Welcome to College Confidential! You are well-prepared to be academically successful in college.
Do you have any interest in playing baseball in college and, if so, do you think you would be competitive enough to be recruited? I don’t know what the recruiting calendar is like for baseball, but I just wanted to raise this as a possibility as recruited athletes can sometimes get into schools that would have been very hard reaches otherwise.
My comments below are based on the idea that you would not be a recruited athlete.
I’m not a big fan of debt, particularly when there are great options that will not require loans. If a student plans to take out loans, I generally advise that they limit themselves to the federal limit for loans which is currently $28k for undergrad (starting with $5500 your first year). Additionally, the current administration is talking of changing policies where the amount of educational loans an individual can take out over their lifetime is much more limited, which could definitely impact you if loans are needed for law school.
Due to that, I would eliminate IU Kelley, UGA, and UIUC, as I don’t see them falling within a $40k budget for you.
Has your family run the Net Price Calculator at Villanova or Boston U.? If the Net Price Calculator doesn’t come back with an affordable price, then I would eliminate those schools from contention as well.
Frankly, UW-Madison and UMN are FABULOUS options to have, especially with in-state pricing. They will be hard to beat.
Some other schools you may want to consider include:
Extremely Likely (80-99+%)
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Butler (IN): About 4500 undergrads at this Indianapolis school. According to its NPC, you would likely be eligible for $23k in merit aid, bringing it right to the top of your budget. With likely shifts in the population of incoming freshmen, that number might rise.
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Miami U. (OH): Thirding this school of about 16k undergrads
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Saint Joseph’s (PA ): About 4800 undergrads at this Jesuit school in Philadelphia.
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Saint Louis U. (MO): About 11k undergrads at this Jesuit school which had a favorable write-up in the college visit thread today.
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Seton Hall (NJ): About 6100 undergrads at this school that is close to NYC
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U. of Houston (TX): About 38k undergrads, the sticker price ($34k) falls within budget, and if you receive a small merit scholarship, you may end up with in-state pricing ($22k).
Likely (60-79%)
- U. of Dayton (OH): About 8200 undergrads
Toss-Up (40-59%)
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Binghamton (NY): About 14k undergrads
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U. of Tennessee: About 29k undergrads
Lower Probability (20-39%)
Low Probability (less than 20%)