Question About Merit Aid

Paying for College
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<p>Hello, I'm a high school senior, and I'm just starting to apply to colleges and all that fun stuff. I have always thought that if I got good grades and test scores, that I would be able to get a significant chunk of my college education paid for. Although I can't be certain, from things I've been looking at I'm beginning to think that that maybe isn't how things work . . .</p>

<p>I have a 3.9 (4.1 weighted) gpa and a 33 ACT composite score, looking to apply to selective Midwest LACs as well as U of MN and UW-Madison. Could anyone with a lot of experience in the college admissions process tell me what I might be able to expect in terms of merit-based aid? Thanks in advance :)!</p>

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<p>Based on the information provided, you can expect zero merit-based aid from UW-Madison.</p>

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<p>Try <a href=“Office of Student Financial Aid – UW–Madison”>Office of Student Financial Aid – UW–Madison;
Also <a href=“Net Price Calculator”>Net Price Calculator;
Ans see <a href=“Our Opportunities - Wisconsin Scholarship Hub (WiSH)”>Our Opportunities - Wisconsin Scholarship Hub (WiSH); & <a href=“Scholarships | Office of Admissions”>http://admissions.tc.umn.edu/costsaid/scholarships.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>@Madison85 Even though I’d be somewhat on the upper end of the spectrum score wise? Or do you have to be quite exceptional to get merit-aid? Once again, I don’t know much, so I’m just inquiring.</p>

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<p>@Minnesnowta‌ </p>

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<p>Many kids think that. </p>

<p>There are a number of schools that don’t give many merit awards. They may not feel that they need to, or they may feel that they need to put their funds towards low income instate students. </p>

<p>Wisconsin has a good-sized population. They have enough good students to fill their seats. They may have a few awards for the most tippy top students, like ACT 35+. For instance, if they have 25 large awards to give, they’re going to offer them to 25 tippy top students.</p>

<p>Some schools do give good sized merit for your stats, you just have to look at the schools that do so. </p>

<p>What is your situation? How much will your parents pay? What is your major and career goal? </p>

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<p>Wisconsin has the Kemper Knapp awards for WI residents who are NMF. </p>

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<p>@mom2collegekids‌ My parents are probably slightly above the typical “middle class” income, I’d say combined they make maybe $100k or $110k a year (although that’s largely a guess). I do have two siblings within a couple years of me, one who’s at Iowa State right now, and one who is a sophomore in high school. Hopefully that helps?</p>

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<p>Helps with what? </p>

<p>How much will your parents pay each year?</p>

<p>OOS publics don’t have much motivation to help you pay high OOS costs, if that’s what you mean. They charge those rates for a reason; your family doesn’t pay taxes there.</p>

<p>Have your parents run the NPC on each schools’ website. also have them run it on Iowa State’s website. I doubt ISU will give your sibling more aid once you go to school.</p>

<p>How is the sibling’s college getting paid? I know that Iowa State does give merit scholarships…who is paying for the rest? </p>

<p>when you go to college, how much will your parents pay for EACH child? </p>

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<p>@mom2coIlegekids I meant hopefully that helps with your assessment, sorry for the confusion.</p>

<p>I believe my brother is splitting the cost somewhat 50/50 between my parents help and his own student loans. And by the way, Wisconsin’s public schools have a reciprocity agreement with MN so I’d be paying not a whole lot more than in-state cost if I enrolled.</p>

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<p>To get large merit aid, you need to apply to schools that offer it. UW-Madison has little. They do have full tuition scholarships available for URMs. There is a non-renewable in-state NMF freshman award of about $7500. There are 10 four year full tuition scholarships awarded to winners of a music competition after junior year at their summer residential music clinic.Students who audition into the music major get variable renewable scholarships based on talent, on the order of a few thousand $. I have heard anecdotally that engineering may have some money, but I am not certain of this. Other than this it’s mostly small dept scholarships awarded to continuing students. No guaranteed money for high stats at UW.</p>

<p>However, UAlabama will give you an automatic full tuition scholarship for your stats and if you happen to be in engineering, there is another $2500/yr. </p>

