Is your daughter by any chance a National Merit Semi Finalist?
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No, we never took that National Merit test with either daughter. To be completely honest, I was just not very familiar with the test until just recently. Probably did not handle that correctly.
Did she take the PSAT in 11th grade? That is the test they use to determine National Merit.
Would she consider Tulsa? If so, she might look at their Presidential Scholarship.
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Will you be starting your own thread? Or can you tell us the budget and what sheās looking for, besides great merit aid and to study communication disorders?
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Well as a Lafayette graduate I could not bring myself to recommend Lehigh and Bucknellā¦lol
I ran the NPCs at all 3 this evening, and Lehigh was 13K less than Lafayette and 17K less than Bucknell. 
So Lehigh is looking more attractive than it was earlierā¦
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Absolutely. She already visited Tulsa and enjoyed the school. She has a good friend that was a senior in IB at her school that just got the Tulsa Presidential Scholarship. Tulsa is very high on her list at this point.
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Budget is pretty flexible. Ideally she wants to maximize scholarship dollars, but perhaps she will fall in love with a higher priced school and go a different route. We are going to apply to a few very expensive schools like Baylor, TCU and Colorado School of Mines. I think those will be unlikely as again they are expensive, but we will see. Other schools on her list right now include Ohio State, Iowa State, Texas, Florida St, Tulsa (we have toured), Missouri S&T (we have toured), Oklahoma State (we have toured), Alabama, Oklahoma, Creighton and Mississippi State. Schools that are maybes: Kansas, Kansas State (where my wife and I went to school), Texas A&M, Missouri, Dayton and Central Florida. We live in Kansas and the Kansas schools would be inexpensive with in state tuition, but both give very poor scholarship money to in state kids. She is also going to apply to UMKC which has a 2+4 Med program. It is very competitive with 1750 applicants for 105 spots per year. You finish both an undergraduate and full medical degree in 6 years straight. You go year around including summers for 6 years. The advantage of the program is you never take the MCAT. You are accepted into med school day 1. Disadvantage is it is a brutal 6 years and very expensive. We have also toured this med school program.
In looking at the list, it appears as though there is a range of school sizes, primarily hanging out in the middle of the country, and not the far northern part of it. These are some schools that your daughter may want to look into and where she might receive generous merit aid.
- College of Wooster (OH): About 2k undergrads
- Augustana (IL): About 2300 undergrads
- Truman State (MO): About 3900 undergrads
- Southern Illinois - Carbondale: About 8100 undergrads
- Saint Louis (MO): About 8700 undergrads
- Northern Illinois: About 12k undergrads
- Bowling Green State (OH): About 14k undergrads
- Ohio U.: About 18k undergrads
- U. of Nebraska - Lincoln: About 20k undergrads
- U. of Arizona: About 37k undergrads
- U. of Houston (TX): About 39k undergrads
Just as an FYI, but U. of Texas-Austin is an extremely difficult admit unless one is in the top 6% of a Texas high school graduating class.
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Appreciate the info. We toured Nebraska with my oldest daughter for Chem E, so I am somewhat familiar with them. I even had an uncle play football for NU long ago. I will research the other schools tomorrow and again thank you for the tips. Yes, Texas is a reach school and the least likely to get into by far They have one of the top ranked Speech therapy programs in the nation though, so she wants to give it a shot. Other schools that are her reach are Ohio St and CO Mines, but she has a much better chance with those two we think.
Iād think she has pretty good shots at Mines & Ohio State.
I think Duquesne has a 5 year Speech Therapy undergrad and masters program. If you are considering public universities in Ohio, Miami should be on the list. My D21 is attending and loves it. Good merit money, tuition room and board remain the same all 4 years, very pretty campus, they give lots of credit for AP classes.
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Grand Valley in Allendale, MI close to Grand Rapids has an excellent five year Speech Pathology program. From what I understand, hospitals all around Michigan and surrounding areas beg students that graduate from there. They also are great for premed. You also should quality for in instate tuition plus 11k off, so you would pay 13k a year, plus they have scholarships specifically for students from middle class families who donāt qualify for aid. I currently go there and have a major in the College of Health Professions if you have any questions!
