I have been following the Tuition Exchange forums for two years as my daughter progressed through high school. She is now a rising senior and my Tuition Exchange quest begins. The last couple of years, the forums have been dominated by parents who have kids with 34+ ACT scores and they were only applying to the top tier of colleges. My situation is a little different and I am hoping that others in the middle pack will join in. Here are her stats - ACT 31, gpa 3.8 UW. Honors classes, and involved in nearly everything on campus, including four years of SGA.
We have visited eight colleges on Tuition Exchange. We picked colleges that put my daughter in the top 25%, but sometimes she is just barely over that point. They include
Elon
High Point
Baylor
Samford
Belmont
Furman
TCU
GWU
From those visits, she will probably only apply to 6 of them, and of those, all but one offer full tuition.
Now, we wait. This is the hardest part. Most of her friends will know where they are going to college by the end of April. But TE can sometimes keep you waiting, even into the summer
Good luck with your process – that is quite a geographic range!
My oldest just graduated from GWU (alas, I joined a TE school too late for the benefit) and while she had an amazing experience, (and stayed in DC for work after graduation) there is a decidedly wealth-based social gap there. She hung around with “normal” kids, but knew tons of folks going out every night, doing high-end shopping, exotic trips and such – she could not keep up financially. GW has even all but eliminated on-campus dining, giving students “GWorld” dollars at fast food places in the Foggy Bottom area instead. The last traditional dining hall is on the Mt. Vernon Campus, a 20-min shuttle ride away.
Hi, all – these threads are very helpful. S21/just getting started thinking about this. My son is interested in fashion design/merchandising programs, which are fairly rare. Any intel on:
Pratt Institute (appears to allow stacking)
School of the Art Institute of Chicago (not sure if they allow stacking)
Columbia College-Chicago (full award)
Drexel (does not allow stacking)
A hard-to-predict factor on these programs is that they may require a portfolio.
(He’s strong in math/science & is taking the ACT in September.) . He has a decent in-state option but would appreciate any and all info about these schools. I know he would prefer to go out of state.
Thanks -
Following too. Son has submitted to 5 schools (including home campus). Any idea how being associated with the TE affects overall acceptance, regardless of actually getting the money?
In our experience they are not connected in most every case. At only one or maybe two safety type schools, did my S19 receive the TE award at the time of admittance. All the other were MUCH later. Hang on…it’s a long wait!
Went through this process last year. It seems most of you have already learned what I found most eye-opening…the competitive nature of TE scholarships. Going into it, I thought it was guaranteed benefit, but not so…can be tricky to navigate. My D19 received TE offers from UDel and UPitt. Received NMF scholarship from Fordham and non TE other scholarship offers from other TE schools. She ultimately chose UPitt and is very happy there. We are visiting for Family Weekend this weekend! Hang in there and best of luck to you all.
Congratulation to your daughter! We had Pitt on our list but took it off because everything we read said it was near impossible to get the TE. Our son checks all the boxes (and some) but so do MANY other kids. Your daughter must have had an impressive resume. He applied to University of Delaware too. I have no idea how many TE spaces they usually have and honestly know next to nothing about the school in general even though from the Northeast. We are in TX now and he’s looking to get out.
I’m a returner from last year (S19) and DS had good success when his stats were at or above the 75% at given schools. I do suggest (and may have already on this thread) the you call ahead to each school and find out the TE status for the 2020-2021 year. We didn’t do this and while my son got into Villanova we later learned that because they had sophomores piled up from the previous year, they would not be offering any TEs for the year. Would have been good to know… He was admitted to all but one school and was offered the exchange everywhere except Villanova and GWU.
My D20 may or may not use the TE but I have identified potential schools to include at least for now. I have also heard that Pitt is very difficult to get so your DD’s stats @lionni must be impressive. I have it on the list as well as Delaware but we’ll see. Also, most of the expensive schools only provide set rate so that definitely needs to be taken into account.
Does anyone have insight into the GPA requirements? I noticed USC has a 3.0 gpa minimum in order to continue the TE benefit. Wondering how they handle situations when a student falls behind? My son has never had a grade below that mark but Freshman year can be tough - new environment, away from home, social activities. I feel like he can handle it but that added pressure is tough and you just never know.
