Ok…so we need to find free tuition options based simply on her stats.
Try this…make a new thread in the Parents Forum.
Make a title like: Which schools would still offer FREE TUITION for (put in test score and GPA).
Then in the body of the new thread simply put something like:
DD doesn’t have any affordable choices so we need to find schools that she can apply to that will still give her FREE TUITION for (XXX GPA and XX test scores).
We can cover the room and board with family funds, small student loan, and summer earnings, so she must get at least free tuition.
Her major and career goals are undecided but she prefers some sort of science major. Sciences are her strength and interest.
Which schools can she still apply to that will provide free tuition with her stats?
@MamacatTX : thank for providing info on what you need and what you can afford.
NMSF is unrelated to IB - she may have taken the psat junior year during class time?
@mom2collegekids : because Hofstra is so expensive and definitions of ‘generous package’ vary, we couldn’t tell just from 'generous package ’ and ‘20k loan’ :(. Now things are clear.
I agree the odds of getting a full tuition scholarship from the NACAC list are low, although there’s not much to lose in trying.
Your parents forum strategy is great. I hope it’ll work.
(Considering the student 's stats, I’d really advocate a gap year over community college since if the daughter attends community college she’ll lose all chances at sufficient merit scholarships even at Texas colleges .)
OP Here
Thank you all for all the advice.
We had a heart to heart with DD as there was something I was beginning to suspect that she confirmed.
She is not ready to head off to college, by only choosing unreachable schools (financially) she put herself into a position of not being able to go. By choosing Hofstra, it gave her access to NYC which is where she would like to intern/shadow a chef. She viewed college as a means to her adventure not wanting to consider the costs.
Once we all realized this (sometimes us parents can be a bit slow) we took a deep breath and listened to what DD wanted. She is going to take a gap year, she wants to shadow/intern a chef as she really thinks culinary is in her future AND she is going to go off and travel a bit via WWOOF (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms). I honestly had no idea she wanted to do this but I guess in retrospect, we have been so college focused that we didn’t hear or see this. Fortunately we have connections in a few major cities to help aid in housing while she pursues an internship in culinary and we have a very close family friend who is very high up in the industry who can help her in this endeavor. We bought her a membership for WWOOF Hawaii and she is planning a few months in the islands on various farms.
We are going to revisit college applications in the fall for the fall of 2018 with a completely different mindset, we will go into this with eyes open and be seeking out schools that her stats can carry a chunk of the costs.
We maintain that no matter what she does, we will not support a decision that will leave her with major debt at such a young age.
The whole house slept much better last night.
Again thank you so much.
For those of you who keep asking:
Hofstra offered up:
32K in scholarship/grants/awards
3K in work study
However, the starting point was 65K of which 16K is housing.
The amount due out of pocket was just ridiculous.
Her second choice was Univ of Minnesota where she was accepted to the School of Science and Engineering, however, no merit or scholarships were offered and with a tuition hike this coming year, their price tag became too steep.
This sounds like a win-win. She’ll have much better options after a gap year than she would have if she tried to find something at this late date. And it sounds like a gap year will help her determine where her interests really lie, which will be invaluable as she looks for the right college next year. I’m so glad this has worked out for the best.
@MYOS1634 “She can use the list of colleges that miscalculated yield. It’ll be published around May 5th. There are always excellent colleges on that list. She needs to have her commonapp ready to go, and take 3 days to write good supplemental essays. The early bird gets the worm or rather the first applicants get whatever FA/merit is still there. If she wants to study OOS, it should be feasible.”
Good for you ferreting out her thinking! Now you have a real starting point
Can’t help but think maybe she’s afraid of people’s reactions (not just yours) when she is open about wanting to pursue something in culinary arts. With her grades and test scores, some will likely think she’s not interested a field that uses her academic potential. What they’re missing is that this is her passion. And if she can make living at her passion, what else would you possibly want for your kid?
Has she considered Culinary Institute of America in NY? It doesn’t cost $65K and sounds like it may get her what she is looking for after her gap year. Hospitality is a great industry to be in. Do what makes you happy.
Oh she is very worried about the stigma and peoples reactions. She didn’t want to face her friends group as they are all off to an assortment of Ivy’s and high ranking schools. However, once we began to discuss her options, she went away with a new confidence.
We looked at Culinary schools about a year ago - the CIA in NYC is approx $43,595.00 per year whether Bachelors or an AA in Culinary or Pastry Arts. My DD works summers at a GirlScout camp, she is on the kitchen staff.
Fortunately, her boss at camp talked her out of culinary school as the Boss’s hubby went to CIA and regrets it. Culinary is a profession where the costs of formal education is rarely recouped. Culinary school is very expensive, chef’s still make peanuts and must work their way up the ranks just like everyone else. The rate of employment following graduation is ok, not great.
DD is really interested in baking, the pastry arts.
My friend’s son is at the CIA in Boston. He went there after a tech high school program in cooking. His older sister just got a PhD in some super science thing, from a school in Italy or Spain, and is very smart and employed in Pharm now. His older brother is completing and engineering degree but has already worked for a top computer company in Canada for several years (his co-op kept begging him to stay). There was a lot of external pressure to succeed academically as they also lived in a community with the best schools and high competition for Ivy and the like. Fortunately for him, there was no family pressure to anything but what he wanted.
There are also plenty of cooking schools/restaurant management courses that don’t cost $50k per year.
One thing you might do when applying next year is look for colleges with programs that complement her interest in culinary arts. In particular, if she thinks she might want to eventually own a chain of bake shops or create fresh baked products to sell to restaurants, then she could look for college programs that would help her understand how to start and run a business. Real world stuff like business plans, accounting, supply chain, etc.
Great job figuring out what she wanted!
A gap year sounds best indeed.
She can also try to intern in Quebec, there has to be some French restaurants there since French-from-France people flock to French-from-America :p. NYC and DC have restaurants, I know Harlem has a few, if you guys go to NYC, she can look them up and ask.
I honestly think that learning French and/or German would be quite important. (French tradition, Austrian tradition).
A gap year that helps with this would be well spent.
If that is truly what she’s interested in, she can do the “intensive course” at Ferrandi - an EXCELLENT cooking school in Paris. There are six months of classes and 4 months of internship. When they go home the chefs are ready for hire.
It costs $25,000 for tuition though… not to mention $1,000 likely needed for living expenses (so, an extra $10,000). Admission is pretty selective and requires two recommention letters from professionals who can speak to the pastry or cooking abilities of the applicant. http://www.ferrandi-paris.fr/en/international-programs/certificate-programs/intensive-professional-program-french-pastry
@MassDaD68, The list is called the NACAC list. It will turn up on CC as soon as it comes out. A Google search will probably locate it pretty quickly too.
Perhaps she can also work in the dining hall in college. While it may not be a place for culinary artistry, it will give her experience in a commercial kitchen and operations in higher volume food preparation.
Little bit of an update: DD has settled into the beginnings of her GAP year and has completely shifted gears. She has already applied to several schools for the fall of 2018 where her stats will earn her significant merit awards and she has applied as a Secondary Education major with an emphasis on English, Language Arts and History. She wants to be a high school teacher.
