We have been following this site and hope that all the experts here can offer some advice. My daughter is a junior and we are trying to put together a Spring Break college tour and need some school suggestions. She LOVES Vanderbilt (mid size school, near a city, most students live on campus all 4 years, strong sport teams and academics). Other schools that have caught her eye…Georgetown, American, Boston College, Tufts, Brown.
Stats:
State: SC, public school
Rank: 24/375; 3.9/4.0 GPA (take hardest classes available-AP Human (5)in 10th grade, 2 APs in 11th grade
ACT: 28 in 10th grade, should get Feb scores soon…practice tests averaged 33
ECs/Other: AYLP Singapore/Malaysia thru US State Department, EFL (Economics for Leaders), HOBY,RYLA, class officer for 3 years, Varsity golf for 3 years, National Honor Society, Interact, Student Intern Volunteer for local medical/outreach ministry program, leader in student lead worship services.
Major: International Realtions, Global Leadership, Economics (maybe a future in Foreign Service, State Department, etc)
Money: we can only afford to pay approximately $20k (with $5500 student loans). As a point of reference, according to EFC Vanderbilt would cost approx $10k. Family income=$110k
Any suggestion of mid size schools 5,000-10,000 students that either offer strong financial aid or possible merit that she may qualify?
What is your instate public flagship and does it have an Honors program? Having been through this twice with my kids, we started with building the safeties, and then added on from there. With your financial constraints, an affordable instate public could be a financial and admissions safety (depending on where you live).
Input the financial information in the Net Price Calculators of a few of those private schools to see what estimated aid you might qualify for. The big surprise for us was coming to accept that, “need” as defined by the college/university, was a very different number than the one we defined it as. If the NPCs are telling you that you are expected to pay significantly more than the $20k you are prepared to handle, then you need to shift the focus to schools that award merit. I don’t know if Vandy is an outlier and more generous or if that would be a consistent expectation of the family’s EFC across the board. I would run more NPCs to see the range.
While we researched exhaustively liberal arts colleges with generous merit awards, I am not familiar with mid-sized privates that give good merit awards. Possible schools might include Tulane and Syracuse. To qualify for merit, a student should look for schools where their stats put them in the top 25% of students.
In terms of admissions – don’t know about merit or financial awards – Brandeis might be a possible in the Boston area, in addition to BU. In DC, look at American and George Washington as well as G’town. In Chicago, look at Loyola Chicago, very good merit awards, vibrant student community etc. Fordham in NYC.
Good luck, it is a wild ride, with lots of twists and turns.
Thanks for the great suggestions thus far. She really wants to go out of state (SC), if possible. I realized I said EFC earlier when I meant NPC for Vanderbilt. Any other suggestions? Vanderbilt would actually be cheaper than Univ of South Carolina or Clemson according to NPC. Any other suggestions?
If you want to spend $20,000 maximum per year, your DD needs to find a few affordable safeties. Is she a possible NMSF?
Take a look at the University of Richmond.
Your Vanderbilt NPC number seems a little low.
Here is a list of schools with good financial aid. You might play around with some of the NPCs of the lower ranked schools (this is relative-theses are good schools) and look for some safeties. You daughter will also be competetive for merit awards, but what I have found is that you will need close to a full tuition award to bring the cost down to the $20,000 range.
Based on what she likes about Vandy - I’m not seeing the appeal to the other schools except BC - and possibly Georgetown.
My niece went to Vandy and loved it and her very close second choice was USC in California, which is offers generous merit aid - I think they offer a National Merit partial scholarship.
Other comparable schools (strong sports teams and academics) that immediately come to mind are:
Wake Forest
Northwestern
Notre Dame
Tulane
Stanford
Duke
I would add UVA, UNC and Georgia Tech, but probably no aid there unless she applies for one of the highly selective merit scholarships. That may also be true for some of the above listed - I’m not sure.
You may want to rerun your NPCs. With your daughter’s stats it is unlikely that Vanderbilt would be less that Clemson on USC with the Palmetto Fellows Scholarships. That Vandebilt NPC seems very low.
I agree…start with the safeties…those being colleges she would be delighted to attend that you can afford.
As others say, state flagship honors programs are a good place to start.
Daughter’s stats are irrelevant to the NPC. It’s always good to double-check, but the Vandy numbers are probably good because they cover full cost of attendance – the state schools and many others do not. She will need to get that ACT up substantially for Vandy though.
Some NPCs do apply automatic merit depending on stats, so they are not always irrelevant. I have even seen one where it was not automatic merit and they still showed merit awards (surprising, but it does happen). They may be irrelevant for Vandy, but it is not always the case.
-Fordham University
-Howard University (She’d automatically receive full-ride)
-Marquette University
-Providence College
-Southern Methodist University
-Villanova University
These schools meet a high percentage of need:
-Emory University
-John Hopkins University
-Lehigh University
-Tufts University
-University of Chicago
-University of Pennsylvania
-Washington University in St. Louis
The last three are huge reaches, but she definitely has a chance.
@higheredrocks I can assure you that OPs daughter’s stats are extremely relevant when completing NPCs for SC public and private schools. With her stats , she is eligible for thousands of dollars of state scholarship funds that are funded by the lottery system.
“the Vandy numbers are probably good because they cover full cost of attendance”
I agree that the Vanderbilt NPC is comprehensive and reflects the true cost of attendance. I just don’t believe that the OP will have to only pay $10,000 for Vanderbilt with an income of $110,000. I suggested that the OP check these numbers. Everyone’s finances are different. So I could easily be wrong.
Right you are @carolinamom2boys. I was thinking of it from the Vandy perspective (all about need and generous with need to some fairly high incomes comparatively), not the cheaper than instate perspective. I’m not familiar with the SC lottery scholarships, but it may be a flaw in the SC NPC that doesn’t factor that into their results.
@higheredrocks It does factor it into the NPC. I’ve applied to 5 instate schools, both public and private, and it was included in every one, including USC and Clemson.