Can't Narrow down my college list

austinmshauri
Tue, 18 Jul 2017 10:54:39 +0000

In your other thread you said your parents are divorced. Is that recent? I don’t think the NPC’s will be accurate for you, but I can see why your financial situation might be difficult to pin down. You’ll have to use both your parents’ incomes for CSS profile schools (a separate financial aid form usually used by private schools), so you need to get that sorted out.

Ask your parents how much they can pay per year. You can only borrow $5500/year, and if you work summers you can probably earn ~$3k. That’s your budget. You can’t borrow $50k like you mentioned doing in your other thread, and you can’t raise the money to go OOS for 4 years by entering competitions for $1,000 outside scholarships. The student who told you they won $24k that way is a new poster whose first post was to promote their financial aid blog. Only one grant of $1,000 was renewable for 4 years, so it’s not a helpful strategy for covering tuition. Books and gas money, maybe, but it won’t cover OOS tuition.

Your best option is to pursue merit. Get your scores up if you can. Build your list by starting with your safeties. If your state participates in an exchange, find something to love about a couple of those schools. Then focus on where you can get merit.