Pitt or Alabama?

Sticking only to the original question (and hopefully you won’t get into NYU because, oy) I would go with Pitt. Excellent school and getting better. The campus is great…having Carniege Mellon right next door is great…and google self-driving cars are everywhere! I will send good vibes your way!

Are you male? If you apply now online it should be free to apply to Duquesne. They let you include SAT scores on your transcript.
Write a good essay.
They have many more female students than male. So they might give you more merit.
Duquesne is also in Pittsburgh.

If you got their highest merit of $20,000 plus $4,000 for on campus living, the remaining cost would be about $24,000.
If you have about $13,000 a year from savings, loan and summer work, then if your parents would be willing to borrow about $10,000 you might have enough.

You could also apply to WVU and possibly get merit. They have a happening place there, similar to UA (sports, greek).

If they are too busy to order parchment transcripts, then maybe they can print two or three official transcripts for you and seal them in an envelope.

If not, go to Alabama and pick the cheapest room and meal plan choice for the first year. Major in chemical engineering so you get an additional $2,500 a year.

Only fly home for Xmas and at the end of the year.
Live off campus with lots of roommates and cook your own food year 2, 3, 4.

Or plan to graduate in 3 years.

I also believe OP stated earlier in the thread that he is intending on going to medical school, that is a lot more money to add on to undergrad debt.

I talked to my parents and they agreed to co-sign for whatever additional loans I may need, because (unlike some people on this thread) they value education more than money.
I’m a girl to whoever asked
The guy who said the car comment is a real bleep and almost made me cry
Thank you to whatever adult told him off and to the two people who answered my question

This thread has more than run its course! Where are the Mods when you need them?

@nyuhopeful44 - They way this could have all been avoided would to have said “Money is not an issue…which school should I select.” That lets everyone know that your parents are willing to take on the debt (or you have a trust fund or some other source of funds) and then everyone would have concentrated on the original question.

Best of luck.

I value education, and my D tells everyone how I instilled the importance of education in her from a very young age. That doesn’t mean I would go into debt to send my D to a school I couldn’t afford. And you know what? My D would have never asked me to take on any such loans - she didn’t even want me to have to pay anything out of pocket and so worked hard to get scholarships and chose only from among those schools. Cultural differences, I suppose.

I sincerely hope you help your parents pay back those loans.

Hold on.
Alabama COA is $48K. With a $20K scholarship, your net is $28K

Michigan Tuition is around $15K. Since you live in Ann Arbor, you can live at home take the AATA bus to school, which is free with your MCard. A 3.75 and 1440 gives you are pretty good shot at admission, especially if you attended Pioneer, Huron, Skyline or Community and took some APs.

If you don’t get in, Eastern is not the best option. Go to Washtenaw and transfer. UM reserves spots for CC transfer students (around 300, I think) and has a very well defined path. You will have to make sure that every class you take at Washtenaw has an equivalent at UM. The transfer office will help.

Financially, you can make it work with the $25K your parents saved, loans, and a job over 4 years.

Michigan tuition = $60-75K
Parent contribution = $25K
Loans = $25K
Job = $10K
Internships =$0-$25K

If you study CS or engineering, tuition is higher for upperclassmen, but higher paying internships will offset the extra cost.

If you go to Washtenaw and transfer, you can knock off $25K from the tuition bill.

NYU is not as good a university as Michigan , and costs a lot more

OP- You are close to the stated 1480/33 threshold for Pitt merit. I didn’t read every post, so forgive me if this has been discussed…but have you emailed Pitt to ask about merit? Talked to your Pitt admission rep? They may say the gpa is a tad low, but you never know, it’s worth a shot!

If you are in one of the 4 public high schools in Ann Arbor, you can talk to your counselor about the situation and ask to get a transcript sent via parchment. I can’t imagine they would say no if you asked sincerely. Just in case you want to throw another safety in for the Jan 1 regular decision wave. I know you’re set on one of these 3 schools, but it never hurts to have another option!
To answer your original question, I do think Pitt is a better fit. But $42k (the first year…it goes up) is a lot. The Alabama deal is better. But you know that. So hash this out with your parents and then pick. Good luck either way.

OP. Before your recent proclamation that your parents will co-sign loans for you, you indicated that there was not enough money to pay for any of the three colleges. Over and over people, including myself, were trying to help you do the math and find affordable options.

Then you made your statement about not going to a crappy college.

So here we had this young person, you, who was being so obtuse that they lacked a grip on reality.

So I made both of my comments about going to college for 1 year at Alabama, 1 semester at Pitt or going to Alabama and living in your car to help get you to see this reality.

I’m sorry if that almost made you cry but you needed to have that conversation with your parents about funding college because there were big decisions to be made and your understanding of how to pay for the college was severely lacking. Without your parents contributing substantially more through their loans or cosigning yours, none of the options were possible.

I agree with your parents that education is worth more than money and I’m thrilled that they have agreed to co-sign loans for you. Those are my values too. Good luck to you.

It would have been a lot better if the OP’s high income parents cared about education enough over the past several years to have saved up enough money to contribute substantially more for the OP’s college costs, rather than burdening the OP and themselves with heavy debt.

@ucbalumnus they’re not “high income” they’re middle class. My mom is a teacher and my dad is an electrician. They saved up as much as they could, keeping my sister’s hospital bills in mind. I think 20K is pretty good considered what they were given. And I do plan to help them pay off the loans if I do end up needing them.

If your family is paying off medical debt, that is a basis for a financial aid appeal. However, those types of appeals would be more likely to be successful at an in-state public or at a generous private school (NYU is not known for generosity).

You have not served yourself or your family well with this college list. Whatever your intentions here, statistically most cosigners do end up having to make at least some student loan payments.

Earlier, you wrote in reply #28:

$150,000 per year is more than double the median household income of $59,039 and the median family income of $72,707 (in 2016).

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEFAINUSA672N

Doubtful

@ucbalumnus that 50K number doesn’t seem right for middle class. My dad makes 80K and my mom makes 70K. Neither profession is considered “wealthy.”

@nyuhopeful44 ucb is just sharing the actual median household income in the US. It varies a bit by state and certainly an income goes farther in some places than others. https://www.census.gov/library/visualizations/2017/comm/income-map.html

“Middle class” is a moving target with no real definition, but if we mean by it, literally the middle, then ucb is right on, it’s around $59K +/- some amount. Maybe it’s the middle 50%, maybe it’s the mean (that would be higher since very high incomes count in the average).

I think the vast majority of people consider themselves to be middle class, wherever they are in terms of income.

@nyuhopeful44


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Pitt or Alabama? <<

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neither. go to Ole Miss with their full-tuiton scholarship.

https://finaid.olemiss.edu/scholarships/#8

@Wien2NC OP doesn’t qualify for full tuition (1440 SAT).

I really think the Michigan schools could provide a comparable educational experience for much less money.