<p>There are lists of automatic and competitive large scholarships pinned at the top of financial aid thread. Pay attention to deadlines, as if you are applying for merit money deadlines may be earlier than general application deadlines. GaTech is a school with a very early deadline for their big competitive scholarships. Maybe 10/15???</p>

<p>St Olaf is an example of school that may give you decent merit, but not guaranteed. I think they cap it at half the cost of attendance. Or at least it says so on their scholarship page, though I’ve heard people claim they got more from them.</p>

<p>How much money can your family pay? Do you need merit to be able to attend college, or just hope to get some to make the bills smaller?</p>

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<p>@celesteroberts‌ St. Olaf is definitely on my radar, I visited there and Carleton last year. As for my financial situation I briefly outlined it in an above post.</p>

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<p>Oh, I see. Carleton only has small merit awards for NMF, nothing else meritwise. But you should qualify for some need-based aid with them for that income and also with another sib in college. Run their NPC to see what you get. </p>

<p>The Kemper Knapp NMF scholarship mentioned in above post is the $7500 freshman award I mentioned.</p>

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<p>@celesteroberts‌ Thanks for your help, I may do some price calculators tomorrow. I am not a NMF though, unfortunately.</p>

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<p>Well it isn’t much anyway. Only $2,000/yr at Carleton. So not much help on the scale of total cost there. But they say clearly on their website that that is it for them and merit.</p>

<p>In general if you are looking at expensive LACs and running NPCs for need-based aid, you need to be aware that if you receive any merit aid in addition that it counts first to reduce the need-based award. They don’t usually stack. The first few thousand $ may be useful to reduce what they expect you take in loans and work-study, but after that merit will reduce need-based grant dollar for dollar. Hence you need a merit award either just a few thousand to eliminate loan requirement, or then larger than your FA package to make a difference. The in-between sized merit doesn’t really help once you get beyond loan and work study amounts. Except that if it’s renewable, it is more stable than need-based FA which can vary dramatically with sibs graduating college, parents getting raises, etc.</p>

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<p>I think you need to figure out exactly how much your parents are going to pay and then go from there.</p>

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<p>UMN does offer a lot of merit aid to NMF. Otherwise, you will need a higher score (e.g. 35+) for scholarships. Or you should look up the list that offer automatic scholarships with your credential.</p>

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<p>When you’re looking at LACs, first thing to do is look at their aid policies. Sorry I’m not familiar with schools in the midwest, so I’ll use schools in the NE as example. Many high-tier schools offer only need-based aid - for example Boston College - they offer only 15 merit awards each year, and those go to students who are Ivy-caliber. All other aid is need-based, so unless you have significant need, you better be prepared to pay. A lot. Schools like Villanova do offer some merit aid as well as need-based aid, but are very open about how they don’t even guarantee to meet your EFC. Middle-class families with decent incomes but without $200,000 saved for each child are pretty much shut out of these schools.</p>

<p>Many very good LACs DO offer merit aid, but for the most part it’s not straightforward and guaranteed (like at Alabama or Ole Miss for example). NPCs typically won’t include merit information, as it is competitive and the schools don’t know how much they’ll award and to who until the see the applicant pool. Some schools will even have you come for a competition - Elon does this. Top students will get some merit aid right away, but then the top-top students are invited to a competition day after which they can be awarded up to $12K in additional merit money.</p>

<p>You do have to be quite exceptional to get significant merit aid - aim to be in the top 10-15% of the student body. Merit money is awarded to attract students who help raise the curve. If you apply to schools where you are that close to the top, look for schools that have an honors program or honors college within the university. The better honors programs offer more challenging classes and special cultural opportunities for top students.</p>

<p>It’s totally hit-or-miss with who awards you what. Some schools that we thought would surely invite D into their Honors programs didn’t. One school where we were skeptical about her getting into Honors did invite her. We didn’t have the full aid packages from all schools until early April - which was frustrating. Her friends had all deposited and knew where they were going, and she still didn’t know which schools we could afford.</p>

<p>Have a frank discussion with your parents NOW about how much they can contribute so you can be realistic. Also check deadlines - many schools require apps be in early for merit consideration. Some have a separate application for Honors or Presidential scholarship consideration.</p>

