Anybody have any recommendations for schools offering sizable merit scholarships (30k+/yr)?
Now how would folks make that suggestion for you without knowing your stats…and what you can afford for a net cost.
A $30,000 scholarship at a college that costs $35,000 will leave you with a net cost of $5000.
A $30,000 scholarship at a college that costs $70,000 will leave you with a net cost of $40,000.
So…what can you afford to pay per year?
What are your SAT or ACT scores and your GPA?
Also, you are a HS sophomore…get the very best grades you can get…and the very best ACT or SAT you can get…
I could pay $40,000 per year at most. I got a 1470 on the PSAT, but that was without any studying so I can definitely do better. I currently have a GPA of 4.4, which, at my school, means perfect grades in all honors classes. My extra-curriculars are a bit weak, but acceptable.
$40K/year is a great number and will give you many, many options. What is your intended major? Did you look through the pinned thread in this forum for merit $?
So…are you saying you are only looking at $70,000 a year colleges that can give you $30,000 a year in aid?
I would suggest that you start by researching colleges that are within your $40,000 a year price range. This might include your instate public universities.
Look also at the SUNY schools which might come in at your $40,000 price point especially if you include the $5500 Direct Loan.
Does your state participate in any academic common market? If so…check out college in that.
It sounds like you are only looking at expensive and competitive private universities. So…first check to see if they even offer merit aid. Many don’t. Some do.
But really until you have a SAT or ACT score, and your junior year GPA, it’s going to be difficult to even guess if you will be a competitive admit for the private schools that DO offer merit.
What colleges are you thinking about. In another older thread, you mention University of Chicago. Another mentions Notre Dame. Both do have a very very limited number of highly competitive merit awards…highly competitive.
I’m intending to major in economics. I’m mostly interested in small, liberal arts colleges, but I understand that only a handful offer merit aid. I am also looking at a few large, public universities as backup options.
Which state are you in? Depending on your state and on how your score was distributed between EBRW and Math, that PSAT of 1470 could mean that you are a National Merit semifinalist or not. While the National Merit scholarships are pretty modest, many universities will offer very good scholarships to National Merit semifinalists, finalists, and Scholars.
As far as I know, only Macalaster of the “top” LACs provides relatively large merit scholarships.
@bigmood There are many good liberal arts colleges and smaller universities that offer generous merit scholarships that might get you within striking distance of your 40K budget. This is based on our Midwest-centered college search that is now two years old, but here are some options: Macalester and Dickinson (20K merit), Denison (up to full tuition), Grinnell up to 1/2 tuition, St Olaf and College of Wooster (up to half of cost of attendance), , Oberlin (up to about 30K) Lafayette (up to full tuition). Kenyon offers some merit but not sure how much. A bit lower in rank but still very fine schools: Lawrence, Beloit, Knox, Earlham, and many other Colleges that Change Lives schools (ctcl.org).
If you are female, there is merit at Mt Holyoke, Bryn Mawr, and Smith.
@thumper1 mentioned that you were looking at Chicago and Notre Dame. Mid-sized research universities which offer large merit awards include Case Western, Wash U St Louis, Vanderbilt, Rice, Emory, Tulane, American, USC, George Washington, U of Richmond, Fordham, and U of Rochester. Check their websites for particulars as not all will get you to your budget target. USC and Fordham value NMF.
The largest awards from these schools are generally by separate application and are EXTREMELY competitive.
Good luck.
@MWolf I’m a sophomore right now, but I do think I’ll likely be a semifinalist or finalist next year.
“I’m mostly interested in small, liberal arts colleges”
What is your home state?
We live in the northeast of the US (and yes we are about to get a lot of snow). One daughter wanted small schools such as a liberal arts college. In our corner of the US most of the well known LACs offer need based aid, but do not offer merit based aid. I ran the NPC on Bowdoin, Wellesley, Amherst College, Williams, Colby, and a couple of other schools and got somewhat unpleasant results. One daughter was offered a pretty good merit scholarship from Bennington College. We also found some very good small schools in eastern Canada which are under your budget of US$40,000 even without a scholarship, and which do offer some merit scholarships for international students.
Of course your results from the NPC might differ from ours. Have you run this to see if you would qualify for need based aid? At least a few schools (UVM comes to mind) will estimate merit aid on their NPCs as well.
If you are a HS sophomore, you have no way of knowing your NM status…at all.
Your sophomore PSAT score doesn’t count for anything if you plan four years of high school attendance. It’s a good baseline…but it does NOT count towards NMF status.
You will take the PSAT for NM consideration in October of your HS junior year. You will then need to have a sufficiently high SAT score, and all grades to qualify as a finalist…which you won’t know for sure until your senior year.
With regards to aid, net price calculators and the like…you are starting college in fall 2021, right. The net price calculators are currently set for students starting college in fall 2019. Your 2021-2022 financial aid forms will use 2019 income…and you don’t even know that yet. Financial aid policies can change…so what is there in 2019 might not be the case in 2021. And costs will certainly increase.
Illinois is my home state and I’d prefer to go to college elsewhere. I would not qualify for need-based aid except for at the most exceptionally generous schools (Harvard, Princeton, etc), where I likely will not be offered admission.
You were given some schools to research above, I will suggest a few more. My daughter has been granted very generous aid at Ohio Wesleyan and Manhattan College with COA well below $40 k per year. Your stats will likely be superior. Drexel also seems to give good merit aid albeit was not adequate in my daughter’s case. Ursinius, Clark, Susquehanna and Quinnipiac might be a few other schools for you to research. None of these are as selective as Norte Dame et all but they are still good schools and will likely be within budget.
Ohio University, Miami University of Ohio, Dayton University, U Scranton, Case Western might give enough merit for a 1400 plus SAT score to be affordable.
Check with your parents to find out what they can for sure afford to pay per year.
So…most important question to get answered…what WILL your parents pay annually for you to attend college when the time comes. Find out the answer to that.
@thumper1 $40,000/yr at most
So…if your parents are willing to pay $40,000 a year…there are PLENTY of colleges within that price point. Start with your instate flagship university. Add the $5500 Direct Loan and you could just about cover the SUNY schools even as OOS.
No one…repeat…NO ONE has to go to a $70,000 a year college to be successful…and especially if that is not affordable.
If your stats DO end up being as high as you hope, you could look at some colleges with guaranteed merit aid for your stats…BUT as a sophomore…you don’t have the info for that…yet.
Hendrix College has competitive merit scholarships, up to full ride:
Washington and Lee has the Johnson scholarship:
If you do well on your NM, U of Minnesota Twin Cities is an excellent choice, if you don’t want to go to UIUC or another state school. The full price with room and board is a bit more than $40,000, but my kid was offered $15,000 a year aid off the bat, for being a NM semifinalist who was almost certainly a finalist. I’m sure that a bit of haggling would have increased that amount. So you could end up paying less than $30,000 a year. Macalaster has good merit aid, and they are an excellent LAC. Some good universities in the Southeast and Arizona have full tuition scholarships for NM finalists.
If you already have 1470 on your PSAT 10, there is a very good chance that your PSAT/NMSQT selection score will be high enough so that you’ll be a NM semifinalist, and proceed to finalist (my kid’s score of 1480, SI of 221 was enough in Illinois).
So expand your ECs (you’re just a Sophomore yet), keep up your good work in school, and check back in here early in your Senior year. You seem to be on track, so keep up the good work, and put aside thoughts of “Which colleges should I apply to” for now. Suffice to say that, if you continue as you are, the list will be long enough that you’ll need to put most of your thought into culling it rather than filling it.