<p>I would greatly appreciate if you may provide any input and help me make the decision. Chicago north suburb female, EFC = ~$20,000. Accepted by following schools:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>IU Kelly Direct Admit, with the $9000 OOS Schoarship, ~250 miles from home.</p></li>
<li><p>IIT (Biology), received scholarships covering full tuition ($34,000 each year for 4 years), near home.</p></li>
<li><p>Loyola (Chicago, Biology), received $13,000 per year for 4 years, near home. </p></li>
<li><p>UIUC (Biology) and UW-Madison (Biology), received no merit-based scholarship, both 2.5 hrs driving from home.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Also, what need-based grants or scholarships can we expect from each of the above schools? Thanks!</p>
<p>Well if you want to major in business I would choose Indiana because you are already in the business school, it has the best business school of all the choices, and it is the second cheapest option.</p>
<p>If you want to do biology I would choose UIUC because it will be very similar to IU in terms of pricing and has a good biology department.</p>
<p>UW Madison and UIUC do not give out too much need/merit based financial aid. My experiences have been very good at IU. I am from Chicago and more than half of my expenses next year (tuition, rent, books, etc.) will be covered from financial aid ($13,000 scholarships and $7,500 in federally subsidized loans).</p>
<p>The question is what do you want to do after you graduate?</p>
<p>Bio/business seem like strange bedfellows. UW is the best for bio of the group but all are very good. Probably more costly as OOS aid is limited except for URMs where it is passable. For overall experience I think UW trumps the others but at some cost. Illinois and UW are not far from Indiana in business in case you change majors. UW does allow for a bio/business dual major possibility.</p>
<p>Tough choice but not a bad one in the group either. (excluding IIT and Loyola which are not in the same league as the others).</p>
<p>Thanks both of you. I intend to be on pre-med track with a biology major, or study neuroscience and do research in neuroscience as a career; for business, I tend to like International Business. </p>
<p>Parents want to keep me in the neighbourhood, and they do not like getting more loans either, as our current home loan is already some kind of a burden on them (EFC appears not to consider home loans but only family gross income). I already compromised and gave up the opportunities to go to U. Pittsburgh and U. MN which appear to have good neuroscience program. </p>
<p>The IIT (Illinois Institute of Technology) academics appears to be OK, but the campus is one of those I liked least. But again IIT is very generous to me. Would you refuse the full ride? Thanks.</p>
<p>At IU, you can’t major in international business unless you also major in another area like finance, accounting, economic consulting, management, etc. So you would have to find another major at the Kelley School of Business, in addition to international business, that you like, too.<br>
[International</a> Business: Degree Requirements: Academics: Undergraduate Program: Kelley School of Business: Indiana University Bloomington](<a href=“Undergraduate | Bachelor's Degree in Business | Indiana Kelley”>Undergraduate | Bachelor's Degree in Business | Indiana Kelley)</p>
<p>Business is not a good major for pre-med in general. If you would like to go pre-med, you need to save some money for medical school ~250K total. These UG’s do not make a lot of differences for most medicla schools. You should choose the cheaper option. Go to the pre-med forum to look around if you have not done so.</p>
<p>I would go to least expensive school and save money for medical school. Indiana Bloomington is beautiful and friendly camous with wonderful business school and yuou can minor in biology.</p>
<p>In this economy, with the decreased value and increased cost of a college education, and especially if you are pre-med, I’d advise you to go to the school where you can save the most money for the future.</p>
<p>Thanks for replies! We are Illinois residents, have no very strongly-preferred fields of study, and are open to exploration. More inputs and comments are greatly appreciated.</p>