<p>My son is a rising senior and has a 2130 on the new SAT, and has scored 5's on the AP French, AP Calculus B/C, and AP US History Exams. He also scored 800 on his French SAT II, 740 on the Math SAT II, and a 770 on the US History SAT II. He has virtually no extracurricular activities, except he was selected to attend the Virginia Governor's French Academy for 3 weeks this summer.</p>
<p>The U of SC representative visited our area and more or less told us that my son would get a $4,000 per year scholarship from USC for his academic abilities, and even better, would be granted in-state tuition status for all 4 years as long as he kept a 3.0 GPA. This sounds to good to be true. This means that USC total costs per year would be about $11,000 vs. $16,000 to go to our own state schools, UVA and W&M. </p>
<p>Has anybody heard of such a great deal? What is USC's motivation to do this? And above all, is it a good school? I have heard great students can excel just about anywhere, and where you go to grad school is more important than undergrad.</p>
<p>Thanks in advance for any advice you can give</p>
<p>I think it'd be a huge waste of his academic achievements for him to attend USCar. Not that it's bad, but he's rediculously above the student body. Unless you are in a bad financial situation, i'd look at a more challenging school.</p>
<p>namtrag - not sure, but I think classifying certain exceptional students as in-state is U of South Carolina's way of giving merit aid to those students, while keeping the number of "real" merit aid to OOS'ers low, for political reasons.</p>
<p>If you have a smart student who gets into the honors program, and money is a real concern, it may be a good deal for you. Of course your own state schools are superior, but a truly motivated student can get what they need from any school. </p>
<p>If your student is stopping at undergrad, there is a cost by not attending a higher ranked institution. But let's say for instance, that you student wanted to go into law, where only the LSAT and the undergrad GPA count - this might be ideall, since he would stand a great chance of a wonderful college experience plus a stellar GPA.</p>
<p>If money is a big concern, you might want to consider this option. But if he gets into W&M or UVa, and you can afford it, I'd stay with W&M and UVa.</p>
<p>That's the pretty much guaranteed grant. He will be able to apply for some really prestigious award where he has a chance to get a full four year deal. I think they only award that to 40 kids per year. </p>
<p>But he wouldn't get any merit money at UVA or W&M, because he would just be an average student there. Which brings up another question: would he be able to get merit money enough at any prestigious private schools which would bring our cost down below the $16-17,000 cost of in-state at UVA (room, board and tuition)?</p>
<p>Need based aid will not happen for a couple of years because we mistakenly put money in his name when he was younger. He has about $45000 in his account. We will have to spend it before he will get any need based aid.</p>
<p>namtrag, I'm no expert, but I would just say that, just as with the U of South Carolina, you can expect to get the most merit money from his target and safety schools rather than his reaches. So you might want to check out schools that give a lot of merit money from the US News & World Report, and make sure you have some of those on his list. </p>
<p>A couple of active merit scholarship schools include U of Miami and American, both of which would consider your son a terrific catch.</p>
<p>Also, in terms of pure money, James Madison might be a possibility for him. </p>
<p>Except for JMU, and the other VA state uni's, you will not see much merit money from publics (obviously other than U of SC, who are actively trying to create a national rep). So you might want to look predominantly at private institutions.</p>
<p>If you share some more specifics, maybe we could come up with some particular suggestions: your S's preferred geographical location, size of school, etc.</p>
<p>I posted the rest of his stats in another thread: he is in top 1% of his class in addition to having great scores, plus he got straight A's his junior year in all-academic courses, including 3 AP classes.</p>
<p>Anyway, he wants to stay in the eastern US, wants to major in math/cs, but continue with languages, in the hopes of a CIA or NSA job. I would suspect these interests might eliminate many smaller schools, but am not sure. He is not into sports, so prestige of the athletic teams is not a concern. He doesn't mind cold weather, or not living in a big city (but I don't think he cares if he does go to school in a big city).</p>
<p>I had always assumed he would stay in-state at UVA or W&M, but it might pay to check into some private schools. I will look at the merit award more closely.</p>
<p>namtrag, I took a look at various schools for your S. He clearly has the resume for many extremely selective schools, and no one needs to tell you about Tufts or Carnegie Mellon. So I won't include any schools I think are realistic reaches. Those are the schools he has a good, but not slam-dunk, shot to get into. But they also are the ones he has a lesser chance of getting merit aid.</p>
<p>So here are some matches/safeties that came to mind, each of which has computer science/technology majors and strong cultural and language programs in some of the languages the gov't wants (Arabic, Japanese, etc.) :</p>
<p>American
Boston University
Bucknell (excellent Japanese program, but I forgot to check their Middle Eastern program, sorry!)
Dickinson (smaller, very pretty campus, but languages and foreign studies is one of their surprising strengths)
George Washington (known for being expensive, but note they give out lots and lots of merit money.)</p>
<p>This is not a thorough list, but at least gives a few names that would give your son a choice of matches & safeties that offer small and large campuses in both cities, suburban and rural environments. Although they are matches/safeties, I am sure your son would find academic challenge at each of these schools.</p>
<p>Let me know what you think, and best of luck!</p>
<p>Wow, Hayden. Thanks for the research. We will take a look at these schools, and not rule them out because they are private. I just hope I can return the favor by helping someone else out on this board. Thanks again!</p>
<p>If he wants to go to South Carolina, he should consider Clemson as well. My S got a DVD from Clemson touting a four-year free ride program for students with exceptional numbers. Clemson has made a political stir in SC by going before the legislature and touting the economic benefits of having a truly top-ranked public university in the state, and they are spending money to improve their ranking.</p>
<p>Basically, what others have told you is true. Many schools that want your son because he is far more academically accomplished/talented than their average student will spring merit money for him. Schools where he would simply be another in a gaggle of extremely talented students are unlikely to do that.</p>