@acquapt, thank you for great suggestions. Would’ve never thought to look at SUNYs.
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OP- there is no “penalty” for having saved for college. Imagine trying to navigate this process with no college savings, and leave everything else in place. It can be a nightmare. I know lots of parents whose kids end up in our local branch of the state college system (not the flagship, and very limited majors) because they can take the bus, live at home, keep their HS job, and the price is right. Yes, the kids reached for merit aid; parents applied for need based aid. Guess what-most colleges don’t care that you can afford X. They’ll give you a 5K merit award (“chancellor’s scholar”) or a 5K need based grant and send you out a bunch of information about loans. You’ve been gapped- try filling that gap- the math doesn’t work. So it’s off to study accounting or early childhood ed, and kid can kiss her interest in nanotechnology goodbye because the local state college doesn’t have that (or anything else besides a two semester sequence in physics).
Having saved GIVES you options, it doesn’t take them away.
Do NOT rely on the “official” number of Jews on campus. A quick email to the Hillel Director (if there’s a Hillel), the Rabbinic couple (if there’s chabad) will tell you how many “active” Jewish kids there are on campus right now. A college which gets 8 kids to a chanukah lighting and 4 kids to a Passover Seder may or may not hit the threshold for your family- but at least you’ve got real data. Some vague “we think 20% of the student body might be Jewish” is not helpful in calibrating.
What’s he doing this summer? Time to get cracking on a summer job! Even if he hates it- it will make a great essay topic. And it’s terrific rounding out his skillset.
It’s not the quantity but quality…just kidding, being rewatching Curb Your Enthusiasm, gives me too many irreverent ideas. Feels like it’s going to take significant time and effort to find the right college fit.
Do not get me wrong, I am not comparing about college savings. Well, definitely wish we had more in the bank given college cost inflation. I can’t imagine not having saved to pay for their college education. I realize and appreciate that we only need to pick from the great or really good school options. It is a good place to be at, no doubt.
Yes, need to get him out there to find a summer job. The carrots have not been working, it’s time to apply the sticks…His younger brother has had a job for six months, since he was 14, and gives him a lot of grief about his total financial reliance on us.
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R1 refers to the level/volume of research conducted at a university. A flagship state university is a typical R1. Brandeis is an R1, even though it is closer to the size of a LAC. That means the students are much more likely to be conducting research and doing the associated scholarly writing during undergrad. The only smaller R1 is Caltech, which is grad student heavy and very intensely research focused.
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Thank you, very interesting.
You might find this thread interesting: Colleges ranked by SAT Score: What do you find interesting?. In looking at these schools’ average SAT scores from 2015 (i.e. pre-test optional almost everywhere), these are some of the schools with very similar SAT scores (within +/- 10 points).
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Butler (IN): About 4500 undergrads: Actually has the exact same average SAT as Miami of Ohio, U. of Denver, and College of Wooster and within 10 of Fordham, Skidmore, Furman. As it’s in the state capital, there are also lots of political opportunities here.
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Christopher Newport (VA): About 4500 undergrads. Within 10 of DePaul, U. of Cincinnati, Lake Forest, Bradley, Allegheny, SUNY Buffalo, U. of Iowa, Iowa State, U. of Nebraska, U. of Kentucky, etc.
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Mercer (GA): About 4900 undergrads. Within 10 points of New Jersey Institute of Technology, Clarkson, Penn State, Loyola Marymount, St. Lawrence, U. of Delaware, Texas A&M, U. of Vermont, etc.
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Truman State (MO): About 3900 undergrads. Has the exact same score as Elon, Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo, CUNY-Baruch, Wofford, Loyola Chicago, U. of Colorado, Texas Christian, and U. of Alabama - Huntsville, among others.
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U. of Alabama - Huntsville: About 7600 undergrads. See Truman State.
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U. of Denver (CO): Already mentioned; about 5900 undergrads: See the schools mentioned for Butler
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U. of North Carolina - Asheville: About 3200 undergrads. See the schools listed for Mercer.
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U. of Tampa (FL): About 9900 undergrads. Within 10 points of UNC-Charlotte, SUNY-Oneonta, Towson, U. of Illinois - Springfield, U. of Montana, U. of Maine
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U. of the Pacific (CA): About 3300 undergrads. Within 10 points of UC-Irvine, Indiana University, Syracuse, Fairfield, Loyola Maryland, U. of Vermont, Texas A&M, etc.
On College Navigator, at least, it indicates no religious affiliation for Mercer: College Navigator - Mercer University. Its Mission & Vision indicates that it was founded by Baptists, but indicates that it is now independent.
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As I mentioned above, U of the Pacific has a Methodist affiliation.
