Hello!
My state/city doesn’t particularly have incredible education opportunities and I believe our ranking fluctuates between 45-50th last in the nation! I heard that some schools look at where you’re from when deciding admission, for diversity, and I was wondering if this was true or just a myth? Would being moderately-achieving in a low prospect area be a benefit, or no help at all, or even hurt my chances of getting into a selective university?
Or, maybe, since not as many students in my area apply to selective universities, will my chances increase because admission officers want kids from all over the country? maybe?
I want to get into UC Berkeley/UCLA… those are my “match” schools (based on my scores and such) but its still a slim chance I’ll get in and I was just curious if where you’re from is a factor in that decision. I am out of state.
Any help would be appreciated!
@tylerss usually OOS admissions are more competitive, and I think it still will be due to the budget crisis being solved. UC only takes into slight consideration your state of residence.
Matching schools are not those your scores/GPA within the mid 50. You need to consider the admission rate too. If a school has a low admission rate like UCB/UCLA, it would be hard to be a match school even if you have above admission average stat.
@Tylerss, those schools are very expensive. As an OOS student, there is no financial aid for your fees. You will be paying $55k per year. Can your parents afford those tuitions?
OOS students grades have to be better than the average admitted student. Your area of residence might get a second look, but that doesn’t mean you will get over $200k for your college career.
Depends on how the school values that particular state. If a college likes to brag about how many different states and countries its students are from and your state is not one of that number, then they probably would be interested in adding one more state to their diversity in those stats. Although it would probably be a very small factor in comparison to everything else. If they don’t generally care about that stat, then it should neither hurt nor help you.
As for doing state schools out-of-state, some people believe that various state schools of make it easier for out-of-state students to get in because they pay higher tuition, even though they are supposed to be preferential to in-state. I have no clue how much truth there is to this statement. It’s very possible that those people who claim that are bitter because they’re in-state and didn’t get in, but either way, since no college would ever admit to doing something like that, we’ll never for sure know if this is true or not.
@“aunt bea” That’s true… I only have two college options in my state and they aren’t too incredible and my parents said they would prefer to help pay for an out of state school versus keeping me in-state.
I’m so confused about college I don’t know what to do! I was told to look into private colleges because they tend to offer more financial aid… is that true?
pls help
@billcsho I understand. But I’m still hoping to get in even if my chances are slim! Thank you!
Update on my previous response…LA Times actually just released a story just yesterday about UC admissions in which it points out the number of OOS/foreign is rising, with a record low for Californians: http://www.latimes.com/local/education/la-me-ln-uc-admit-20150702-story.html
Still nothing official from the UCs and we’ll see if the UC system decides to respond to the article, but the statistics definitely show a trend towards much higher numbers of OOS than ever before, so that should definitely help your chances.
Privates:
Many less selective privates have a significant number of scholarships they use to entice students who are qualified to go to a more selective school in hopes that the scholarships will make them choose there. Some also offer a variety of other scholarships offered through their various departments, such as athletics, performing arts, arts, etc. Some of these are competitive, particularly for those with good programs, but others use these scholarships to build up budding programs. Scholarships can range from just a few thousand to a free ride. Most also let you accept more than one scholarship if offered, although some cap it off when you receive more money than tuition.
More selective privates often have meet-your-need financial aid in which you only pay the EFC (expected family contribution). The rest is given in work study, grants, scholarships, etc. If it says “packaged loans”, then some of that will be in loans that you can choose to accept as part of your package, or reject and only take the free money. There are online financial aid calculators to see what your EFC is likely to be.