<p>There are a lot of wonderful LACs in the MidWest - good luck in your search!</p>

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<p>From your sign-on, I conclude your residency is MN.</p>

<p>What do you want to study? Do you like smaller campuses, college town, large flagship, smaller school in metro area?</p>

<p>Have you visited various schools? Sounds like you have a little.</p>

<p>Sounds like you are cramming a lot of decisions in a short time - and as a high stat HS senior, you have to meet application deadlines, scholarship deadlines. Since you are not NM or tippy-top stats, much of the scholarship situation is ‘it depends’.</p>

<p>Have you talked with your parents about what they are willing to spend on your college? Will they do 50-50 like with your brother - maybe they are paying essentially tuition and he is paying room and board via loans and earnings. Maybe they believe your scholarships or lowest cost of attendance school should be the way to go? I imagine they want to be ‘fair’ with how they pay for school for you and your two siblings, while also having financial limitations.</p>

<p>If your parents have completed FASFA on your brother, they are knowledgeable about what brother’s school expects for family’s contribution, or what loans he qualifies for. Maybe they believe that with scholarship and their contribution - and want you to avoid student loans?</p>

<p>Perhaps you want to live close to home or your parents want you to stay in region? Or is it you believe the merit in your region will be similar to out of your region? </p>

<p>Univ of AL does offer full tuition for your stats - and as a result has a huge number of OOS students. I grew up in WI and it is a fine comparison school to Univ of WI - Madison. Two generations of graduates from UW (one this year). </p>

<p>I live in AL and my younger daughter is at UA (Tuscaloosa, the flagship school). If you are open to a school out of your region, the honors program there is amazing. There are opportunities at UA that you might be interested in, and UW may not have - while UW might have some things you are interested in. There are honors freshmen (a sizable established program) doing research; my daughter is one of 300 freshmen in a STEM MBA program. She also has the extra $2500/year engineering scholarship (she is studying civil eng).</p>

<p>Best to get applications in and the scholarship applications in to a broader group of schools if you have not made some narrowing decisions. Univ of AL has a cheap and easy application process - if you have good feelings about Univ of WI you will want the option for a lower cost to attend school (if you do not get any UW scholarships which would reduce cost of attendance, COA). Maybe as the year goes on you have more feelings to spread your wings outside of your geographical area.</p>

<p>Some students believe a school out of their area will cost more to attend due to transportation costs for school break. However if there are significant scholarships and lower COA, that can weigh out to include that school. </p>

<p>Has your GC been of any help? Have you kept an eye out for any college fairs in your area and talked to representatives from various schools of interest to you? Sounds like you have visited some schools and thought about where you would see yourself, and what you want to study. </p>

<p>Maybe your parents think you will be more successful closer to home, or maybe you haven’t thought about going out of your area.</p>

<p>As you indicate, it is ‘work’ with this college process - but hopefully it will land you at the right school for you. Good luck.</p>

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<p>Thanks for the replies everyone.</p>

<p>@InigoMontoya‌ I might look into some slightly less selective schools in MN and the surrounding states, some that maybe aren’t well-known nationally. Maybe then I could get more aid because I’d have stats well “above the curve” as you said? I guess I’m keeping my options open.</p>

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<p>@Minnesnowta - if you use the SuperMatch tool on this site, it allows you to put in your scores and check a box to show you schools where you are enough above average to have potential for aid. I wouldn’t entirely rule out more-selective schools - you never know what might happen - but if you have a few schools that offer lots of merit aid, where you are above the 25-75th percentile scores, that gives you some options that are likely to be more affordable. It doesn’t mean you have to go to a lousy school - just not as highly-ranked as you might have been initially looking at, or as you said maybe more regionally rather than nationally known. D had many people tell her she should be looking at “better” schools - but we knew the best school was one where she would be happy academically and socially AND where she would graduate without a mountain of debt. </p>

<p>Be sure to express interest in these schools, so they know you are serious - sign up for literature, attend chat sessions, request info about Honors programs, visit if possible. Sometimes when you’re above the range schools are nervous you aren’t really interested.</p>