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Itās Baylor. It doesnāt have a combined program, but if she plans to do the honors program, she would have a faculty mentor and present original research and have access to smaller classes and a better chance at building relationships with the relevant faculty. (Also, my mother was on the faculty there and she has a number of family Baylor grad school legacies.)
Right now Baylor is probably her first choice for Psy.D, and I understand that her chances of getting in as a successful undergrad in the honors program would be high.
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Make sure to have her look at applying to the Baylor2Baylor Medical program. Itās 8 years, but it comes with additional scholarship money and provisional acceptance to medical school. It looks like her stats put her right in the zone for it. It is competitive, but itās another one to try for.
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Hi friends, new here. Iāve already sent two kids off to college with great success, and here I am with my last one, D24, and really just need a place to commiserate and brainstorm a bit. She has ADHD and is very avoidant, so although she is keeping up with her college counseling at school, she really isnāt close to narrowing anything down at this point. Not the end of the world of course - S19 had no idea either, but he was a little more āreadyā for it all than I think she is.
That being said, I will list her rough stats and schools sheās considering in a separate post. If anyone has any other suggestions, please pass them along!
I say āroughā stats because she hasnāt taken the ACT or SAT yet. I know thatās maybe controversial for this forum, but none of my kids took them more than once, and all went in blind, no prep or studying. Oldest son was a very good but not āgreatā student, and just graduated with a Bachelorās in English and will have his Masterās for Teaching after this upcoming year. He got a ton of merit aid from a smaller school (Bellarmine University) and is thriving. D21 studies Biochemistry at Williams College and we pay virtually nothing thanks to his merit awards and their grants. He is currently doing a paid internship at Cornell.
I only share that because I know I take a much more relaxed approach to this than many of you do. Thatās just my style.
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As promised, here are D24ās stats, wants, and colleges sheās considering. Any additions are welcome.
GPA (unweighted): 4.0
GPA (weighted): 4.3
PSAT: 1360
Pre ACT: 34
Grades are straight As
APs:
Chemistry (recād a 3)
APUSH
AP World History (recād a 3)
AP Calc AB
AP Physics I
next year she is taking AP Calc BC, AP Physics II, and AP English
Must haves:
LAC
Majors: Studio Art, ideally including animation; English/Creative Writing; potentially Sociology and/or Religion
Would like to have:
small school <5,000
good mental health resources on campus
not hot/humid (Portland is her ideal weather)
Would be nice to have:
not in the middle of a big city
good food
strong art community
She has strongly considered but mostly ruled out art school. She spent a month at Ringling last summer doing a pre-college program and although she enjoyed it, she wants to have the opportunity to study other things as well, and not shoehorn herself.
She is not interested in any Ivies (except possibly Brown).
Colleges on āthe listā so far:
Brown (no animation, but does have a dual-enrollment program with RISD)
Bowdoin
Bates
Reed
Colby
Carnegie Mellon
Hamilton
Dartmouth
Carleton
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I think posts like this should be in their own chance-me thread.
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That is a great list of schools but, as you know, they are all reaches. You might consider Skidmore and Connecticut College as a couple of ālikelyā LACs. If you are looking for financial aid, Colby is very generous - and their aid packages do not include any loans. They have put a lot of money into the arts and their new art building is due to open sometime next fall. You will still need some safeties if you havenāt identified any yet. You didnāt indicate where you are from but maybe your state flagship is a possibility (though not a LAC).
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@Thorsmom66, thanks! Yes, I know they are all reaches. Thatās as far as sheās gotten. I did see Skidmore somewhere on a list but she hasnāt added it to her āofficialā list. Iāll look at Connecticut College. She is having a hard time identifying safeties. Our flagships are IU and Purdue, both huge, and she doesnāt even want to apply. I suggested Butler yesterday, which she might consider, or DePauw.
Iām telling you, she is my toughest nut to crack. I just donāt want her to be even more overwhelmed in the fall.