Starting to panic! Please help finalize D18’s college list.

Parents Forum
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Cost constraints: In state (NC) public or a private that offers enough merit aid to be competitive. Budget is in the low $20k range, despite our EC being in the mid-$30’s (not sure how they come up with those!)

Interested in pre-med program. (yet another reason for keeping the costs down)

Stats 3.3 or 3.4 UW, 1 AP (Calc AB) Sophomore yr., 3 AP’s (Calc BC, English, Biology) Junior yr, 4 AP’s (Statistics, English, Environmental Science & Psychology) Senior yr. Weighted GPA is 4.3 or 4.4, I believe.

ACT=34, SAT=1480 superscored (780 math, 700 reading), 1460 not superscored.

Participating in a medical science program in HS that requires certain life science electives, job shadowing, an internship and service in medical related areas and will graduate with this designation on her diploma. Program is not likely known outside of our local universities, however.

Ideal location would be in NC or north (D prefers colder climate), but within driving distance.

Toured a number of LAC’s last spring, mostly so she could see the kinds of options that exist, vs our large state schools.

Current list, though more research needs to be done on each:

Dickinson – She fell in love and it is her first choice. Looks like an excellent fit for her. A huge financial reach for us. Will apply EA.
UNC-CH – Really liked the school a lot. Checks off so many of her boxes. Applied EA.
NC State – Also liked State. Applied EA.
Ursinus – Liked it, but didn’t love it. Would need to visit again, do more research, etc. Expects generous automatic merit. Applied EA.
Appalachian State – Liked it pretty well, but we all have a few concerns about the academics and fit. Applied EA but did not do the Honors Application (sigh.)

Alabama may get added, in time for the merit awards.

I’m starting to panic because I feel she doesn’t have enough safeties (i.e., where she has a high likelihood of acceptance and we have a high likelihood of being able to pay) and may not have enough options. UNC-CH is a reach because of her GPA and NCSU may be, as well. There’s a fair gap between those two schools and the schools commonly considered to be the next tier, academically, and we don’t get a great feeling of fit at any of them. Honestly, just not “academic” enough (she tends to be motivated by peers who are intelligent and successful).

At this point, since I don’t think there are any other great in-state public options, we probably need to identify privates that have very good merit aid for someone with her stats. Ideally, we will also find schools that have good support systems in place for pre-meds, where she is a good fit academically and can get the grades she needs for med school. She would do best in a collaborative, vs competitive, environment.

Oh, and did I mention I’m starting to panic? I realize the deadlines for merit at some of these as-yet-unidentified schools are either past or quickly approaching.

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Instate UNCW or ECU?

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NC state has good engineering so science classes should be rigorous as well.

If she is going to be premed she should keep costs down. And she doesn’t want to struggle in her classes so her GPA stays high.

Ochem is hard anywhere.

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Elon?

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@mommdc , thanks for your input. Both are on the list for possible RD application, but the rigor at UNCW concerns me and the size and party reputation at ECU also concern me (and her.) We toured and really liked the UNCW campus, but it doesn’t seem very geared toward students who will continue on to post-graduate studies. That makes me wonder about the availability of all the extras the pre-meds need, like internships and such.

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There are more NC schools:
Fayetteville State
North Carolina A&T
Queens University of Charlotte
Western Carolina

I found those on the SEAPHAGES list of participating institutions
https://seaphages.org/
https://seaphages.org/institutions/

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Susquehanna is very generous with merit, and my daughter liked it much more than Ursinus. Honestly I’ve never heard/read anything negative about the school.

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They have pre-professional programs at UNCW
https://uncw.edu/preprofessional/

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If you want merit to reduce the cost any further, and her test score should get her some merit, then have her apply to several instate schools now, not wait.

Also she could take advantage of the Early Assurance program at ECU:
http://www.ecu.edu/cs-dhs/bsomadmissions/assurance.cfm

Please don’t think that there are no academically interested students at these less selective schools.
She will have plenty of competition from other premed and pre-professional students.

