<p>Going off Descartesz’s list, College of St. Benedict/St. John’s University has an extensive theater and music program for non-majors along with up to $4000/year to participate in those programs, as well as a LOT of close connections with the Minnesota Orchestra, on top of merit aid-which tends to be very generous for out of state students especially, but she would get $20,000 to start plus other opportunities for scholarships plus the music scholarship.</p>
<p>St. Olaf, Luther and University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire would be others I would consider. Money for NM at all of them and very, very well respected music programs available for non-majors.</p>
<p>St Olaf for sure! However I think nearby Gustavus Aldophus should also receive serious consideration. Like STO, they offer NMF’s $7500 and will fill in with other great merit scholarships. Academics are great and the students are some of happiest I’ve run across anywhere. It’s also an all Steinway school. And if she’s serious about theater, the Gustavus theater department has produced a number of successful Hollywood actors.</p>
<p>OP - someone else already mentioned it but if your sister and ex don’t have a FIRM plan on who’s paying how much for college, your sister and niece may be in for a bad surprise. If the ex is any kind of problem at all to this point (not in the picture, negative toward his ex-wife, etc) then I strongly recommend your niece look at FAFSA-only colleges and no colleges such as Ivies that will require him to submit his own CSS. It’s very tough to get a non-custodial parent waiver, especially at Ivies. </p>
<p>If he’s fully in the picture and plans to support his daughter financially at any college she’s admitted to, they’ll need to get a decent idea of how colleges will look at the incomes/assets for both parents’ households together. If only one household is running the numbers and thinking they’ll be able to afford a certain college, they may have a pretty bad surprise waiting for them when the other household finally submits their financials (maybe at the last minute!) and the COA gap jumps to a double or triple amount that the combined households aren’t able to come to an agreement on for who’s paying how much. </p>
<p>Just saying that if the other parent is already flaky now about stuff like child support, visits, or leftover negative issues with the mom, trying to come to a joint agreement about a major shared expense like college isn’t going to be pretty. Having some colleges on her list that only require the FAFSA and give some decent merit aid can be very helpful.</p>
<p>I suggest buying a book on financial aid and colleges. Go over some key points with your niece, explain that it is better that you stay out of the picture, but that she should have a talk with her mother about college costs, financial aid, and that a number of the more generous schools will ask for her father’s financials, schools that seem to be the ones the mother has in mind for the niece.</p>
<p>Regardless, the young lady should have some “safety” choices on her list. Everyone should have school plans at a college that will certainly accept him/her and is affordable without contingencies. From that point, the young lady can built her list upward, and should certainly include some schools here mother has in mind, if they are schools for which the student has interest. Any time anyone is looking for money, a wide net should be cast with a variety of types of schools. The lists that are given her have all kinds of possibilities. There is nothing wrong in including some lottery tickets in the mix as long as the student has a safety.</p>
<p>Make sure the family knows that they’ll have to pick priorities of merit scholarship vs Ivy. Ivy colleges offer only need-based aid. It is usually more generous than need based aid at other colleges… but typically not as much as typical famlies want/need toward the $60K/year bill.</p>
<p>The niece’s stats and accomplishments would likely get here great merit-based need at many colleges. And regardless there needs to be a good mix of schools on the list - Ivy admission is a bit of a crapshoot.</p>
<p>No husband in the picture–he’s an ex, and not involved in their lives much at all–lives across the country.</p>
<p>This does not look good for the ivies/elites and lots of aid. </p>
<p>Doesn’t sound like the ex will pay, and he might not even fill out the paperwork. Even if he does do the NCP paperwork, if his income causes an unaffordable “family contribution” and he won’t pay, then none of those schools will work.</p>
<p>Maybe the sister either doesn’t know that the NCP’s income will count or she thinks that because they don’t see him much, they’ll get a waiver. </p>
<p>Does he pay child support? If not, how has he gotten out of that?</p>
<p>thank you all–great ideas and good points to bring up with sis on aid (I’ve mentioned the calculators and such to her, but I don’t think she’s actually done any to see).</p>
<p>We’re really different. I’m a planner and she’s just…not. </p>
<p>I can’t wait to run a few of these new ideas past my niece. St. Olaf’s is one I just wasn’t familiar with, but it sounds great…checking out some others on the list, too. </p>
<p>Look the bottom line is it a crapshoot, I cannot begin to tell you the awards based on inflated prices for tuition, never mind room and board. There are so many kids like mine with IB 3.9875 GPA’s, excellent SAT’s, ACT’s, 3/461 and yet no merit aid (Univ of Chicago), North Carolina, etc… or $28K per year at Univ of Miami out of a $54K yearly bill. And consider if liberal arts, than its a future with Starbucks, with STEM possibly a real job if very lucky. Sorry to be such a pessimist, been there done that.</p>
<p>Mark2m–You do realize that people that got to Liberal Arts schools do NOT graduate with a degree in liberal arts, right? Merit aid at most LAC’s is very generous and I can assure you that most of these students get jobs at rates equal to or greater than state universities.</p>
We’ll agree to disagree on this statement. There are >1500 LACs, many of which don’t have the endowments to offer much merit aid. There is a small percentage of those that do.</p>
<p>Erin’s Dad–well then we must have found every single one that does offer large merit awards. When you are full pay, it helps, a lot. The smallest award our kids are looking at, automatic awards, is $15,000 but most are in the $20,000 neighborhood. There are also opportunities for additional merit aid on a competitive basis. There is a multi-page thread at the top of the parent’s page listing all of these schools.</p>
<p>That sounds like an inflated count. “Baccalaureate CollegesArts & Sciences” is the Carnegie Classification that covers LACs like Amherst, Kenyon, etc. According to the Carnegie Classification site, there are 270 of them in the USA ([Carnegie</a> Classifications | Basic Classification Summary Tables](<a href=“Carnegie Foundation Classifications”>Carnegie Foundation Classifications)).</p>
<p>The sweet spot for merit aid at these colleges seems to be in the mid range of selectivity (not the USNWR top 15, but within the top 100 or so). At Centre College, for example, about 90% of students without need get awards averaging ~$15K.</p>
<p>There are 393 Private institutions in the IPEDS data base which ONLY grant bachelors (which is a more restrictive data set than LACs). So it seems the Carnegie Classifications listing has some issues as well.</p>
<p>There was a gov’t study on education I was trying to find to get the “real” number and I just can’t find it now.</p>