Chance my child [OK, 3.9UW, 32 ACT/1400SAT, Poli Sci/pre-law]

Below are some schools that your D may want to consider, some of which would be extremely likely to hit your budget, and others which might hit the budget depending on how much merit aid the school gives your D.

  • Arizona State: About 65k undergrads at this school in the Phoenix metro area. Sticker price is around $48k, but it used to give pretty good merit. It’s worth checking out to see if it might meet your price.

  • DePaul (IL): About 14k undergrads at this Chicago school that can be generous with merit aid.

  • Florida State: About 33k undergrads in Tallahassee (population of about 200k). Sticker price is about $32k/year.

  • Ohio State: About 46k undergrads in Columbus (population of over 900k). Sticker price is about $53k, but sufficient merit aid is possible (though not guaranteed) to get the price within budget (source).

  • Temple (PA ): About 24k undergrads in Philadelphia. Sticker price is about $55k, but merit aid is offered here.

  • U. of Delaware: About 19k undergrads with a sticker price of about $55k. About 1h from Philadelphia and 1h16m from Baltimore. Merit aid is available here.

  • U. of Houston (TX): About 38k undergrads with a sticker price of about $33k. I suspect your D would receive merit aid here and would likely qualify for a waiver of out-of-state costs here as well, dropping the sticker price to about $21k.

  • U. of Kansas: Lawrence gets great reviews as a college town and is about 45m from Kansas City (metro population of more than 2 million people). Sticker price is about $41k but it appears that your D would receive $14k/year in merit, dropping the price to around $27k (source).

  • U. of Kentucky: About 23k undergrads with a sticker price of about $49k/year. Lexington has a population of over 300k (and a metro of over 500k). She would receive at least $12,500 in merit aid but would be eligible to compete for a full tuition scholarship (source). If her test scores increase slightly (33 ACT or 1450 SAT) she could compete for the full ride.

  • U. of Minnesota – Twin Cities: About 39k undergrads at this school that @fiftyfifty1 mentioned earlier with a sticker price of about $50k. If you run the Net Price Calculator it will estimate the amount of merit aid your D would receive. I’m guessing it would probably be about $14k or maybe more, which would drop this school’s price to around $36k. Additionally, I’ve heard anecdotes of the school continuing to stack additional scholarships.

  • U. of Pittsburgh (PA ): About 24k undergrads at this school with a sticker of a little over $53k. Lots of people at CC love this school. Applications are open now and are rolling admissions. Your D’s best shot for merit aid here would be to get that application in ASAP.

  • U. of South Carolina: About 27k undergrads at this school with a sticker closing in on $48k. It has a very well-reputed honors college here as well. Merit aid is possible. The Columbia metro area has over 850k people.

  • U. of Utah: About 26k undergrads at this school in Salt Lake City. It also has a well-reputed honors college. Its sticker price is about $42k/year, but if your D stays in UT over the first summer, she can then qualify as a resident of UT which would then drop the price to about $22k/year from her remaining years.

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