At MANY colleges, this income level would not put you in the running for any need based aid. Your family contribution would be in the $50,000 plus per year range. And if your family has those significant assets NOT in retirement accounts…that could make your family contribution even higher.
Lots of opportunity for merit aid.
My stepdaughter graduated from the University of Iowa. She is very intellectual and creative, so were her friends, plenty of intellectual types there… Iowa city is, furthermore, a great college town.
I understand your criticism of the campus - it’s why my bio daughter, SD’s younger sister, did not want to apply there… Imo, the town makes up for the sprawling campus though…
Iowa State is also a good school and I understand the campus is more compact. Did you apply there?
If it’s too late to get merit scholarships at Iowa State, then I recommend you consider a gap year, then re-apply to Iowa State next summer.
Another reason to take a gap year and reapply to schools next summer/fall -
There are other small schools, besides the ones you listed/applied to that would give you the cozy intellectual vibe you want. Furthermore, I think you’d get a very nice merit scholarship from these schools, enabling you to come close to your father’s budget. (Can you go a little over? Is there any leeway at all, or is that 100k a set and steadfast number?)
It’s likely too late to apply to these now for merit scholarship consideration, but if you take a year off, consider appyling next year to these LACs:
Beloit College, WI
Knox College, IL
Earlham College , IN
Cornell College, Iowa
There’s a book called Colleges That Change Lives, with descriptions of these, as well as other liberal arts colleges. If you want to go further away from home, you will find some other schools listed in the book that may be a good option for you…
Also,
Grinnell College, Iowa
Macalister College, MN
But the latter two may not give you enough merit aid.
The applications to these are also free, so it doesn’t hurt to apply and see how much merit money you can get.
Now, if the 100k is a firm number, then obviously you may need to go to state school.
Based on your most recent comment, you might want to take the gap year and reapply to Iowa and Iowa State, to get as much merit aid as possible.
Also consider -
U of Minnesota-Twin Cities
U of Missouri-Columbia
U of Kansas
Just because their OOS tuition is more affordable, and you would NOT pay full-price, given your high stats.
Finally, consider taking the ACT again, to shoot for a 32. That’s the magic number for full tuition at U of Kansas and some other state schools for full tuition scholarships.
@BeeDAre I did not apply to Iowa State. I have actually visited ISU about three times just because so many events happen there. They ask me what I want to major in, and I say business. They respond that they have a great ag business program…but I said business, not ag business. ISU is a great school, and I really like the campus, but it does not have a strong program for a plain business major. At ISU, everything is either ag related or engineering.
I did apply to Grinnell, but I don’t really include it on my list because I’m not that big of a fan of the school. I applied because it was free and it keeps my options open.
Also, I asked my business teacher at my school about the 5,500 to 7,500 max in loans. He doesn’t even believe me. How do some people graduate with $50k-100k in student debt if there is a max? (Of course there is grad school, but it seems hard to accumulate that much debt if there caps on loans.)
They have their parents co-sign additional loans; or have their parents take out loans.
Not something your parents should do, especially with your good grades and scores, and adequate savings/budget.
My dentist’s assistant’s daughter is majoring in Business at Iowa and is very happy there.
It’s considered a respectable school here in the Chicago area. Many families around here pay OOS tuition to send their kids there.
Because students take out private loans in addition to the federal ones. Problem: Private loans require a co-signer.
Look, I’m going to disagree with the idea to take a gap year and reapply to Iowa. The number of presidential scholarships is limited, and while I’m sure you’re a great student, small town Iowa is full of kids with your stats. If you’re going to go to Iowa, go next year, as you are far from a sho-in for the presidential.
People get into that much debt because some parents foolishly cosign loans for those amounts. Spend some time reading about the [types of loans](https://studentaid.ed.gov/sa/types/loans#types) that are available to students and their families so you understand how the process works.
Challenge: Define “better” in a meaningful way.
You seem to have some sort of hazy, gauzy dream about what life at Big Name Elite College™ would be like (read: “surrounded by people that are very smart…[with] a lot of intellectual conversations and interesting viewpoints”), and a corresponding hazy, gauzy nightmare about what life at the University of Iowa would be like (read: not like that).
You are, quite possibly, maybe even probably, wrong on both counts.
I offer my own history: I started out at Big Name Elite College™, and flunked out. Why did I flunk out? Because I didn’t take advantage of the resources around me. I wasn’t interested in the intellectual side of things, I was interested in the fact that I was finally away from the farming community I’d grown up in and had plenty of social freedom without having to worry about my parents’ rules. Yeah, Big Name Elite College™ may have had a lot of really, really smart people (heck, my roommate was one of them!), and there were certainly deep, intellectual conversations going on around me, but it’s not like I was into them, you know? (Well, I had a lot of what felt like deep, intellectual conversations at the time, but they tended to involve listening to a lot of Pink Floyd and so on. In hindsight, I don’t really think that counts.)
