<p>I'm not really sure what scores would indicate to me a school where I have a good chance of getting a fair amount of scholarships while having the school be as intellectually stimulating and academically rigorous as possible.</p>
<p>Quick overview of my stats:
GPA: 4.0 (UW) 4.3 (W)
SAT: 2220 (Superscore) (760 CR, 750 W, 710 M)
AP: 5 (World History, Government, BC Calculus, Chemistry)
IB: 6 (Social Anthropology)
ECs: Fairly good. Focus on orchestra, tech theatre, and debate, with some leadership roles and some awards.</p>
<p>My top three choices right now, regardless of aid, are UChicago, Columbia, and Princeton.
But what sort of stats should I look for in a school that will be as good as possible and still give me pretty good aid?</p>
<p>Also, what colleges have good aid as well as an intellectual stimulating environment, a flexible major policy, are near a large suburb/city, have a good college town, and are around 2,000-12,000 students?</p>
<p>Look at: URochester</p>
<p>Merit is usually based on SINGLE sitting of the SAT…not superscores…and only Math + CR.</p>
<p>What is your best Math + CR from ONE sitting?</p>
<p>How much merit do you want? In other words, how much will your parents pay each year?</p>
<p>First you have to find schools that give the amount of merit that you want. Then determine the schools’ upper quartiles. If the school is known to give awards to many/most of their upper quartile, then your scores should be well within the upper quartile.</p>
<p>I’m guessing that your best sitting Math + Cr is about a 1450…so look at schools where a 1450 is well within the upper quartile…and they give lots of merit.</p>
<p>mom2collegekids, oh really? Okay, that would still be 760 (CR) and 710 (M), so 1470, my writing is the only score that’s different.</p>
<p>See the thing is, I still want a really good college with a lot of other academically focused students. I’m looking for a good mix of aid and intelligence, not just pure aid. Aid should bring total costs around to 20,000-30,000</p>
<p>Are you a likely National Merit semifinalist?</p>
<p>warriordaughter, yeah, I’m pretty positive I’ll be a NMSF.</p>
<p>Erin’s Dad…the cutoffs haven’t been released yet. High schools haven’t yet told students.</p>
<p>What is your PSAT?</p>
<p>if you make NMF, then lots of scholarship opps.</p>
<p>*that would still be 760 (CR) and 710 (M), so 1470, my writing is the only score that’s different.</p>
<p>See the thing is, I still want a really good college with a lot of other academically focused students. I’m looking for a good mix of aid and intelligence, not just pure aid. Aid should bring total costs around to 20,000-30,000*</p>
<p>So, have your parents sai that they’ll pay $20k-30k per year? If so, then you know what you need. If they haven’t given a figure, ask them.</p>
<p>Virtually all schools have academically focused students…especially in the harder majors. Students that aren’t academically focused usually drop out quickly. </p>
<p>The higher up you go in the rankings ladder, the less likely there is merit…or if there is merit, higher stats are needed. </p>
<p>For instance, UChi has some merit, but a 1470 isn’t going to get it. </p>
<p>What is your major and career goal??</p>