I am looking for mostly East Coast/Mid Atlantic schools that give generous merit aid, especially to out of state students in the case of non-PA schools. My stats are:
33 ACT
1380 new SAT (740 English, 640 Math, working on improving)
4.2 GPA
2 APs this year, 4 next
1 sport, key club, vocal ensembles, theater, NHS, community service at zoo and animal shelter
Hobart
Clark
Loyola MD
Muhlenberg
Dickinson
St Lawrence
What do you need your net costs to be?
The NE and east coast can be difficult places to find large merit (low net price) unless you’re a NMF.
How much will your parents pay each year?
What is your major and desired career?
Are you asking about public schools? Because “out of state” is irrelevant for private colleges and universities. And you need to define “generous.”
What is your intended major? What CAN you and your parents afford?
My planned major is environmental science. The most I could afford is $30,000. Public or private is irrelevant, but if I went out of state I would need scholarships for most bigger schools.
If your parents can only give you $15,000, where is the other $15,000 coming from?
Did you first write that your parents can give you $15k per year…and then edit?
If it’s true that your parents have said that they can provide $15k per year, then that is important info. You won’t be able to provide the other $15k.
It’s best to deal with facts so that you don’t end up either unable to afford your accepted schools or having to leave your school because you can’t come up with “your portion”. And since schools usually raise their prices each year, you may find that your gap will grow and grow.
With a major like enviromental science (rather than Enviromental Engineering), your income probably will not be high enough to pay back a bunch of loans during your early years of employment.
If your parents will pay $15k per year, then expect that you will only be able to contribute about $7k per year ($5k from loans, and $2k from summer earnings).
Depending on the type of environmental science you want, you might do better to look west and not east, or even, eek, in the Midwest. Colorado State, Oregon State, U of Wisconsin Stevens Point all have excellent environmental programs. Lots of the southwest schools too. Vermont is really expensive but does have some merit money. You’ll have to decide if you want location over money. You could also look at Maine.
If your parents can pay $30,000 a year…and you add $5500 to that, you could probably afford a SUNY as an OOS student. You will need a job to pay for personal expenses, books and transportation.
The cost of attendance at SUNY Binghamton for OOS students is just under $38,000 a year.
Of course, if your parents can only afford $15,000 a year like you originally posted…this would not be affordable.
The $15,000 from parents was correct, but they preferred me to not post that information. But oh well, it has now been addressed. Obviously $30,000 is absolute max with private loans (scary) and my own contributions. A price around $20k-$25k would be much prefered. Unfortunately this is a fraction of what many private and OOS schools cost, hense the merit scholarship search! And east coast is non-negotiable as I may loose that parent input altogether.
I would agree. Stay away from the private loans if possible.
So…you have $15,000 from your parents, plus $5500 Direct Loan…so $20,500.
What about Temple? You are from PA, right? It’s instate. I think you would get merit miney from them.
Another one is York College of PA. PM @fendergirl who is a grad. Again…I think you would get decent merit aid.
Women’s colleges? (unclear if applicable!) Would you consider West Coast LACs?
I would prefer a coed college. And no, the furthest west I would consider is Michigan! I have been looking at Temple, it is unfortunate that it is in such a bad area of Philadelphia. The parents are very resistant to that one. @thumper1 @PNWedwonk
Temple is an urban campus. We know students there who love it.
What exactly are your parents looking for? It sounds like they already have a college choice for you…and maybe you aren’t thrilled with it. They have given you some restrictions. No urban areas it sounds like. Less than $30,000 a year net cost. East coast.
What else?
Is Ohio too far afield? What about Denison or Otterbein? I think you would get good aid at both.
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The $15,000 from parents was correct, but they preferred me to not post that information. But oh well, it has now been addressed. Obviously $30,000 is absolute max with private loans (scary) and my own contributions. A price around $20k-$25k would be much prefered. Unfortunately this is a fraction of what many private and OOS schools cost, hense the merit scholarship search! And east coast is non-negotiable as I may loose that parent input altogether.
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Ok…assume that you have $15k-20k per year to put towards college. (you won’t want to borrow much because as a young graduate, your earnings will be supporting yourself).
With a 33 ACT, there are merit scholarships, but you really need a “full tuition” award so that your family contribution can cover room, board, books, fees, travel and personal expenses.
Exactly how far west and how far south will you go. (Please explain to your parents that you need to be able to go where the money is. Frankly, I think that once they see that the money offers are larger outside of the NE areas, they’ll be open to a greater geography).
As a practical matter, the northeast is generally the most expensive part of the country to live (apart from some areas of the west coast) and the financial aid at a lot of the good NE LAC’s is modest. If you are trying to avoid an in-state school you might need to extend your radius to find a good academic-financial match.
Look at the links in this thread and check the colleges to see if the awards are still,available.
Rowan University offered my OOS D $15K merit for 32ACT, 3.9 U/W GPA. It is in the nice suburban town of Glassboro in NJ, close enough to Philly for internships or visiting. Since cost is approx $33K tuition, fees, room and board, it might work financially.
They offer an environmental studies major and also civil and environmental engineering, There seems to be a lot of investment in the campus, with new construction and expanded programs, I think Rowan is overshadowed by other NJ publics such as Rutgers, but is growing in reputation.
My daughter will be attending Temple University in the fall with a full tuition presidential scholarship. The campus is really very nice, and they work very hard to keep students safe, with escorts available, and lots of security personnel. If you can get your parents to visit, they may be pleasantly surprised, as we were.
You have not mentioned your EFC. I would suggest running the net price calculator on any NE LAC of interest. With the high sticker price you may qualify for both need and merit aid at some. Still, they are very unlikely, most of them, to come in at or under 30k. 35-45 is more likely and that’s with merit aid. I assume your parent’s plan to take a loan for the difference as all you have is 20,500 with your parents 15k and the 5500 you’ll be able to take in loans yourself.
In theory you can stretch that with summer savings and a job during the school year to maybe 25k max, but in practice, it would be ideal not to work your freshman year at a minimum
The big money is in the south and midwest and rockies. NE and West Coast are far less generous. Ohio University may have some options that would work, especially through their honors college I think and Maine did roll out a new Flagship tuition match program for all states that is quite good so I’d look at that. On the LAC side, McDaniel and Ursinus might be options.
As others mentioned, factor in a rise in costs over the years.
The Maine option might be helpful. What it does is allow students to attend U of Maine for the cost of their instate public university. So this student would be paying the same cost as attending Penn State.
To the OP…is Penn State affordable? If so…are you planning to apply there?
And if so, you could attend University of Maine for the same cost.