My son attended BC for both his undergraduate and grad degrees, then spent a year on a fellowship in Rome before applying to a variety of law schools. He had 'the numbers (GPA and LSAT), and he was accepted to all the T14 to which he applied (for example, he did not apply to UMichigan Law School, though they sent him a letter encouraging him to do so).
Columbia and a couple of others offered full, three-year merit rides- his own ‘Sophie’s Choice’ was choosing Columbia Law on the Hamilton Fellowship (3 years, all paid for) or Stanford, Harvard, or Yale Law Schools (none of which offer merit-based scholarships). In the end, he chose YLS and is a 2L there currently (editor for both the Yale Law Journal and the Yale Law & Policy Review, I’ll proudly throw in 
), but his choice wasn’t so much about rankings as it was about options and possibilities both within the law and outside of it (YLS generally a more ‘open’ or selectable curriculum and cross-registration allows him to take classes aligned with his specific interests).
A little background- we are from the ‘near West’ (Colorado/Wyoming) and my son oddly had a number of teachers and counselors who had attended BC who highly recommended it (otherwise, I don’t know he would have considered coming to the East Coast), and the school seemed to fit his interests in both Applied Math & The Classics.
While at BC, he became aligned with an organization whose charter is and was to focus on promoting the studying and appreciation of classical languages (by name, the Paideia Institute). That alignment has been transformative in his life- it led primarily to roughly half a dozen trips to Italy and France working programs for that organization while he was attending undergrad classes, it led to his desire to get his grad degree at BC, and it led to his year-long fellowship centered in Rome.
Having that background and his BC accomplishments (Phi Beta Kappa, summa cum laude, graduated in the top 1% of his class) surely helped set him up for YLS and other law schools (as an aside, you’d be shocked at the number of Law Schools who noted, “We LOVE Classics majors” because that major (and math : ), ) have, per Harvard Magazine, the highest success rates of any majors in law school).
All that having been written, he didn’t, at an undergrad level, apply to Yale so he didn’t have your specific option; had he been accepted to Yale or Harvard he might well have attended even assuming some level of tuition pay (he was in BC Honors but we applied late so the (then) BC Presidential Scholarship (the equivalent now the Gabelli) was not in play).
I know he has no regrets about attending BC (undergrad debt wasn’t much at all, and his grad degree was a free ride), and frankly I loved visiting him on campus (it is gorgeous and their 10-year plan has buildings being erected and refurbished sprinkled across the campus).
Bottom line? Hell, I don’t know. I know he had a number of people telling him, “Go to the best school who accepts you, regardless of any debt you’d incur”, and others who noted, “Whoever gives you the most merit-based scholarship(s), go there”.
What he went with was the Best Fit, for him, at an undergrad, grad, and Law School levels, and things seem to be working out fine.
Congrats on the Gabelli- if it works like Honors did you can pick where you’ll live (Gabelli Hall itself is quite nice, though in my son’s day all Honors/Presidential Scholars were in Medeiros for their freshman year), and the great thing for you is that you have no wrong choice here.
Good luck in making your choice and your academic career moving forward.
There’s magic to the word “Yale” as you go through your life. I’d take Yale given the two. New Haven is a fine city. Sure it has problems, but it’s not like Boston doesn’t. New Haven at least has its own energy, plus it’s on the MetroNorth line to NYC, if you really need a “bigger city”–it’s easy to get to NYC and back in a single day. The word “Yale” strikes wonder in people’s hearts and minds in a way that explaining that marvelous scholarship rarely if ever will, so much so that you will gulp back the word rather than stop a conversation. You will start saying quietly “well I went to college in er New Haven.” The college system there, furthermore, offsets to my mind the ability to choose a dorm at any other school. Boston, I’ll admit up front, is NOT my favorite city. I’ve spent time there and in New Haven and I prefer NH for the reasons I’ve stated. NH is small but it’s got arts that spring from its soil–amazing theater productions that go from there to Broadway often (Long Wharf and the Yale theater both are places where new plays work out their kinks before progressing.) The Yale art museums are really quite fine on their own and then–zoom on the MetroNorth line into NYC for the marvelous museums there–the best in the world some of them. The food in NH, while the selection is smaller, it’s still rather sophisticated as, you know, the Yale Crowd is there. Yale has traditions that are fun to be part of. I’d choose Yale in a heartbeat too.
@alwaysdriving I was aware of that. I want you choose your spot within the class year options. No you can’t select Vandy or the mods as a freshman. It wasn’t the meaning
I’ll amend one thing- someone else mentioned that as a freshman (Honors or Gabelli) you can choose to live on the upper campus (not necessarily that you will be living in Medeiros)- that is more accurate than my own statement.
Did you even read the post? And even if you statement is true about internationals and FA, it is irrelevant to this students actual financial situation.