academically strong student, with 4.00 unweighted GPA, 6 AP classes 1520 SAT, 500 hrs in community volunteering/service, varsity basketball, no leadership roles. wants to study computer science. will not be eligible for any need based aid. can pay/get loans up to $25-30K. what schools should he apply to in NY/NJ/PA?
Stony Brook for NY residents.
Rutgers for NJ residents.
what private schools offer nice merit with these stats?
maybe Stevens? Drexel is a great choice for CS, and with the coop program can earn money along the way.
Stevens, Drexel, Lehigh, Stonybrook, Rensselaer Polytechnic, Virginia Tech, Penn State, University of Mass Amherst–this is the list we have so far… just started the process. Are we missing any other good CS programs?
Stevens Institute of Technology’s net price calculator at https://npc.collegeboard.org/student/app/stevens asks for GPA and test score; with 4.0 and 1520 SAT and financial parameters that are too high for any need-based aid, it suggests a $25,000 scholarship, leaving a net price of around $42,000.
You may want to check other colleges’ net price calculators to see if they ask for GPA and test scores and estimate any scholarships.
RPI, and not quite in your desired area WPI (Worchester MA) both have merit scholarships. I don’t know exactly what stats/activities trigger them, my son was offered more $$ at WPI, but I know people for whom it was the reverse. He was a NMF and SAT score was 1560. He didn’t have much volunteering (one summer at the senior center), no leadership, he’d done a lot of programming - including full time job one summer, volunteer stuff for a med school prof and some gaming things that actually won awards to our surprise. His two school ECs were Sci Olympiad and Academic Team - the teams were very successful and in Sci Oly he had a bunch of medals every year. No sports. He was obviously much more one sided than your son which has plusses and minuses.
another vote for Penn State
SUNY at Buffalo. My nephew recently graduated from there and had his pick of jobs before graduation. He had a great experience and now my son is a freshman CS major. He has similar stats as you. UB has a Presidential scholarship, the largest in the SUNY system that you have to apply separately, if awarded, it’s $15,000 per year. It’s highly competetive-400 applicants and only 25 are awarded the scholarship. You can stack the STEM incentive (free tuition) onto that and basically get your college for free.
Penn State is a great school… but even with these excellent stats, if this student is OOS, the costs will be high.
The northeast is not well known for merit aid.
What about Northeastern? They don’t have as much merit as they used to…and it goes to the top applicants each year. But it might be worth a try as this student has good stats. In addition, their co-op program might be beneficial.
Does Pitt have CS? If so, he should apply there and apply early.
Is he a senior now? Or or a junior?
Northeastern merit maxes out at 30K for NMF, 28K for Honors. That will put the cost at about 34K I believe even with the maximum merit.
UMDCP, great CS program, good location for internships metro access to DC on one side and NSA nearby on other side. Son might be competitive for Bannacker/Key scholarship, application has to be in by Nov. 1.
What is your state flagship?
Carnegie Mellon, RIT
Are you living in NYS? Do you qualify for Excelsior scholarship? Or is student top 10% of class and can get the STEM scholarship at SUNYs?
If he has a 1520 SAT he should not have to pay $40k at Penn State and similar schools that don’t give much merit.
You can find ABET accredited computer science programs in those states by using the search tool here:
http://main.abet.org/aps/Accreditedprogramsearch.aspx
He would get merit at the less selective schools on that list.
Pitt merit deadline is today, he could do the online app and SRAR today, and order scores sent and do short answer questions. He might get a bit of merit there and they have a great COOP program.
UAH would give him full tuition plus room I think, and they have a good computer science program.
Private schools most likely will cost too much, and without need based aid and only merit aid the price might not come down low enough.
NJIT has full tuition merit scholarships (not private, I know, but worth looking into.)
Where does he rank in the class (or if no ranking is he in the top 10%)? Those are great stats, but the top schools do not give out a lot of merit and seems like he might need close to/more than half tuition.
University of Rochester is a great school that might give him merit. RIT may give even more, but is a bit less prestigious.
For a merit award in the $30 to $40K rangeyou would need to meet your budget for a $60K+ private, you would need to look at a college that is well down on the “prestige” list, one of the big OOS publics with automatic merit or in the South where tuition tends to be lower.
If you are in NJ, Rutgers is certainly a great option or Rowan which has put a lot of money in STEM.
Good luck!
Someone just posted this in the Drexel thread having been accepted EA/ED:
Computer Science
4.1 weighted
1510 SAT (790 Math, 720 Reading)
Accepted
Accepted with - 39,000 merit aid
If you can go a little further, Ohio State & Michigan State have decent programs with excellent merit. Waterloo’s tuition in Canada is around $32K for the best CS school in Canada, and recruiting is outstanding (still in driving distance from NYC)