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College Discussion / Colleges and Universities / Alphabetic List of Colleges / T / Texas A&M University
Chance of getting OOS waiver as a current student
rvhappynow
Registered User Posts: 202 Junior Member
So, after the Class of 2021 merit awards were rolled out yesterday, we are so close, yet so far. We were offered $3750, which is just right under the $4000 we need for the OOS waiver. I've heard that the engineering department is only offering scholarships to currently enrolled students, but someone pretty please correct me if I am wrong. I want to be wrong, as this is likely our last chance to bump up to the $4000 with even the tiniest of awards. But, just for "what if" sake, do any of you know what might happen if we were to scrape our pennies together, grit our teeth, and figure out how to afford one year at A&M without the waiver, and then have our son apply in the spring for scholarships. Do you know if he would have to get another $4000 to then qualify for the in state tuition, or would just one small scholarship of $250 be able to be added to his current $3750 (it's for all four years) to have the in state tuition kick in for Fall 2018 as his sophomore year? We're grasping at straws here. We are grateful for what we received, but since it's not enough for the waiver, it's such a drop in the bucket, considering it's almost $50K to go as an OOS student. Praying outside scholarships come through as well.
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Replies to: Chance of getting OOS waiver as a current student
Where else has your son applied? With our three sons, we visited 21 colleges with good engineering programs altogether and I'd be happy to share our impressions.
Have you looked at Iowa State? My youngest son picked ISU over his other finalists, Arizona State, Alabama, and Michigan State. ISU is very affordable for OOS students. OOS tuition is "just" $21,500 and my son received an $8,000 merit scholarship and a $3,500 College of Engineering scholarship. ISU's engineering college is one of the largest in the U.S. We have been very impressed with the school so far. They are very organized and the Freshman Honors program is worthwhile. My son already has an engineering professor mentor assigned to him and he is just starting a research project. ISU applications are still being accepted and are formula based. You will have an answer in just a few days. https://www.admissions.iastate.edu/apply/online/ Scholarship awards are automatic, based again of a formula: https://www.admissions.iastate.edu/scholarships/freshman_award_calc.php
Finally, campus is beautiful and Ames is a great college town.
Please feel free to message me directly.
Your son sounds great and I'm sure he will do well wherever he goes. If he wants to stay south, both Arizona State and Arizona are still taking applications. ASU's Barrett Honors College is rated number one in the country, with it's own dorms on a campus-within-a-campus, and the engineering school is huge. Tempe is a great college town. Arizona is in Tucson. The campus is older, greener, and more traditional than ASU's. The engineering college is smaller but has a good placement rate. I don't like Tucson as much, but others love it. Your son should expect good scholarships from either college.
Alabama likely would have been a good fit but it is probably too late. They are extremely generous with high achievers and they have spent hundreds of $millions on new engineering facilities, and dormitories. Tuscaloosa impressed us too. It might be worth a call to see if they might make an exception to the scholarship deadline.
Now I am stressing out all over again. My junior at TAMU has decided that he wants to go on for a PhD. That's a whole new process to learn. We visited Michigan and Purdue two weeks ago and he is also interested in TAMU, Georgia Tech, and Princeton for the field he is interested in, so there will be more visits. Applications start being due this December 1, for fall 2018 admissions. One good thing we learned is that most top engineering programs will offer research or teaching assistantships, plus tuition. My son was originally looking at getting his masters degree at TAMU, but his scholarships and in-state tuition only cover four years. We would have had to pay full boat for the fifth year to get a masters. With his ultimate goal being a PhD, it made no sense at all to get a masters degree first. So he is working hard to get some research experience and line up faculty recommendations.
But you may not want to take my advice. I have twins applying, one got a corps scholarship only, the other a opportunity award and the president's endowed BUT waitlisted for a corps scholarship. It makes no sense.
Being short just that amount, I would call the department - they most likely have a smaller scholarship. I would also make an appointment with financial aid. Another alternative is there is an appeal process - you can try that as well- if neither of the above works. No guarantees on appeal, it is a pretty tough route to conquer although many people (including me when my D started) do not know about that option. I do know that they do not match dollar for dollar with other offers (we tried that).
The prospective student centers are really geared towards instate students, I would make the trip to College Station if that is an option. You can have your student call the department vs. yourself, but either works for that sort of situation -- when you're talking OOS tuition, everyone knows the student is not going to be the one paying. Expressing interest directly if this is your #1 might just tip the scales. We did state that his attendance (highly recruited student out of HS) was going to be influenced by OOS waiver directly to the department in a face to face ourselves. To be honest, that tactic would not have worked for my oldest as you really need to be at the top of the pile and she did not have the same stats as my son, although she was also an academic admit. She did not get any offers from TAMU until her senior year - but outside scholarships every year. It's tough.
Our dealings with financial aid office were less personal, honestly they are not that concerned about a single student unlike the contacts in a departmental program. I would ask if there are any additional scholarships for the amount you need or if they have distributed everything already. Of all the places I ever dealt with financial aid office is probably the coldest, least helpful spot on campus - just know everything on campus isn't like that office.