Demographics
White female, Massachusetts, large urban public school
Intended Major(s)
Mech E
GPA, Rank, and Test Scores
GPA 94/100 uw
SAT 1450
Coursework
APs: US Gov (4), Environmental sci
No calc, unless I make a last-minute schedule change (that would have to involve dropping AP environmental science); 3 years of foreign lang
I’m a vo-tech student (Automotive) but most of my other classes are honors (it’s a comprehensive school, not a dedicated vocational hs.)
Extracurriculars
Two varsity sports, two jobs, some volunteering
Cost Constraints / Budget
EFC 14k, but my family’s financials vary a lot every year. Actual amount we can afford is more like 10k plus whatever I can personally contribute/take out reasonable loans for.
Schools
EA:
Safeties: umass dartmouth, umass lowell
Likely/target: umass amherst (do I have a shot at merit aid? going by the NPC, I can’t afford it otherwise)
What’s the highest level of math you’ve reached and have you taken physics?
Are your safeties affordable?
Did you run the NPC for Northeastern, CMU, Syracuse, JHU or UVA? If they aren’t in budget, I wouldn’t bother applying.
Have you run the NPC for RPI or Clarkson? You’d see merit at both schools so potentially with need based aid too, they could come in to budget…maybe. Clarkson stacks scholarships too.
My understanding is UMass Amherst doesn’t give merit aid to in-state students. (There is some merit aid for a small number of in-state students but it is on the order of $1K or $2K.)
Did you run the NPC at Lowell? Your stats are similar to my son’s and the NPC indicated he might be eligible for significant merit scholarship there. Haven’t received decisions yet, so I can’t confirm.
I don’t know enough to comment on the others. But I can tell you that UMass Lowell is a good engineering school. My husbands company hires Elec Eng & MechE student from there, and he speaks highly of it. It is also my son’s “safety” and (due to costs where he is most likely to end up).
My highest math is precalc and I’ve taken honors physics.
In terms of affordability, umass dartmouth should give me a good scholarship and my dad ran the NPC on the reaches and said they’re okay. I believe they all come out to around the 13-15k range, AKA “not ideal, but we can come up with it if necessary, and we probably won’t do any better”. I’m not too confident in lowell’s aid, but it’s one of my top choices so I’m applying anyway just in case they surprise me.
Haven’t heard of Clarkson, I’ll look into that, thanks.
UMass Amherst doesn’t give merit aid to in-state students.
Well, sh*t.
I do like the sound of umass lowell, but I’m not sure about their merit- their website was a bit confusing but it sounds like their best scholarships factor in class rank, which my school doesn’t have, and the NPC came out to about 20k.
Take a look at Manhattan College (not in Manhattan) and run the NPC. Excellent School of Engineering as well as Arts & Science, Business, Education, and some health technologies. They have rolling admissions, so you could find out early.
Being a female will help your application to any college of engineering.
The biggest draw back you have is the lack of calculus. That would be a limiter for some of the top programs. But fortunately for engineering there are some really good schools out there, and as long as it’s ABET certified, you’ll get tons of opportunities.
@tsbna44 could tell you more, but look at Alabama - they have great merit aid, and if you are interested in automotive engineering, they have a very good program for that. I think you’d qualify for something like $25K per year, which I think would put your around $20K per year to attend as full pay (you could also apply for the engineering scholarship). I’m not sure how it works with need based aid, and how it stacks though. But I think you could probably make it work.
I understand Arizona gets good merit aid, not sure about need aid. My son applied to ASU and got in with merit aid as well, but UofArizona gives more merit aid.
Your potential RD schools are mostly far reaches, even for kids with higher grades, a slew of APs and with calculus. The lack of calculus will likely be a pretty tough hurdle for engineering admissions.
Given your financial constraints, would the MassTransfer program make sense? I am not super familiar, but my impression is that good performance at a community college will enable you to get a UMass Amherst transfer.
The automotive vo-tech experience might help to differentiate you for engineering so that seems like a great experience to have. How are your grades in core, non-vo-tech classes? While the experience will help, the classes won’t weigh into most schools’ recalculated GPA. Will your recalculated % be higher or lower than the the 94%?
If you complete precalculus before 12th grade, taking calculus if available to you is highly recommended if you want to study engineering in college. AP environmental science is much less important in comparison.
If you forego calculus even though you could have taken it, more selective schools with holistic admission reading may wonder why an intended engineering student is afraid of calculus.