So like I said, I flunked out, and after bouncing around at a community college so my student loans didn’t come due, I ended up at Big Home State Flagship University™. While there, I found that there were lots and lots of incredibly smart people I could have deep, intellectual conversations with, and we didn’t even need Pink Floyd to get us into them! Yeah, Big Home State Flagship University™ may have had a bunch of wastrels who couldn’t be bothered with taking their education seriously (and yes, it has made the Playboy party school list a handful of times), but they weren’t the ones I was hanging out with, you know? And you know what? I was incredibly successful there, and was very nicely prepared for grad school in my field, which I continue to work in quite happily decades after my graduation with honors.
Basically, it’s not that Big Name Elite College™ had a student body that was 98% intellectual jokers who didn’t care about their education—maybe it did, maybe it didn’t, I’m not really in a position to say. It’s not that Big Home State Flagship University™ had a student body that was 98% students who were incredibly focused on educational attainment and development, either—maybe it did, maybe it didn’t, I’m not really in a position to say. I do know, however, that I grew up a lot in the process of flunking out and transitioning from the one school to the other, and so I sought out different sorts of people and different sorts of experiences at each place.
TL;DR: It’s not the school, it’s the student. Get over yourself, and stop thinking you need or even deserve on particular kind of setting to thrive—it’s simply not true. What matters is what you do with what you’re given.
One of the “brightest” students in my MBA program at the University of Michigan Business School, was a graduate of the University of Iowa. We did a number of projects together and she was exceptional. You will find very talented and well rounded students at University of Iowa. Were you accepted into their Honors College? You could attend a graduate (business) school outside of Iowa at a later date.
The COA at University of Iowa is approximately 21K (Tuition/R&B is only $18.7K). If you do get the Presidential Scholarship, you will have most of the $100K left after undergrad and could be used to offset your graduate school cost. As others have said, a lot of students wish they were in your position, with $100K available for college. Make the best use of the opportunity in front you!
@Jamrock411 Yes, I’ve been accepted into their honors program. I’ve submitted a non-binding housing application as well. Would you recommend that I take a gap year and get the full 18,500 scholarship? A year is still a long time to take off. I certainly would want to take advantage of work exchange programs like WWOOF.
I would not take the gap year – you might not even get the scholarship, and then you have wasted a year.
hi Adam
I have a different perspective, having been one of those rare seniors that turned down a full “presidential” scholarship to my state u. to go somewhere else. because i am a lot older than you the price differential was not as great at the school i did choose, my mom said she would pay for wherever i wanted and i did take her up on that offer. Only much later did I learn what a burden it had been. So, I believe I know what it is like to want to reject that big scholarship…I did reject it! It was not easy to do and it would not have been easy to accept it either and lose other opportunities.
You would like to leave your state, understandable after 3 summers detassling (I hear you,I too spent two summers doing farmwork). Unfortunately, your family finances can’t quite make it. That must be disappointing.I think anyone, with more or less wealth can feel disappointed. The key is to figure out what you can do with the situation as it is. What is it that you want from college? time out of your state? there may be ways to do that even at U of I. Spring break volunteer travel, summer jobs (my friends were going to Alaska to work on canning ships…a once in a lifetime crazy experience), study abroad. Is there any way to make this lemon into lemonade? But yes, I hear your disappointment and once again, feeling grateful for what my parent was able to do 30 years ago…
In 2015, there were 33 presidential scholarships awarded (no idea how many got the full 18500 in state or 20000 OOS). and the incoming class size was 5241.
I’m not sure what the point in a gap year is. You have plenty to fund your undergrad education at Iowa without that scholarship which you have no guarantee you will receive anyway.
Go now…and say THANK YOU to your parents for giving you the gift of an undergrad college degree with no debt.
Yes, it does get cold in Iowa. I spent many years in Wis and Minn, so I know. Do you not think it gets cold at Brown, Whitman, U Wash? Do you not think U Wash or UNC are huge, spread out schools? Those are minor factors at those other schools and you are making them big factors at Iowa.
I also disagree that at some of those schools you’ll be surrounded by intellectuals of the caliber you can’t find at Iowa. Elon is very popular on CC with the ‘where should my B student go’ and Tulane has its fair share of party people. In fact I know someone who went to Tulane and found it lacking in intellectuals (but I think that was her issue, not the real situation). There are plenty of students at those southern Cal schools who are there for the fun and sun, and not for the opportunity to sit around discussing Jane Austin, just like there are plenty of people who want to do just that at Iowa.
You have a lot of choices. One of those is not to have your father pay more, so you’ll need to figure it out. It looks like you have some leads on scholarships. You just have to keep on them.
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Also, I asked my business teacher at my school about the 5,500 to 7,500 max in loans. He doesn’t even believe me. How do some people graduate with $50k-100k in student debt if there is a max? (Of course there is grad school, but it seems hard to accumulate that much debt if there caps on loans.)
