Listing “tuition” as one of your two main criteria seems to imply you are sensitive to cost. It is unclear if that means you are full pay, but let’s assume so (since the advice would be very different if you are seeking substantial need-based aid).
Many full pay parents in CA look at the cost of our UCs (~$30K per year) and have to think long and hard about whether to pay more than that. They may even have used UC costs as a benchmark when saving for college.
If that’s the case then you really have three main buckets of schools to compare with the UCs you get into (and you should have some choices there, though perhaps not the most competitive ones):
- Expensive top tier privates with no merit, where you will pay $75K-$80K per year
- Mid tier privates and publics with merit, where you will pay $45K-$55K per year (unless lightning strikes and you win a super competitive scholarship), and
- Lower ranking schools with merit, where you will pay around $30K per year, and possibly less if you are lucky with merit.
You may decide to cut out bucket 1 straight away, or you may be able to afford to pay that much, so to me that is the first decision in drawing up your list, basically what does $200K difference mean to you? Is it easy to pay or impossible to pay? Would it mean loans? Would you offer some or all of that difference to your kid for grad school or a home downpayment if they chose a cheaper option? If you can’t afford it then don’t apply to those schools, it is a waste of time you could spend on applications to schools that are financially feasible.
Then move onto bucket 2 and ask the same question. For those colleges it may be a question of throwing the dice and comparing the pros and cons at the end, depending on what UCs you get into. And in bucket 3 you at least want some affordable auto-admit options, which may include some of the WUE schools, plus nearby flagships with decent merit like Arizona, ASU and Utah.