brent7009

Hi all,
I live in Calfornia and probably have the transcript that will get me into schools like UC Santa Barbara, Santa Cruz, and Davis. I understand the UCs are great schools, but for college I want to have a different experience. My number one school is UNC- Chapel Hill, a top thirty university in an actual college town(we are devoid of that in CA). However, my parents are only interested in paying for the UCs because it will save them money. Is it worth it for us to get FA if I choose UNC over the state schools? We will need $10,000 per year, but I havent looked into scholarships. This is for undergrad btw.
Thanks

amarkov

What do you mean, is it "worth it" to get financial aid? You won't get any merit scholarships; because it's such a high ranked school, all the merit opportunities at UNC will be extremely competitive, and in fact may not be available to you as an out of state student. (Scholarships not from your school are rare and don't necessarily get renewed each year, so you can't rely on them to pay.)

So it will come down to need based scholarships. UNC meets 100% of demonstrated need, but I get the impression from your post that your parents will not be able to demonstrate much need. Even if they can, the aid is probably going to come with a lot of loans, so you really need to think about it. Go to one of those online loan calculators, and figure out how much your loan payments are going to be. Are you prepared to pay that amount for years and years after graduation, just to go to UNC rather than Davis?

patsmom

This is not accurate unless rules have changed recently. My son received a generous merit scholarship to UNC-CH as an out-of-state student back in 2007.

mom2collegekids

Is it worth it for us to get FA if I choose UNC over the state schools? We will need $10,000 per year, but I havent looked into scholarships. This is for undergrad btw.


???

that is the oddest question.

Anyway....it doesn't matter what you "need". It's what your QUALIFY for. Your family's income/assets may not qualify for ANY aid. Have your parents run the NPC on UNC's website since they would know the family's income/asset info.

Although UNC does have some merit scholarships, they are for tippy top students. Since you've indicated that your stats would admit you to the mid/lower tier UCs, that suggests your stats aren't close to being high enough.

That said, UNC accepts only a very limited number of OOS students. Usually the students have to have high stats. It's not likely you'd be admitted.

Private scholarships are usually for small amounts, are only for freshman year, and often are for low income students, so you can't rely on those for $10k per year.

What are your test scores and stats? If you want to go OOS to a college town school, there may be a few that will give you merit for your stats.

UCs cost about $30k per year. Is that what your parents are saying that they will pay? Is that your budget?

4kidsdad

See
https://npc.collegeboard.org/student/app/unc