Are your parents divorced? Are they self employed or do they own a business? Do they own real estate other than your primary residence? If YES to any of the above…keep in mind that the NPCs might not be accurate.
Also, they are currently set for students starting college fall 2023. And financial aid awarding policies do something’s change.
So…view any net price calculator results you get as estimates only.
Apologies if I missed this, but is your 3.9 GPA weighted or unweighted? And, any idea as to where you fall in terms of class rank?
Are your parents open to input? Could you research and present a few that will definitely give you merit (but are not on your list yet)?
The thread linked below is very informative about schools where students of various Stat levels are getting merit. In recent posts, people are sharing actual merit offers and COAs for specific schools.
For me, that thread expanded what I realized was possible. I saw it too late for us to add much to my kid’s list, but you have time.
Note that the thread started a long time ago, so start with the latest posts. Earlier posts may no longer be accurate…
OP, I had a friend in high school who was in a similar situation. Her parents sent her to a tiny (500 student) college in an isolated rural location because with scholarships it was almost free and because it was affiliated with their denomination. She was not happy about this and as a strong student felt like she deserved more of a choice, but her parents didn’t budge. So she attended with a plan to spend as little time there as possible by doing maximum study abroad and aiming to graduate a semester early.
But then she ended up having a good experience! She found that there were other students in her same position of being strong students and not religious themselves. So she found “her people”–one of whom she eventually married.
With such a small school, she also got a TON of opportunities, and ended up being student body president, something that in NO way had been on her radar before going to college. She did very well when it came time to apply to graduate school.
I am not saying that you should just do what your parents want, but if you DO have to end up there, you should make the most of it if you can.