OOS safety or match w/ good sci/eng and financial aid?

College Search & Selection
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<p>I'm pretty desperate to get out of my state, but my family can in no way afford OOS to a state flagship. I'm interested in both physics and engineering, and probably would be happy in either one. I would just prefer the school to have strong programs in both to accommodate my indecision.</p>

<p>Quick stats:[ul]
[<em>]Asian female [</em>]Location: Las Vegas, NV [<em>]Family: 40k-60k annual income with a household of 6 (I'm the oldest of 3)
[</em>]GPA: UW 3.9 W 4.7 (on 4.0 and 4.8 scale)[/ul] </p>

<p>I have a 2250 SAT, 36 ACT. My major extracurriculars are robotics club (officer), orchestra, and Varsity Quiz, and Chinese folk dance. Other things that might work in my favor are National Merist Semifinalist status, and perhaps the fact I skipped a grade?</p>

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<p>try purdue university in indiana. it has a very well respected engineering program and seeing that your stats are higher than their average. </p>

<p>And if you want to get out of your state… i suggest applying to private colleges/universities instead of public ones. if you need the financial aid, they will most likely give way more than state colleges (especially since you’re out of state.) Out of state tuition for public universities cost just about the same as privates. i wouldn’t worry too much about financial aid until you get your financial aid package. </p>

<p>Santa Clara University has a good engineering program, so does Cal Poly SLO (but it’s pretty much dominated by CA residents only) </p>

<p>you should definitely look into ivy leagues. they give the most amazing financial aid. i’m not sure how your stats match up with theirs but you should definitely research them. Princeton, Dartmouth, and cornell are good in engineering. </p>

<p>other schools you should look into is</p>

<p>carnegie mellon university,stanford uni, cal tech, bucknell university, villanova. </p>

<p>use your act score instead of your sat too.</p>

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<p>hope it helped- good luck :)</p>

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<p>Purdue’s on my list, and so are Caltech and Stanford (as reaches), but I didn’t think of the others. </p>

<p>How many schools should I apply to? I mean, it’d be good to cast a wide net, but the application fees will go through the roof. Unless I get an application fee waiver, which I don’t know how to do.</p>

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<p>You’re in a WUE state - Western Undergraduate Exchange. There are a number of state Us (including some flagships) that will offer you admission at 150% of in-state tuition.</p>

<p>[Western</a> Undergraduate Exchange](<a href=“http://wue.wiche.edu%5DWestern”>http://wue.wiche.edu)</p>

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<p>

</p>

<p>No. Worry now.</p>

<p>WUE is worth considering, but without additional aid, 150% of in-state tuition may not be a sufficient bargain for a household of 6 making $40K-60K. Someone with the OP’s stats easily could wind up with better offers from more selective private schools.</p>

<p>In addition to the schools cited above, also consider Harvey Mudd College and Swarthmore (two top liberal arts colleges that offer engineering). Also Johns Hopkins, Duke, Northwestern, WUSTL, Vanderbilt, and Rice (top universities outside the Ivy League). Cooper Union, Olin, and the military service academies offer free or reduced tuition to all accepted students … and have excellent engineering programs.</p>

<p>[Best</a> Undergraduate Engineering Schools | Top Undergraduate Engineering Programs | US News Best Colleges](<a href=“http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/rankings/engineering]Best”>http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/rankings/engineering)</p>

<p>As for physics, it’s hard to tease out where the best programs are at the undergraduate level. Here’s one take on graduate programs (which may at least suggest undergrad programs with access to the strongest faculty): [Top</a> Physics Schools & Top Ranked Physics College Programs](<a href=“Web Page Under Construction”>Web Page Under Construction)</p>

<p>So which top schools land at the intersection of good aid, good engineering, and good (graduate) physics? These include the Ivies, Caltech, MIT, Stanford, JHU, Rice, CMU, Duke, Northwestern, WUSTL. Maybe move away from the West Coast and the Ivies to get a better bump-up for being-female-while-Asian STEM major. You might get an even bigger bump-up from a “contrarian” choice like Swarthmore (a top LAC, offers engineering, far from Nevada).</p>

