<p>URM=under represented minority.</p>
<p>In a nutshell, your son will probably get some good financial aid from schools that want to increase their Hispanic enrollment.</p>
<p>Oh. Is there a list of such schools, by chance?</p>
<p>Most colleges want to increase diversity, but that is just one factor among many that they consider.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Oh. Is there a list of such schools, by chance?
[/quote]
I don't really think there is. But I also think you can rest assured that many/most of the most selective schools in this country have that as a factor. So, as others have been saying, now that you feel your son is seeing a whole broader set of opportunities (previously thinking that finances would limit him to Texas), I think he can safely make his "list" of criteria: how far from home, what size of school, what atmosphere (big sports or not, Greek heavy or not), rural/urban/suburban, special majors/programs of interest... Through this board, or Princeton Review's search function or USN&WR search function, he can begin to identify a list.</p>
<p>He's visited Austin and knows he likes it there. Since travel $ are an issue, are there schools of varying types nearby that you can visit (a Texas LAC?....) to serve as prototypes for him to consider?</p>
<p>Yes, we'll definitely be visiting some Texas schools, and we just made the list of oos schools this past weekend.</p>
<p>Here's another 'dumb' question:</p>
<p>The UT tour has a part for the student and a part for the parents. When the kid visits an out-of-state school, does s/he normally go alone, or does the parent go too?</p>
<p>Thanks again to everyone for your wonderful input! A lot of thought-provoking ideas to consider.</p>
<p>Re visiting OOS - depends on the situation and the student/parent.</p>
<p>We very much wanted to see any place where we were sending our D, because she was looking so far from home. On the other hand, had she been going to visit schools that we had some familiarity with, we would have felt more comfortable. We made a couple of trips as a convenience, a parent is able to rent a car, and cut down on travel time.</p>
<p>Plenty of kids go visit on their own, or overnight on their own - often the parents simply cannot go, it is just whatever works out best in a given situation.</p>
<p>whether to go with your kid on tours depends on time and money
Lots of kids go alone- if they are going to stay on campus with a student- there won't be room for parents & ditto for attending classes- parents can go on tours of course- but if the student is at the point where he is doing a visit and overnight- there isn't a lot for parents to do once they have been on a tour.
I enjoyed just traveling to and from with my daughter though- I didn't normally get to see her much, with all of her activities- and I recognized that once she was off to college I would see her even less so I wanted to make the most of it ;)</p>
<p>D is applying to 5/6 OOS and 4 require flights. She and I flew to 2 OOS individual schools. H,D and I saw 5 others on the west coast during a spring break 'vacation'. She did the instate tours while visiting friends at the colleges. (We had seen them with #1 or #2).
She will be doing any accepted student visits on her own.</p>
<p>Many schools have recruitment weekends for urms where they pay air and everything for kids who can't afford to attend. I suggest calling the schools your son is interested in to find out if they have one.</p>