<p>Both my daughter and I are US citizens living in Australia. My daughter is desperate to go to college in the US but the fees are so much higher than in Australia. I estimate if she went to her dream school UCLA it will cost us around $60,000 each year for fees, living allowances plus airfares home in between semesters (compared to about $10,000 if she stays in Australia and lives at home.</p>
<p>Anyway I was wondering if she would be eligible for merit scholarships or anything as she is a US citizen even though she lives in Australia so will have to sit SATs to determine her grade.</p>
<p>I doubt we would qualify for financial aid as our income is high but our cost of living is so much higher in Australia our discretionary income is low.</p>
<p>She would probably have much better luck with merit aid at a private school, and at a lower cost, than out of state tuition, especially in the CA system. Keep in mind that CA is broke. There just isn’t much aid to go around, merit or otherwise.</p>
<p>Sorry, really dumb question, but what does that mean? I assume merit is for good grades (of course we have no idea how to compare her grades in Oz to the US system until she takes the SATs which is a little late to know how to plan). How do I kind out what kind of merit aid is around (ie how much $)</p>
<p>It might not be enough to make it possible for her to go. I don’t want to shatter her dreams but $250,000 for a bachelors degree is crazy!</p>
<p>Check [EducationUSA</a> | Study Abroad, Student Visa, University Fairs, College Applications and Study in the U.S. / America](<a href=“http://www.EducationUSA.state.gov%5DEducationUSA”>http://www.EducationUSA.state.gov) for the contact information for their advising center in Western Australia. I am almost certain that there is one in Perth. The people there will have useful ideas for you, and if no one in that office has helped a citizen recently, certainly they have colleagues elsewhere in Australia who have.</p>
<p>Several students like your daughter have posted here at CC in the past couple of years. If I can track down their usernames, I’ll post them later. The only one I can remember off the top if my head is beeish who is in college somewhere here now.</p>
<p>Can fully empathize-- we are expat Americans in the same boat. We are also praying for merit aid or an athletic scholarship in the U.S. for our S.</p>
<p>Highly recommend that your D take the SAT as early as Fr or Soph year, to benchmark her performance and to get insight on what areas she needs to focus on to get her SAT scores up by Sr year. Good luck.</p>
<p>There are a number if threads on merit-based aid in the Financial Aid Forum, start reading there for ideas. I do agree that it is crazy to spend $250,000 when your family has excellent options that are more affordable!</p>
<p>If you believe that she has a chance to score very well on the PSAT, it is worth jumping through the hoops set up by the PSAT/NMSQ organization so that she can arrange for testing outside the US. The cut-off for National Merit Scholar usuall is very high for citizens abroad, but NMS status can bring in quite a bit of merit money.</p>
<p>great feedback thanks. DD is in the final term of year 10 so has 2 years to go. Does that make her a sophomore now? Is there any benefit in taking SATs so far out (2 years of high school left) as she wouldn’t have covered the curriculum that a final year student would have so probably wouldn’t do well and may end up discouraged. Or am I completely wrong? Must admit I left the US when I was 13 so have no clue!</p>
<p>She can try a sample SAT at home to get a notion of what it is like. You should be able to find any number of sample tests on line. If you can’t, ask at the EducationUSA office. They should have some exam prep materials.</p>
<p>Yes, your D would be considered a Sophomore in the U.S. Our S is the same grade as your D. Is your D in an int’l school? The int’l schools usually have info for the SAT.</p>
<p>Taking sample tests at home of the SAT is good practice, but it does not have the same gravitas as taking the real thing. You can find SAT study guides in bookstores in just about every country in the world-- I’ve seen them everywhere.</p>
<p>If you can get it arranged, yes, there is an advantage to taking the PSAT now (which is basically a practice SAT), practice and getting a gauge on where she stands with test scores. There is also the PLAN test which is the practice ACT test. Depending on the curriculum at her school, she may do better on the ACT vs the SAT.</p>
<p>Merit aid is generally awarded based on GPA and ACT/SAT test scores. The higher the better but most schools have some sort of graduating of scores generally starting around a 3.5 on a 4.0 scale and a 26 ACT and comparable SAT. </p>
<p>Also, every college has what is called a Net Price Calculator. I would run your numbers through those at a few schools she may be interested in attending to see what the numbers really look like. You will probably want to look up the Financial Aid calculator on the FAFSA site too <a href=“https://fafsa.ed.gov/FAFSA/app/f4cForm?execution=e1s1[/url]”>https://fafsa.ed.gov/FAFSA/app/f4cForm?execution=e1s1</a>. This will give you a rough idea what your expected family contribution will be and will be a helpful number for the Net Price Calculators.</p>
<p>Your daughters chances for merit money are almost completely dependent on her test scores, grades and the schools she chooses. Some schools give ZERO in merit money. Some have very little, so the chances of getting a sizeable award is small. Basically, the higher she is on the desirable list, the better her chances are of getting any money.</p>
<p>The UC system is not known for its generous merit awards. You need to look at each UC and really each school and see what they have. If the school’s maximum award is a $25K scholarship and they give only 5 of those out with 10000 kids accepted, well, you can see what the odds are for getting that. You can get information from USNWR on what % of kids are getting merit money and what the average award is. That means your kid has to be in that % of the admitted students to have a chance to get merit mone and in the upper half of that group to be getting the average merit amount. I am talking odds, here, not sure things by the way, please be aware. It’s all a lottery except for those schools that have guaranteed awards at certain levels. </p>
<p>Make sure your DD does take the PSAT and see how she can be in the running for NM designation. SOme schools like Northeastern in Boston will give a full tuition award to NMS. Schools like UAlabama have some fixed parameters for guaranteed awards. Otherwise your D is applying and is taking a chance.</p>
<p>As promised, here are the usernames of some US citizen students who were/are living in Australia. beeish, nadalle, and Emeralds should all be here now. I think Emeralds was from Perth. cornellhopeful0, TrueBlue92, and esiotrots might have arrived as well. shaneobain was educated in New Zealand, and would have faced some of the same issues as your daughter.</p>
<p>b@r!um is a US legal permanent resident educated abroad, who is something of a financial aid guru for the international applicants, she has good ideas about pinning down aid if for students who are coming from outside the US. Most of her posts are in the International Student Forum.</p>
<p>Lastly, here are a few parents abroad who may have suggestions for you. USAUGStudy and apply2school are (or were) in India, and JackUK, sarsfield, and Londondad are (or were) in the UK.</p>
<p>Had we returned to Venezuela when Happydad’s sabbatical ended in 2000, Happykid would have been in a situation very much like your daughter’s. You truly have all my best wishes for a successful college application process!</p>
<p>UC financial aid estimators seem to indicate that they give reasonable financial aid up to in-state costs. However, if you are out-of-state, you are on your own to cover the ~$22,000 per year out-of-state surcharge.</p>
<p>I hope you’re able to get some sort of financial aid OP!</p>
<p>Has your daughter thought about other countries where she can study? As an expat she really has a lot of options. As you said Australia, but also UK, Singapore, France, Germany, Hong Kong etc.</p>
<p>In order to keep your daughters aspirations realistic you may want to consider the standardized tests that her Australian school uses to gauge whether merit scholarships are within her reach. For “full” scholarships she would have to be performing in the 98-99% percentiles currently. Some schools will offer $5,000 to $20,000 annually for students who are in the 95% percentile or so. After that it drops off considerably. This would apply for reasonably well regarded/known colleges.</p>