Hi everyone, I’m a rising senior and I’m compiling my list of colleges to apply to in the fall. I’m a California resident so I’ve already decided/am considering to apply to some UC’s (UCLA, UCSD, UCI, maybe Cal) and CSU’s (SDSU). However, now I’m looking for schools where I could get merit aid-my family makes ~$100K and I don’t think we’d qualify for much need-based aid. I really want to stay in-state and I’d prefer going to school in a big city (think SD, SF, LA) or nearby (like how close Berkeley is to San Francisco). I don’t mind a women’s college and I would prefer a larger school, but the Claremont College system kind of appeals to me (how there’s benefits of both a larger school and a smaller one), so I’m considering Scripps right now, although I don’t know what their FA is like.
My stats:
4.0 UW GPA/4.53 W (haven’t calculated UC GPA yet), taken 5 AP courses and community college calc, will take 4 more next year plus linear/discrete algebra
2290 SAT (800CR, 770M, 720W)-2300 superscored
Extracurriculars:
Hospital volunteering (4 hrs/week, every week)
Math tutoring (3 hours/week, 36 weeks/year)
Health Occupations Students of America aka HOSA (Secretary last year, VP next)
California Scholarship Federation (1-6 hours/week depending on availability of volunteer opportunities, 36 weeks/year)
Awards:
President’s Service Award Bronze (not sure this counts for much)
Top 10 in the state for Medical Reading (at state HOSA competition)
I’m interested in majoring in human biology or anatomy/physiology.
I’m aware my extracurriculars are really weak-honestly, my parents are both immigrants who are pretty much clueless about the college admissions process and don’t see the point of EC’s; therefore, they don’t have the time or patience to drive me to extracurriculars-it took me a year to convince them to let me volunteer at the hospital and months to get them to let me attend the state competition an hour away-and they won’t let me drive until I’m 18. They think what I’m doing right now is really impressive and they both think I will get into UCLA, which I know is at best a low reach. I’m aware that’s no excuse for not being more involved in clubs at school but I’m really focused on HOSA (I was a founding member as a sophomore and I spend most of my energy/time with it).
So basically, are there private colleges in California that focus more on numbers that give out semi-generous merit aid? My older sister is currently in college and my parents are only paying $2500/year for her (I think), so I expect that they can afford ~$15K-20K. I haven’t yet run a sample FAFSA yet and will inform you what the approximate EFC is when I do. By the way, I am applying to scholarships on my own (the small $1000 ones).
Thank you very much!
You might want to look at
Whittier
Mills
USC
University of San Diego
Soka
Santa Clara
St Mary’s of CA
@Dustyfeathers Thank you for the suggestions.
And I guess I didn’t mention this, and I don’t know how important it is, but I’ve taken two SAT II’s, Bio M (780) and World History (780), and waiting for my Math II to come out (took it before and got a 690, so I’m expecting a higher score this time because I studied harder/felt more confident).
With your high stats, I understand from others on this board, to chase merit, you should aim to be in the top 20-30% of their applicant pool.
Soka gives Merit to nearly everyone, but it’s a unique school. Highly ranked, but you should be aware of what its niche is
St M of CA gave blanket 17K one year ago in May. It is an CTCL school (colleges that change lives) and is highly regarded. but for some reason it has had trouble filling. You have high stats for them. I’d be shocked if you weren’t offered merit to attract you.
Mills has a lot to offer including cross registration with Berkeley. There’s transport (on BART I believe) between campuses. You get this nice women’s school (if you identify as a woman) with lovely peaceful architecture and camaraderie plus the option to venture forth to a big U if you want. Mills has gone through a bit of upheaval recently in that it’s last president was pretty awful in several ways. Just June 2016 a new presidnet came on board. By all measures, she looks pretty solid and a smart decent leader. I have a friend who was offered some nice places at top East Coast LACs who turned those down for Mills, knowing about the issue with leadership. There may be opportunity for you b/c your stats are very good for Mills. They may try to throw money at you to attract you.
best of luck
Scripps does offer some aid, and it never hurts to try
If your parents make around 100k you should also be eligible for financial aid as long as they don’t have lots of savings and assets
@Dustyfeathers What do you mean by “gave blanket 17K”? I’m thinking I might apply for Mills, thank you for all your suggestions and information.
@citymama9 Really? What if they have land (that’s considered assets, right?) outside of the country? Do you know if that’s factored into the FAFSA?
@ninemuses The 17K that they offered last cycle (May 2015 not May 2016) was done by telephone bank. They had telephone bank callers target students and offer an automatic $17K off upon acceptance. I didn’t read the actual terms and I don’t know what demographic that they were targeting, but I did hear of this from someone who was in a position to know and reliable. I’m not sure if they did the same this year. They were on the list of schools that didn’t fill. (There’s a thread for that on this forum.) (Basically if a school doesn’t fill by May 1 each year, they have the option of sending in their name to guidance counselors in the hopes of scooping up some more students). This tells me that they have funding to use to attract students. They need to attract students, like many very fine small LACs. Since your stats are good, they would conceivably use it to attract you. St M of CA also has cross registration at Mills and at Berkeley (pretty sure check on the Berkeley thing my info may be outdated), but several local area schools have cross reg.
Also the Bay Area schools have access to internship opportunities.
Yeah, Mills is an easy one to put on a list! It’s worth a look and a try. It might just be perfect, you never know.
I’m not an expert, but I have seen it mentioned here on CC that some schools are very generous and 100k isn’t considered a lot of money when many families are making much more. The only way you will know for sure what you can get is if you go to the net price calcuators on the different college websites. There is a place to put in info about assets. I guess it all depends on how much their land is worth and how the school uses that info
@citymama9 Thank you! I’ll try that.