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<p>Indecision + need drives up that number. To get a good balance of reach-match-safety schools, you’re probably looking at a minimum of 3+2+1 (or something like that). There is no magic formula. 10 is a nice round number. Here’s a 5+3+2 mix: </p>

<p>Stanford
MIT/Caltech/Harvey Mudd
Cornell
Rice/JHU/WUSTL/Duke/Vanderbilt </p>

<h2>Harvey Mudd/Swarthmore</h2>

<p>Purdue
Villanova</p>

<h2>Bucknell/Lehigh/Trinity College (Hartford)</h2>

<p>State flagship
1 WUE school (or other state school with guaranteed big merit for NMF or specific stats)</p>

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<p>[RIT</a> - Office of Financial Aid - Scholarship & Grants](<a href=“http://www.rit.edu/emcs/financialaid/table_merit.html]RIT”>http://www.rit.edu/emcs/financialaid/table_merit.html)</p>

<p>RIT, in Rochester, NY has both merit aid & need-based aid, engineering & physics.
Always seeking more female engineering students. Why not take a look?</p>

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<p>*Other things that might work in my favor are National Merist Semifinalist status, *</p>

<p>If you make NMF, which is very likely…</p>

<p>Bama would give you…</p>

<p>free tuition
free housing (including honors)
iPad
money for study abroad
$1k per year</p>

<p>plus</p>

<p>2500 per year from the College of Engineering</p>

<p>So…essentially a free ride :)</p>

<p>This is an excellent safety for you.</p>

<p>Bama has brand new mega-sized Science and Engineering Complex…state of the art equipment and classrooms/labs. </p>

<p>And…depending on income and EFC, you might qualify for a Pell Grant. That is a wide spread for income…can’t you narrow that down…big difference between $40k and $60k. </p>

<p>Do you have a 3rd adult in the household? If so, that adult might not qualify to be counted in your household unless your family is supporting that person and he/she is not getting a pension or social security or has assets.</p>

<p>WUE is worth considering, but without additional aid, 150% of in-state tuition may not be a sufficient bargain for a household of 6 making $40K-60K.</p>

<p>Exactly…WUE is often NOT a good deal if the student needs FA. You’re still considered to be OOS and you won’t get state aid or other aid that is given to instate kids. WUE is fine for those who can pay for most costs themselves.</p>

<p>*Maybe move away from the West Coast *</p>

<p>I doubt a lowish income family can just move away from the WC and settle elsewhere. </p>

<p>your ACT is fabulous…Apply to top schools that give great aid…and apply to safeties that will give HUGE merit scholarships. “Good merit scholarships” are NOT enough…you need HUGE ones.</p>

<p>Purdue will not likely work…it costs about $40k+ per year… Purdue does give good sized merit, but not likely enough for a student with huge need.</p>

<p>How much can your family contribute? Anything?</p>

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<p>Have you looked at University of Southern California (Good aid for NMF’s)?</p>

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<p>Oops. That’s not what I meant. I was using the word “move” figuratively. That is, for your “reach” choices, don’t over-emphasize West Coast schools (and Ivies), where being Asian can mean you are an over-represented minority.</p>

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<p>There are a number of threads about merit-based aid in the Financial Aid, Parents, and other forums. Start with this one:
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/848226-important-links-automatic-guaranteed-merit-scholarships.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/848226-important-links-automatic-guaranteed-merit-scholarships.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>If you care less about the name on your diploma than you do on getting your education for as close to free as possible, and you don’t mind doing a lot of research in order to find merit-based money, read through these two older threads. The specific scholarships mentioned may no longer exist, but the research techniques are timeless:
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/148852-what-ive-learned-about-full-ride-scholarships.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/148852-what-ive-learned-about-full-ride-scholarships.html&lt;/a&gt;
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/291483-update-what-i-learned-about-free-ride-scholarships.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/291483-update-what-i-learned-about-free-ride-scholarships.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>Great, I made a typo. That’s what I get for posting right before going to bed.</p>

<p>Thanks for all the suggestions, everyone! I’ve heard of most of these schools by mail, but I didn’t follow up and really look into them (bad idea).</p>

<p>tk@ 10 schools is a lot. Do you think I’ll be able to get a fee waiver for the app fees?</p>