Hi everyone…While my daughter won’t be headed off to college until Fall of 22, we have begun the process of looking at colleges on the exchange and my husband and I are just trying to get a grasp on what our own potential Out of Pocket expenses will be so it’s not going to be a huge surprise at a later time. I work for the Florida Institute of Technology and while Sarah can always attend here at a minimal cost, she is really interested in a liberal arts degree program involving International/Global Studies. She is looking at Belmont Univ, Sewanne: Univ. of the South and Mercer Univ. in Macon GA. She is only in 10th grade and won’t take the SAT for the 1st time until Spring, but she has a 4.0 GPA, is part of the Science & Engineering Academy at her high school, volunteers as a peer tutor, softball player for the last 8 years, is taking all honors and AP classes.
I have to say this is all so nerve wracking…I would love for her to be able to go to her 1st choice school, but without TE or other scholarship that covers a good bit of the cost, I know spending $30K or more out of pocket is not an option when she could attend Florida Tech and get a great degree in Environmental Science and be debt free.
How do parents handle the waiting game? Also, if you apply in August for a school that has early decision, if you are a TE applicant, are you still locked into your acceptance without knowing if you will be awarded TE? This can be all so confusing!!!
I just found out yesterday that I can participate in this (my institution limits exports to 5 and there was a lottery).
My D20 is actually only applying to TE schools (Simmons, Muhlenberg, Quinnipiac, York, Drew, Widener). Very confident she is likely to get in to these schools, less confident that she will stand out in any way in order to secure one of the coveted TE scholarships, except for at Widener and York.
Her first choice is Simmons, though we’ve been very clear from the beginning that she can only go if tuition is free.
I assume they handle it like schools handle other gpa requirements for scholarships - they review the gpa at a certain time (end of spring semester?) and if your gpa is below the requirement, you either get a probation semester or your tuition goes to full price.
My daughter had gpa requirements on two scholarships she had and she knew if she didn’t make them (2.8 for the major school merit scholarship; 3.0 for the state scholarship) we’d have to find a transfer school because we couldn’t afford it without the school merit scholarship.
We had heard similarly about Pitt being difficult…even at the TE information session held at our workplace, but my d decided to give it a try anyway.
We loved our visit to UDel and I have a good friend who is an alum who loved it there. My d wanted a city experience and UDel’s campus felt a bit too suburban for her. Pitt’s campus is vibrant and she’s very happy so far.
I wholeheartedly agree with @MAandMEmom. We just submitted applications for our TE schools to our home institution for my D20. When we toured schools last spring and summer, I spoke to as many TE liaison officers as possible. The rest I emailed. It was an eye-opening–and discouraging–experience. Almost all of them stated that the stats on the website are WAY off. For example, the TE officer at Dickinson informed me that the last two years they were overenrolled for TE awards. They sent out offers expecting a 6-8 yield, and nearly all 20 accepted both years. She informed me that they are hoping to offer “maybe” 2-3 this year, but may not be able to offer any. She later sent me a detailed letter explaining the numbers over the past 4 years and what that means going forward. All 10 of the schools I emailed got back to me within a day or two, and all were very transparent about the low number they would offer and how competitive it was. In many cases, they emphasized need-based aid is really the best bet, because TE is extremely competitive. Villanova and Dickinson were the most discouraging.
Given this information, we are toying with letting my daughter apply ED at a non-TE school. She has 10 TE schools on her list, and 5 others. We were lucky that she was interested in the colleges before we even realized they were on the TE list. But, the chances for TE at those colleges are so slim, even with good stats (as the TE officers repeatedly emphasized), that we are viewing it as something that would be a nice surprise. In no way are we counting on it.
Just found this thread for this year. Waiting to hear whether D20 will get one of the spots from my U. In the past, she would have gotten one due to my length of employment here, but you just never know…
She is looking at USC, Trinity (TX) and Florida on TE, plus several where NMF would yield big $$$. I know those schools are pretty different, but she is practical and looking for a bargain.
Does anyone know if Syracuse is a guarantee’d acceptance into the program if you get accepted into the college? Also if they stack money, like room and board on a merit basis?