconsin Madison. Contact admissions to see if she can attend some Thursday or Friday classes and then spend the night. A lot of times, spending time with existing students and sleeping over changes that “I have not interest in X school” to "wow, it classes were so interesting and the kids so friendly:, etc.
Great thought, thank you.
For starters, your D can look into schools with a lower COA. For merit to any top 20-ish school, she will need to raise her test scores significantly (and, as others have pointed out, she probably needs to raise it even to be considered for admission to some of the schools on her list as they are reaches for anyone, even with high stats). To get merit, your D will have to go a few notches down the prestige ladder.
Kiplingers publishes a yearly list of best values in colleges and universities. You can access it by type of school (public vs. private vs. LAC) and sort by COA.
Also, the NY Times has an interactive list of schools that offer merit aid, but it hasn’t been updated since 2012. You can sort by amount of merit aid and percent of students that receive merit and it will give you an idea as to how many or how few students get merit. A school like Johns Hopkins may offer an average of $30K in merit, but less than 1% of incoming freshman receive merit aid. A better bet might be Tulane, where 30% of incoming students receive merit, with an average of $20K in merit scholarships. It may provide a good place to start:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/07/08/education/edlife/8edlife_chart.html
(Again, these stats are not current, so take them with a grain of salt. For more recent data, you’ll need to check the Common Data Set (CDS) for schools you are considering.)
Another useful tool that puts together CDS data is the collegedata.com website. You can look at the money matters section and look for information about non-need based awards. Here, for example, is slightly more recent data for Tulane:
http://www.collegedata.com/cs/data/college/college_pg03_tmpl.jhtml?schoolId=1555
University of Minnesota-Twin Cities; UW-La Crosse; UW-Oshkosh; UW-Eau Claire; UW-Whitewater; Beloit; Lawrence; University of Vermont (merit aid will bring down the high OOS cost).
University of Wisconsin, Madison has 6,300 freshmen and and over 31,000 undergrad students.
There is no way that they are all going to be from your daughter’s high school. Even if there are 1000 kids from her high school attending there will still be 5300 that she does not know.
At the end of the day, you need to set some financial parameters. I think giving her a $200,000 budget is extremely generous. I also feel that in order to get big merit, she will need a retake and bring her scores to at least a 32.
You already know that you are going to be full pay for the schools at the top of the list. You state that they are not financially feasible options for your family (and they are an admissions reach for her).
She needs to find something that she loves about Madison, because she will need a financial safety. The worse thing is her her to be shut out, with out any options or to be accepted someplace that she is not thrilled to attend. I guess it is all about perspective because there are a lot of NYC kids who would love to attend Wisconsin, but the OOS price tag takes it off of the table
If I had a dollar for every kid I hear who gives the old excuse ‘too many people from my high school go there’…!!
@Madison85 --seriously! My own daughter was that way and I forced her to apply to our in-state options. After a tour at both schools she was able to see she could make her own way and never even really see the students she was concerned about. It’s a lame excuse for what could be a super $$$$$ college career going OOS unless one does their research.
Funny story: I attended my 30th high school reunion and found out there were two fellow classmates who attended the same university I did and I never knew lol!
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in state school is U of Wisconsin Madison. She has no interest in going there because she doesn’t want to go where tons of kids from HS are going. She’d like to go to Northwestern, WashU, Notre Dame, did a summer session at UChicago and loved it, still looking at others. We won’t qualify for any need based aid but we can probably swing about 45-50k a year. 70-75k just seems absurd for tuition and that is what most schools are projecting we will pay.
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I know that kids say this, but it’s generally BS. Kids say this to pressure parents to pay more and let them go elsewhere.
Unless you live within commuting distance to UWMadison, and/or your DD’s high school is super-huge, then it’s very unlikely that “tons of kids from HS are going.” The main reason is that either many kids aren’t accepted or their parents can’t afford to pay the bill. Your DD may be hearing that many are going to APPLY…that’s not the same as attending.
Also, univs are much bigger than HS, and because of majors, former high school students rarely see their old HS classmates. This is especially true when a student comes in with AP credits and moves onto courses within the major. Even when 1XX classes are taken, often there are 20+ different sections offered, so again, lessening the chances of seeing former classmates.
That said, is it really a big deal to occasionally see a former classmate when virtually all of her other college classmates will be new to her??
At my high school, the ultimate was to go to Madison. This was many years ago, but we had about 500 kids graduate (one of the biggest high schools in the state). About half didn’t go to college, and of the half that did, about half went to the UW in our town. Another good chunk went to technical colleges in the area, and the rest to schools throughout Wis and Minn. About 50 went to Madison, and those were by far the top students. I really can’t imagine any high school in WI sends more than 200 students per year to Madison,and I really doubt it is even that high. We all loved having our hs classmates around, whether it was at the local school or Eau Claire or Madison.
But the OP is looking for schools that are on the level of U Chicago or ND that don’t cost that much. Hmm. I think you are going to have to find schools that give merit. How about Tulane, Richmond, U of Denver? You are going to have to give a lot more information, like size, location, majors, co-ed or women’s colleges, LACs or universities, STEM or liberal arts? There are a lot of LACs that cost less than $50k, but they are much smaller, like Rhodes, Centre, Knox.