My wife and I went to grad school there. When I sent my parents photo of the married grad student dorms they said “oh, you’re living in Spartan Village” (family housing at MSU). When I visited OSU, at times I felt that I was in different part of UIUC that I had never visited.
So yes, very Midwestern Land-Grant University, smack in the middle of corn and soy fields. Still, there are a lot of nice places there.
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I am assuming that you are the immigrant parent. Your kid’s grades are a lot to be proud of. He must be a hard-working student. Please understand that unless your child goes to one of a handful of schools in the US (which he is not going to get into), the name and prestige don’t make a whit of difference to his future. Syracuse, Davidson, Brandeis, etc, all quite selective schools, their name won’t mean much in the future to him or to an employer. The only names that really seem to mean something in the US are the Ivies, a couple of the old 7 sister schools (like Wellesley, maybe Smith and Bryn Mawr), and a very few flagship state schools (Berkeley, U Mich, UNC, surely I forgot a couple), and outside the US, it’s really only the tippy-top schools like Harvard and Yale.
So, where should he go, assuming that you don’t qualify for fin aid, and you can foot 200K for his college (not that you should, just that you can). He should look at U Toronto (currently the best U in Canada, plus in an exciting city) in addition to McGill, since Canadian U’s are less concerned about “holistic” admissions, and more about hard evidence of academic achievement, which he most certainly has. He could also look at other Canadian U’s, like Queen’s. But the reality is that it’s probably going to cost you about 60K/yr - which is better than the 85K/yr that private college in the US would cost.
He should of course apply to his flagship U in-state. In addition, certain OOS flagships, which would probably cost you about 60-65K/yr with no merit, might give him merit that would bring your annual cost down to close to your flagship in-state, and certainly below your 50K/yr ceiling. Many of them have excellent business schools. If his interest lies more towards poli sci, make sure the school is in a state capitol, or better yet, near DC, so that he can get internships (although I’m not sure that he’s going to be a go-getter about internships, if he hasn’t been a go-getter about a job or ECs). If his interests lie more towards business school, he should probably apply to the business schools at the flagship U’s. He also should look at 3rd tier liberal arts colleges which have business schools, which with his stats might give him a lot of merit money, bringing your annual cost down to under 35K/yr.
The leftover money in the 529 account can be used for further education costs (undergrad or grad) for either child, or for a grandchild, or a niece or nephew.
You need to understand that in the US, unless he gets into a very top named school, what’s going to open doors for him in poli sci will be the work he’s done in politics (hence the need to be in a state capitol, or near DC, or at least in/near a major city, so that he can get involved in political work there while an undergrad), or if in business, internships. This is all going to depend upon his own motivation, rather than any supposed boost that a 2nd or 3rd tier school can give him.
I agree that he needs a summer job that can morph into a part time job throughout the next school year, and next summer. You say his younger brother rags him about still taking spending money from you? Stop giving it to him! Tell him to get a job, help him to find one right now (before all the college kids get home in a week or two), and tell him that you expect him to earn and pay for his own spending money, pay for his cell phone, etc. Do it in a supportive, encouraging way, rather than a punitive one, but make it clear that this is a very necessary step towards his goal of becoming an independent, self-supporting human being. If he finds a great volunteer position on someone’s political campaign or in public policy this summer, if that’s what he’s interested in, that’s good, too (and then of course you’d keep on supporting him, since he’s doing something that will help him to clarify his educational and career goals).
BTW, just about every flagship state U and many other schools will have active Hillel organizations, if he chooses to avail himself of them.
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People have given you some great ideas about particular schools, but as it is late in the game to add meaningful ECs, I’d like to suggest instead thinking about how to combine your son’s existing record into something that is meaningful and stands out on the application.
Reading about your son made me think of my S23. He had high stats (35 ACT taken once, 3.99 GPA) but very few ECs (mostly because we moved between three states and five schooling situations from 6-12th grades due to Covid and my husband’s jobs.)
For both of my children, their essays focused on combining their somewhat scattered interests/activities into a coherent story an AO or scholarship committee could understand. Does your school have a senior thesis requirement? For my S23, his interests in Classics (his main EC awards) and Business (mostly only shown by the fact he reads the Economist religiously) were combined into his thesis research on ancient economic factors that gave rise to social instability- he wrote about this in a powerful way in his essay, which (I strongly believe) helped scholarship committees/AOs have an idea that although he wasn’t in a million activities, he did have a (somewhat unusual) focus and direction. His LORs referred to these things. Considering his lack of long-term involvement and that he has only been at his current school to get LORs for junior and senior year, he did well this application cycle with some good merit options.
