<p>Your D may be interested to know that there are state schools that have many service opportunities…Habitat for Humanity, tutoring local HS students, overseas medically-related volunteering, etc.</p>
<p>While in college thru their flagship’s service office, my kids: taught Chess to elementary children, tutored high school students for their AP exams, went to Nicaragua with physicians to provide free services, went to Costa Rica to set up a Free Clinic, built a Habitat home, etc.</p>
<p>"SO looking for the BEST for merit aid. "
-Case Western is well known for very large Merit awards. However, D. has mentioned that the student body lacks diversity since the school is much engineering / pre-med oriented. D. got the largest Merit out of all places at Case. However, she choose to attend another school where she has had more rounded UG experience and she was there on full tuition Merit award. Check your state publics. Do not worry tto much about stats matching to the place. Most state publics will have a diverse student body that allow more personal growth.</p>
<p>Seattle U. rocks!!! My daughter’s best friend is a freshman there and enjoing her school life. (We are from Seattle, so she is a communter) She was accepted by USC so everyone was very surprised that she chose Seattle U. She was an academically very strong student so I assume she received excellent merit aid from there plus she is only 17 years old so I understand if her parents want to keep her close for now.
Anyway, if your daughter doesn’t mind the dreary winter gloom, please come to Seattle!!</p>
<p>My D has very similar stats and if she hasn’t already applied, I would add University of Portland. My D was accepted EA with a nice merit scholarship. Carroll College in Montana is probably too small town for her (state capitol Helena) but they too give lovely merit aid in this range. PLU you mentioned but they do give fabulous merit aids for kids in our daughters stats range.</p>