Even if you do not go to such a more selective school, it is better to get a head start on calculus in order to keep your math skills in practice. If you do well in an associated AP test, you may be able to start in a more advanced math course in college (giving you a free elective in college); if not, you will at least have had a preview of calculus before taking calculus in college. Either would be better than taking calculus for the first time in college after a year off of math since completing precalculus.
Are you a junior or a senior? Maybe I’m misinterpreting but I’m getting the impression you’re a senior from your original post.
I agree with the other comments re: calculus vs. AP Environmental Science, but if you’re a senior I don’t really see how a drop/add at this (late) point is going to move the needle very much with admission officers as there won’t be any calc grades available before you submit your application, even in the regular round.
Take a look at RIT, in addition to the “normal” ME program they also have a Mechanical Engineering Technology degree (here: https://www.rit.edu/study/mechanical-engineering-technology-bs) that is a gentler intro into engineering (first semester starts with more pre-calc review within the 1st semester calc course than the calc for a traditional ME major ), a strong automotive club program from what I remember when we toured, good co-op program, and a much bigger nearby city (Rochester) than Clarkson has (Potsdam).
Seems like the student wants the Northeast or worst case mid-atlantic. Obviously cost is an issue and without Calc, engineering is already a weed out major but hopefully the student will come through. One almost has to plan and ensure they find a school with other areas of interest. If the national rate is 40-60% drop and you haven’t yet had calc - the student can absolutely succeed but there may be concern there.
It’s always hard to know what a 94 is - at AZ, a 4.0 is $32K meirit - so would be $22-25K K a year iall in - but less than a 4.0 which a 94 likely is, it goes down. A 3.9 is still 30K for example. So raise that price a few thousand.
Bama with these stats would actually be $30.5K off ($28K + $2.5K for the SAT score) - so the student would be out - let’s say $16-18K a year all in.
I don’t know how need aid would or would not stack with these - not my area and not sure if student gets Pell, etc. But it sounds like based on school choice, these might be too far for her distance wise. UAH would be another find school (smaller) and similar in cost - and for a student that wants a smaller school.
Is OP interested in automotive? Didn’t read that.
I can’t imagine Syracuse can meet OPs need financially but she said that they checked all on the NPC.
If I only had pre-calc, I might swap out the reaches as they’re not going to happen. But then you need to find meets need schools - so there’s schools that meet demonstrated need like Miami as an example or to stay closer to home Union College. They’re still a reach and unlikely without calc. But while they’re a reach, they’re not a JHU, UVA, or CMU reach which in my estimation would be nearly impossible.
My teachers have recommended community college, but my parents are very much not on board (and I really don’t want to stay at home if I can avoid it). They pretty much think my only strategy for saving money should be get into a top school that offers tons of aid.
I think my GPA would be about the same without auto, maybe a bit higher.
You likely need to find less competitive public schools that have automatic merit - because a need school is great if they meet need - but those are also some of the hardest to get into in the country - so it’s fair to apply (I mentioned Union which is in the NE; a reach but not a JHU reach).
But you have to do your UMASS regionals that offer your major, maybe a U Maine as they will likely match UMASS cost…but then your best odds of getting cost is a school like Alabama (but likely too far). You’d be under $20K a year all in - so above your budget but not horriblly. More like 16-18K a year. Look at their total costs and take off $30,500.
You can check the scholarship estimators at West Virginia and Mississippi State as well - if they’re not too far from home.
Maybe I’m misunderstanding, especially the ones with separate “net price” and “scholarship” calculators, but I’ve now run the NPCs for these (as well as the others people are suggesting in this thread), and they’re all giving $20k to 40k- definitely out of the question unfortunately.
I have met a few in-state students who were offered full tuition scholarship. I think that it was the “John and Abigail Adams” scholarship. Strictly speaking I think that this might come from the state of Massachusetts rather than from the university, but it still paid for the cost of tuition. U.Mass does have significant fees also which I do not think that the scholarship would cover. Also this was a few years ago. Most of these students had stats which to me at a quick glance looked quite close to what @zxlkmc1 listed above.
One daughter had a friend whose father ran a small business in Massachusetts which had rather inconsistent revenues. She went to community college for two years because that was what they could afford. Then she transferred to U.Mass Lowell on a full scholarship. I am not sure whether it was need based or merit based (she would likely have qualified either way). She was able to live with her father the entire time. She graduated from U.Mass Lowell with a marketable major (something business related I think) and relatively little debt. I just happened to run into her in a store a few months before she graduated and she seemed to be doing very well.
I think that admissions at U.Mass Lowell will most likely be able to figure this out. It appears that the high schools give related information to university admissions.