Could your son start reading business and politics articles in French and discussing them with the French teacher weekly? (This could be mentioned in the LOR.) Could he get further involved in reading about French politics or French business policies (in English) with the possibility of discussion it in his essay of a direction in his studies toward comparative politics/business practices/different ways politics affects the business and investment practices in different places? If he does add a new EC, is there a way it can link these interests in some way?
When you don’t have too many ECs, for whatever reason, my advice is to combine those you have to seem like they show a focus and purpose that makes the application readers say, “Oh, that is interesting. This student has a direction."
My other suggestions as a family who also needed merit due to the biological father’s assets:
-Has your son tried the ACT? Mine took that one in school with no real prep and did much better than his PSAT. I strongly suggest trying it if he hasn’t.
-Look at some schools which have automatic merit for an SAT at that level (or ACT).
-Don’t bother with any of the merit scholarship awards that talk about “service leadership” or such in the description.
Good luck!
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Oh, that’s good to know! In case the criteria get tighter, another option to know about is their first year abroad program. If you spend the first year doing one of their study abroad programs, your next 3 years are at instate tuition. FSU International Programs Freshmen
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Probably not for this family, no. But there can be for low income families that have saved enough that they are deemed to have “atypical” assets.
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This may have been prompted by my comment on competitive merit valuing service. I’d appreciate your perspective in case I need to adjust my advice.
To be clear, I’m not referring to random service leadership scholarships for $500 here and there. My advice is directly related to our experience with competitive scholarships such as Stamps, Robertson, Belk, Duke, Johnson, Cornelius Vanderbilt, Jefferson…
Thanks!
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Good point. For the schools that offer starting first semester or year abroad, do you think kids who indicate that as a preference may get an admissions boost?
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I would look at Univ of Georgia. It’s strong in Poly Sci and International Relations, and putting that as your major gets you placed into SPIA, their well-known School of Public and International Affairs, which comes with its own advising. The business school is quite respected as well and you can decide on your major any time. You can apply EA and have a decision by mid-November. It’s no shoe-in for admission at all but I think he would have a shot and it’s relatively affordable even out-of-state.
My daughter is a strong student but with no stand-out EC’s (soccer captain tops the list) and this is where she is headed next year, as a political-sci major.
Hillel is active, I think, and getting a new building.
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There’s a bit of an urban myth around the low income family with “atypical” assets who are getting penalized.
1- That’s what Professional Judgement is for- low income and “atypical”.
2- The formulae are designed to identify the social worker married to the ceramic artist with an 8 figure trust fund, a beach house on Martha’s Vineyard, and $500K in CD’s as their emergency fund, NOT to penalize two low income adults who have saved (exactly how much do you think low income people have in savings?) If you are a social worker married to a ceramic artist who does NOT have such assets- you likely do not need to worry.
3- Every time a parent or kid posts on CC that they are- in fact- a low income family who is getting penalized because of atypical assets- we go 50 rounds before we discover that they own three apartment buildings, live in one of the apartments and rent out their primary home which is worth roughly 500K (but they aren’t living in it). And when they cry that their three apartment buildings represent their retirement savings and in order to pay for college, they’d have to sell one of the units (or their primary home) it becomes very hard to explain that in financial aid parlance, a retirement fund is an IRA, 401K, etc. NOT an apartment building in downtown Boston.
Please cite evidence that there are actual low income families who have managed to save- what-- the 500K in relatively liquid assets-- that would be required to trigger a financial aid penalty?
I know one case in real life. There was a settlement payout due to an accident; the family got bad advice and the money was sitting in a CD, not invested for growth or invested for dividends, or at all diversified. It took exactly one email requesting professional judgement- the family produced the paperwork explaining the payout, that CD was excluded from the FA calculation and the family got aid based on their income.
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I came from such a family. Low incomes, neither parent with college degree. No inherited wealth or anything like that. Not financially savvy. Lived extremely frugally, in a way that was not smart (went without health insurance, reroofed steep 2nd story house alone, forwent opportunities) in order not to incur debt, and to save for college for kids. In the end, the colleges just took the savings because the savings existed. Would have been better to use the money to, for example, drive safer cars. It worked out ok in the end, but it was always 1 accident or sickness away from disaster.
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Gosh, no. I didn’t even see that part of your post probably.
I was thinking of some schools we looked at which had as their largest merit group special programs that focus on service leadership. (Alabama’s UFE comes to mind.) There is nothing wrong with these programs or focus! But I was noting that OP’s child probably shouldn’t spend time on these merit directions since at this point, it would be too late to get serious service leadership on his resume.
I suspect we are saying the same thing: many merit scholarships DO value service, so he might want to aim for those which do not. That is what we found with S23 who lacked those ECs.
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Hugs to you and your family. Did the college deny your appeal?