Mid-size schools with merit financial aid?

We’re trying to pinpoint some schools for my daughter in the 4,000 – 15,000 student range. One of our goals is to find places in that range where she’s likely to be admitted (obviously!) and receive some merit financial aid. She’s going in undeclared, so we’re not obsessed with particular majors or programs. Thus far, we’re impressed with Butler, Denver, Dayton, and St. Louis University – these seems like quality schools that offer decent merit aid for students with 30+ ACT. Are there any other schools we might look at? (Villlanova, Santa Clara, and Case Western also are possibilities.)

What are her stats? (GPA, rank, test scores, etc.) What is the budget?

3.75 GPA – will have 8 AP courses
34 ACT
Elite athlete (unfortunately in figure skating, which does not attract scholarship $)

We probably don’t want to spend much more than $30-$35K.

Butler and Case Western will be more like $40K-$45K after merit aid: Butler offer almost everyone about $16K-$18K, Case Western go up to half tuition on their auto-merit scale (with a few larger competitive scholarships).

If she likes Dayton, take a look at Xavier or Marquette.

Univ Cincinnati (public) popular in our area, as sticker price starts off lower for out of state kids than many regular priced privates, and I believe they give merit, though someone else should chime in.

Miami of Ohio is a mid-sized public school which gives good merit and seems to have very happy kids.

I agree with Miami of Ohio. She could get decent merit there. Maybe Pitt?

Miami (OH) was her top choice for awhile, but she didn’t cooled a little after visiting. I’ve thought about Cincy and Pitt – good suggestions! I know that Pitt’s merit $ has decreased over the years.

Right – I see where only 3% of incoming students get merit aid at Pitt.

Another vote for Miami, Cinci, and Pitt

Miami sounds good

University of San Diego!

@sybbie719 or @MaineLonghorn please move this thread to the FA Scholarships forum. TIA

Northeastern

With USD – the numbers look about right, but I wonder a little about campus feel. I’ve read in various places that the students are on the affluent side – expensive cars, etc. (Not saying that’s actually true, of course.)

Northeastern is a good one, but she visited and wasn’t in love. She loves the city but wants to go someplace that’s a little removed.

Her ACT is fine for getting competitive merit aid. Not so sure about her GPA.

Pitt, in particular, has gotten more competitive in terms of awarding merit aid. Santa Clara too. And Santa Clara is quite expensive.

I think getting your cost to $30,000 will be a challenge at schools listed…with the exception of Miami.

If you can pay $35,000, and she takes the Direct Loan, you would be pretty close to the cost OOS for the SUNY schools.

Are you an Ohio resident?

The demographics at U of San Diego are just about the same as Santa Clara in terms of affluent students. These are expensive private schools.

Another I might suggest is Southern Methodist University near Dallas. But if you are looking for a private University without affluent kids, you will have a little difficulty finding it.

But I should add, we are far from very affluent, and our kids never had cars in college. DD is a grad of Santa Clara, and she never ever felt out of place there. But the school is very expensive.

Look at the honors colleges at your instate public universities. Those are a way to make the big school feel smaller.

What exactly didn’t she like about Miami (Ohio)?

And…

. Add in the grad students and you are near 30,000.

Your $30k to $35k budget should be able to fund the instate publics in your state…especially if you add in the Direct Loan. Are you looking at any of these schools? Or only private universities?

You might look at Creighton, which is yet another Jesuit college but in/near Omaha.

Merit at Villanova is very limited but she could certainly give it a try. And this is only my opinion, but U Dayton reminded me quite a lot of Villanova (but less pretentious).

It’s a bit smaller than the target size but my D got 20K from Loyola New Orleans with similar stats. They offer a few full tuition awards too, which my D was invited to interview for. The total cost there is around 52K so I think you’d have a shot at being in the low 30’s.

Its next door to Tulane and they can take classes there and also use each other’s dining facilities. Those things may make it feel a bit bigger.

Take a look at Valparaiso. Gives merit up to about 1/2 COA.

My daughter graduated from St. Louis University. She had great aid. She loved her time there.

@silverlady what was your annual net cost? How much merit/aid did she receive, and for what stats?