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@mommdc, thanks again for these suggestions. You make a good point about applying now and not waiting. I’m not sure there is any merit available at the in-state schools, but even for Honors, applying early would make sense (even if it’s not necessary.) She’s so loaded with normal schoolwork, that she will probably have to choose just a couple, at this point.

My concern with UNCW was the statistic that was given at the info session we attended. In a recent class, six months after graduation, somewhere around 76% were employed, around 10% weren’t looking for work, leaving us to assume the remaining 14% were in post graduate programs. We could be wrong, of course, but everything about the tour and info session gave us a different impression.

ECU is enormous, and growing by thousands of freshmen every year. My D is the type to get lost in a huge place, which is why even State concerns me a little for her.

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@roycroftmom, I ran the numbers at Elon. We toured with S a few years ago. But unless you get the top Fellowship (Honors, and based on our experience with him, she wouldn’t be likely to get it), it doesn’t fall into the “affordable” range. Good school though, so thanks for the suggestion.

@mommdc, I forgot to mention this - thanks for the reminder of Queens University. We are going to look into that. I read some good things about it on another CC thread recently and it looks promising.

@taverngirl, you’re right. I keep hearing good things about Susquehanna, too. It wasn’t on our radar when we toured PA LAC’s last spring and I wish it had been. I will look into it. In fact, I think I may know someone who went there and is now at Stanford doing his residency. Thank you for suggesting it.

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Tulane? Friend’s DD got full tuition scholarship there

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Goucher? Davidson? Any chance of merit at either of those?

I would not base any decisions on premed needs. She can major in anything and go to med school. At most schools there is no such thing as “premed.”

Goucher and many other schools have post-baccalaureate programs to satisfy the prereq’s for medical school for those who did not get them done in college.

Many many young people want to go into medicine, in late high school, but many of them change their minds. This kind of ambition is obviously well-tested by your daughter’s high school program, but she may also lack sophisticated knowledge of alternatives.

I still advocate for college students to study what they love without career pressures, with the exception of predetermined majors like engineering or nursing. Medical schools welcome humanities and arts majors.

Help her find schools that fit financially, and in terms of size, location, academics, extracurriculars and “vibe.” Overall the impression from your post is that best fit might be a small private. There are threads on CC on this topic.

Maybe check out the Colleges that Change Lives website. I believe Berea doesn’t charge tuition https://www.berea.edu/ but there may be reasons it doesn’t fit. There are also many other great schools on the CTCL list.

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With a 34 ACT she could be competitive for merit money at VCU, and Southern flagships like South Carolina (honors college?), Ole Miss, in addition to 'Bama.

UPitt may have merit potential for her also.

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I think she would get significant merit at Roanoke College in Salem, VA.

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UA and Pitt have more students than ECU.

And I thought Pitt based merit on unweighted GPA.

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U South Carolina has over 25,000 students, VCU has over 30,000 students, those are not small schools either.

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Would Catholic colleges be a possibility? Several good ones (these all happen to be Jesuit), such as U Scranton, St. Joe’s in Philadelphia, St. Louis U, and Xavier in Cincinnati, offer competitive full-tuition scholarships. Her UW GPA might be an issue, but could perhaps be mitigated by a really good class rank. These might all be farther away than what you want, but have the smaller size (4,000-7,500 undergrads) you want and would be more collaborative than competitive.

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University of Richmond?

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Seconding UScranton and Susquehanna, nicer in my opinion than Ursinus; if she liked Dickinson she may like Muhlenberg (especially some of the direct admit programs, at which she has a shot thanks to her high test scores) and Drew (same thing, I think).
UNC Asheville would be more academic than UNC-W. Also, colder weather.
She should always apply to Honors Colleges since those acceptances often come with scholarships. She may not like the Honors College and just stay a year, but at least she’ll have that scholarship for the first year (and can then apply to departmental scholarships).
What about Pitt and Temple? USC-Columbia? All three are very large though.
Smaller state U’s include UDel, UNew Hampshire, and UVermont.
What about St Olaf College? Excellent for premed and liberal arts, meet need and have merit - perhaps not to within your budget though so run the NPC. More merit available at Luther, Gustavus Adolphus, Earlham, Illinois Wesleyan, Concordia-Moorhead.