<p>mom2collegekids@
That sounds like an awesome deal (even without the iPad).
The thing about my family income is that my dad’s a realtor, so his salary is wildly variable, and with the housing snafu in Vegas, you’d get a better prediction with a random number generator.
The third adult is my grandma, who is pretty self-sufficient financially. I think she’s even on her own insurance.
And I’ll have to get a lot more info on my family’s finances to even guess at my EFC. My family keeps me in the dark pretty much, which I’m trying to fix.</p>

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<p>One thing to keep in mind is that some universities require applicants to apply to a specific school within the university. At least one of the universities “tk” listed in post #6 above (excellent post, by the way) will require you to choose either the School of Engineering or the College of Arts and Science for application purposes, and more importantly, for merit scholarship consideration. Although it is often possible to transfer between colleges, and even transfer the merit scholarship, most applicants will be a stronger candidate for a competitive award at one or the other of the schools.</p>

<p>So, I suggest analyzing your relative strengths, both academic and extracurricular, as well as thinking about ultimate career goals, when you decide which direction to go (for those schools that require you to choose).</p>

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<p>Try Questbridge, don’t know much about it.</p>

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<p>he third adult is my grandma, who is pretty self-sufficient financially. I think she’s even on her own insurance.</p>

<p>You can’t count your grandma in your household for FA purposes since she’s self-sufficient. FA doesn’t let people have it both ways…counting extra adults, but then not counting their income.</p>

<p>*mom2collegekids@
That sounds like an awesome deal (even without the iPad).
The thing about my family income is that my dad’s a realtor, so his salary is wildly variable, and with the housing snafu in Vegas, you’d get a better prediction with a random number generator. *</p>

<p>Apply as a financial safety.</p>

<p>BTW…your dad probably has a good number of deductions because he’s a Realtor…however, I know from another Realtor’s family’s experience, that CSS Profile schools will add a good number of those deductions back in. :(</p>

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<p>midmo@ I’ve been needing a reality check on that. Thing is, I’ve been analyzing my strengths and weaknesses for years and I don’t know what conclusion to draw from it. I feel wholly unprepared for the world.</p>

<p>Sierra Lin@ I’ve looked at Questbridge, and considered it, however, the deadline is the 30th, and I definitely won’t have my application ready in 20 days. Also, although my family’s income qualifies me, we’ve never experienced any real hardship. It’s not worth taking the significant risk. I’d rather send in a EA/ED quality application.</p>

<p>mom2collegekids@ What are deductions?</p>

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<p>^^^You are not at all unprepared for the world, or for college. You are in good shape.</p>

<p>If you have taken a rigorous math and science course load, have extracurricular interests that are engineering/computer science oriented (like robotics, that you mentioned), perhaps participate in math club or competitions, then you will be signaling to engineering programs that you are interested in the field. Students who go easy on the math and science, who don’t join STEM activities or in some way show an interest in engineering will have a more difficult time standing out in the eyes of engineering selection committees who are trying to guess which students will prove to be a boon to their academic community.</p>

<p>Not all schools, or even most, will require you to choose whether or not to go the engineering route at the time of application. The one my son accepted a scholarship from did, though. In his case, he majored in both math and computer science, so was split between A and S and Engineering, but his ‘home base’ was engineering. In his case, his record probably stood out more for an engineering selection committee than it would have for arts/sciences, so he chose well.</p>

<p>As a practical matter, most people think it is easier to switch out of engineering and into arts/sciences rather than the other way around, because engineering curricula can be pretty specific from the start. Those who change their minds later in the game may find it hard to finish in four years. That depends on the program, though.</p>

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<p>OP,
BE SURE to apply to USC before their Dec 1 deadline. They have a top 10 Engineering program, the Thornton school of music , which offers lots of opportunities to continue your music activities, and offer 200 Full tuition scholarships, over 400 1/2 tuition scholarships plus incredible FA. You’re NMF standing means you already qualify for their 1/2 tuition scholarships if accepted, which I’m sure you be. If invited to interview for a scholarship, Be Sure To Go, as the full tuition scholarships are ONLY offered to those who actually do the interviews!!</p>