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You have to be careful when talking to older people about student loans. THERE WAS A TIME when Sallie Mae was lending full school costs to students without a co-signer…and many did those loans. Since there were so many failures to pay back those loans, SallieMae (and others) now requires QUALIFIED cosigners for amounts greater than the LOW fed loans.
There was a time when a smaller Sallie Mae loan would cover the cost of college.
I apparently missed the part about the more lucrative scholarship being competitive and not automatic, sorry!
If that is truly the case, I can also see the wisdom in going ahead and enrolling at U of Iowa this year.
My IA nephew (with higher stats than you) didn’t want to go to U of IA. He went to Drake, not with the highest scholarship they offered (he tipped his hand that he really wanted to go there) and his parents cash flowed the other costs (less assets and income than your parents; parents are well educated and value education). My BIL is older, and didn’t want his son going OOS, and the son respected that, so he went to a school he considered the best for what he was planning on studying. Nephew triple majored and graduated Summa Cum Laud and was a Rhodes Finalist - took advantage of every opportunity there. He said Drake taught him how to read and write (volumes of reading and writing in his areas of study, writing well obviously). He has gone onto more great things, has piled cash after PhD program (had offers at all 5 PhD programs he found ‘worthy’ and his dissertation is a book that has been popular enough to also be printed in paperback, was a tenured-track professorship, now is #2 in his U of IA law school class (full tuition scholarship) with an internship at a high profile NY firm - he will be graduating debt free with less help than your parents have set aside for your education. His hard work, motivation, smarts all put to work. A few years after this fella was at Drake, my nephew, his younger brother, also went to Drake - which had a program/programs he wanted; he had a number of schools/scholarships, so Drake made it worthwhile giving him their top academic award - again his parents cash flowed the additional costs and he left school w/o debt.
IMHO - going to U of IA, doing all kind of honors things and being in the top on academics will mean you can go on to a high profile graduate program elsewhere if that is what you want. Make the most of your educational opportunities there. Des Moines or some other cities have some great business opportunities for summer internships etc.
If you ACT (one time testing, not super-score) had been a 32 instead of a 31, you could have been full tuition scholarship at UA - which has a very good business program. That way you could have gotten out of IA and been well within your budget. It seems other OOS schools that were with good OOS scholarship didn’t appeal to you.
I have a MBA from TAMU (was in-state, H and I lived there, went cheap at the time). There were very ambitious students in that program MBA like you are - chasing the $$. I do remember one couple (H/W) that I had in classes with me - they weren’t smarter, just very money/power hungry. Sometimes student ambitions get a bit ahead of them.
Now with the next generation in my household, my kids have gone to very good in-state schools with scholarships. They will graduate UG debt free.
You are very fortunate to have the opportunities you have with the budget you have. Looking at your list:
Brown (9%)
Claremont Mckenna (10%)
Elon (54%)
Emory (27%)
Oxford College of Emory University (38%)
Pitzer (13%)
Pomona (12%)
Rice (15%)
Southern Methodist University (52%)
Tulane (27%)
UNC Chapel Hill (20% Out-of-State)
Vanderbilt (13%)
WashU (16%)
Whitman (53%)
I have known families with $$ that have sent their kids to Emory, Rice, Vanderbilt, Tulane. Tulane has better chance for FA - but the people I know that have their kids there are in a lesser financial position than your parents. I talked to a Brown parent that had older kids that went to Brown, and had the younger ones at UA due to advantages at UA and disadvantages for them at Brown (attending UA with the great OOS scholarship for their stats). I have a friend whose D and son-in-law both went to Emory for MBA - they did get good jobs and are paying off massive debt they took out for their MBA.
Just think if you keep your costs down with UG what kind of opportunities you will have with MBA (or whatever grad program/direction you want to go).
So my 2 cents is be financially smart and go to U of IA.
My D had great grades, good test scores, and a family that couldn’t afford much to send her to college. She wanted to play D1 sports, and loved cute college towns. We live in CA, and she very well could have gone to many of the universities on your list, and we could be up to our eyeballs in debt. She ended up in the Honors program at the University of Iowa because of the amazing scholarships and couldn’t be happier. Three years in, she’s landed good summer internships, made great friends, and learned to tolerate the cold. I know it is “exotic” for her to be in a different state, but the school is pretty darned good, especially when you consider it would cost a good portion of a house to go elsewhere. There are students there from all over the place, and there are some really bright kids there if you look for them. Save the money for grad school.
At the end of the day, your parents money is their money. They’ve earned it, and it’s theirs to spend as they choose.
I really wish I had $100,000 to offer each of my three kids to fund their education.
So that’s the hand you’ve been dealt. You find schools that fit within the budget you’ve been given, or you find a way to fund the gap. My kids have been working since the age of 15.