What should I do

College Search & Selection
1

<p>So hey guys, I'm currently a rising senior and I need help with my college search.</p>

<p>Please before I get into the details I want you to know that I'm currently doing this from my phone using the CC app so please ignore the grammar and spelling mistakes.</p>

<p>Now to the problem. So I'm a rising senior and I have no idea on what I what to major in specifically and I don't have a very strong application. I have an general idea on what I what to major in but no clue on what I plan on doing after I get the degree. I either want to major in economics or political science or perhaps both. I have been locking at colleges since my sophomore year and I still don't have a list of colleges that fit me. Finally I decided to seek the help you guys here on CC on helping me with my college search.</p>

<p>One of my biggest fears is to get rejected and I was hoping to apply to college where I have a good chance. </p>

<p>So here is my info</p>

<p>ACT 32
SAT Subject Test</p>

<p>US History 740
Math 1 770</p>

<p>Freshman</p>

<p>English 9 B
World history A
Honors Biology A
Geometry C</p>

<p>Final GPA 3.76</p>

<p>Sophomore</p>

<p>English 10 A
AP US History A 5
Honors Chemistry A
Algebra 2 C
Japanese 1 A</p>

<p>Final GPA 3.66</p>

<p>Junior</p>

<p>Honors English 11 A
AP Government A (don't know scores)
AP Psychology A (don't know scores)
Trigonometry B
Honors Physics A
Japanese 2 A</p>

<p>Final GPA 3.87</p>

<p>Senior </p>

<p>AP physics
AP Euro History
Pre-Calculus
Honors English 12 </p>

<p>GPA from 9th-11th grade 3.76</p>

<p>Extracurricular</p>

<p>intramural Basketball 2 years</p>

<p>Best Buy sales associate 2 years</p>

<p>College preferences</p>

<p>Size less than 10000</p>

<p>Undergrad focused</p>

<p>Good econ and poly sci departments</p>

<p>In the Northeast, Mid Atlantic, or Midwest</p>

<p>I know it's wrong to just force my search on to someone but I really need help. She I put my preferences in CC supermatch or the College Board search it shows colleges that are out of my league because I have like no extracurricular. So please help me and thanks in advance</p>

2

<p>What can your family afford to pay? Your grades and ACT score qualify you for just about anything except perhaps the tip-top institutions. This means you have lots of options, provided you can make them affordable.</p>

<p>If money is an issue, spend some time in the financial aid forum, starting with this thread:
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/1348012-automatic-full-tuition-full-ride-scholarships.html?highlight=bobwallace[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/1348012-automatic-full-tuition-full-ride-scholarships.html?highlight=bobwallace&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

3

<p>College costs do need to be considered, and I have tried some net price calculators and some colleges seem reasonable while some school are just too expensive.</p>

<p>P.S if this helps our household income is anywhere from 40000-50000</p>

4

<p>Do you want to be in a city, suburb, or rural area? Is there a size that would be too small? Have you visited any campuses near where you live, and if so, what was your reaction?</p>

5

<p>I think that a school with less than a 1000 students would be too small for me and I don’t have a preference on the environment of the city but I do want there to be just one centralized campus. The only college campus I have visited was Lafayette college when my sister applied there over five years ago, but I do plan visiting more campuses once I have my college list ready.</p>

6

<p>It’s bad for you if your biggest fear is rejection. You need to get over that, it’ll happen. No worries though, with your stats, you are going to be accepted somewhere.</p>

7

<p>“One of my biggest fears is to get rejected and I was hoping to apply to college where I have a good chance.”</p>

<p>The beauty of the automatic scholarship institutions, is that if you have the stats, you are in. No ifs. No ands. No buts. In. Period. You do need to pay attention to see if the requirements change from last year to this, but the information should be published by the end of the summer. Apply to a couple of them. Get in. Then with your safety institutions completely assured, work on the rest of the list. You will most likely be rejected somewhere, but so what. You will be sitting on a couple of perfectly fine acceptances that you can decide between come April 2014.</p>

8

<p>I don’t think that I want to apply to any of those institutions shown in the automatic scholarship forum, they are all big state schools that I want to avoid. I really would prefer institutions that are undergraduate focused and have a student population under 10000.</p>

9

<p>Not all of the <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/1348012-automatic-full-tuition-full-ride-scholarships-18.html#post15895768[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/1348012-automatic-full-tuition-full-ride-scholarships-18.html#post15895768&lt;/a&gt; schools are huge.</p>

<p>Given your financial constraints, you may need one that can be an affordable safety, unless you want to use community college as your safety.</p>

10

<p>[Future</a> Students | Washington & Jefferson College](<a href=“http://www.washjeff.edu/future-students]Future”>Future Students - Washington & Jefferson College)
<a href=“http://www.washjeff.edu/financial-aid[/url]”>http://www.washjeff.edu/financial-aid&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

11

<p>Washington & Jefferson looks really good, but how is the Econ and the Poly Sci departments?</p>

12

<p>Any other recommendations?</p>

13

<p>Bump I’m sorry</p>

14

<p>Before you get any more suggestions you really need to get your parents to tell you exactly how much they can contribute per year to your undergraduate education. Until you know this, you won’t be able to accurately judge which schools are real possibilities. No one wants to hear this but finding financial safety schools is the most important part of your college search.</p>

15

<p>I talked with my parents and they said they can pay 5000 year, plus they saved up around 13000 for college. My sister said that she can pay 5000 a year as well and I have saved up around 3000 from work. I’m willing to do work study and take out some loans.</p>

16

<p>Your and your parents’ savings add up to $16,000, so $4,000 per year from that.</p>

<p>So that means $5,000 + $4,000 = $9,000 per year from your parents and you, or $5,000 + $4,000 + $5,000 = $14,000 per year if you can rely on your sister to contribute as well.</p>

<p>Schools typically assume that a student can take a $5,500 Stafford loan and earn about $2,000 to $3,000 in work or work study per year (total $7,500 to $8,500). So a stretch budget would be $22,500 per year including your sister’s contribution. But if you want to be more conservative (not relying on your sister and assuming a lower student loan and work contribution, or leaving a buffer for the risk of financial setbacks), you might want to target a lower cost like $14,000 per year or so.</p>

<p>Check the net price calculators at various schools to see where they land relative to these cost thresholds.</p>

17

<p>I was accepted to W&J with slightly better stats than yours and I received 19.5k per year in merit aid. I would have had to pay about 25k per year to go there. According to the fin aid office, they rarely give over 20k per year in aid.</p>

18

<p>Considering what you just said W & J will be at the high end of the schools I’ll be applying to. I probably will need more than 20000 in aid for a college that charges around 40000, by I’ll still apply since it’s free to do so.</p>

19

<p>Bump (ten characters)</p>

20

<p>Ajda12, remember living expenses, which aren’t covered by tuition: room; board; books; travel; and incidentals. That will make a school with $40,000 tuition, actually cost more like $51,000 or $52,000 per year. You’ll want schools that give lots of need based aid or both need based and merit.</p>