<p>What is your take on Duke(full ride and AB scholar status) vs Harvard. S1 is torn in between the two. Though Harvard is willing to give about $28,000 as financial aid</p>
<p>Well, it’s final. I committed to Harvard and declined all other institutions.</p>
<p>Congratulations to you, CPUscientist! I wish you all the happiness and success in the world!</p>
<p>Thanks!
Feels like a weight lifted off of my shoulders. No debt <em>phew</em></p>
<p>Congratulations to you CPUScientist3000. I’m so happy for you! I was wondering if you could offer some advice. My D has been very fortunate in that she has been accepted to all colleges to which she has applied.</p>
<p>We are overjoyed for her, because she has worked so hard to go the distance in her academic abilities.</p>
<p>She applied to 9 schools of Engineering and received generous awards to Vanderbilt, UVA, Case Western,and the University of Pittsburgh (what an honor and again, she is and we are grateful). She was also accepted to Yale, Princeton, Duke, Carnegie Mellon, and Washington University of St. Louis’ schools of Engineering as well. </p>
<p>Did I say we are grateful?! </p>
<p>We have two others hopefully entering college in a few years. We skipped the second car and used the money to save for college for all kids for the last 4 years (when we could start one). We are solidly middle class. Applied for FAFSA and CSS and as many outside scholarships as possible. Out of 8 or so scholarships applied for so far, only one received for sure and it’s the NMF one time award (again – we are grateful). D is smart, but so are so many other great students!</p>
<p>Over the past several days, D is pretty sure she has eliminated Yale (haven’t read good reviews on Engineering school and low financial aid offer), Wash U (low financial aid offers) and Case Western (too cold!)</p>
<p>D is going to attend Princeton and UVA college campuses to help with her decision. UVA (our state school) and University of Pittsburgh are wonderful places but is the least “fit” of all of her choices due to school size and academic flexibility. </p>
<p>D has only seen the Vanderbilt campus once for about an hour. She has no car and the campus seems heavily dependent on students having transportation. This is the furthest and would mean she could only come home on extended breaks. Other than transportation issues, she is honored to be considered for this school and will visit soon.</p>
<p>She loves Duke. It would be a perfect fit for her (great weather and great school) but the financial aid is so low, she would be saddled in debt. She knows this would not make sense. </p>
<p>Princeton would be her other great choice, but again, too much money!</p>
<p>What would college confidential parents advise. We know D is extremely fortunate to have these options. Many would be so grateful to have these choices. So with this in mind, should she call and speak with the financial aid offices of these prestigious schools or should she take what she’s got and be happy!</p>
<p>I’ve made my choice, Berkeley for me, the one closest to home.</p>
<p>In the end, it was them offering a particular major, that swung it for me.</p>
<p>Now I can start making plans.</p>
<p>Thanks Razzyreb. </p>
<p>That is a tough decision. For my family, we chose the most affordable option. Although maybe I would have fit in socially more at Brown, it was really a financial stretch for us (and Johns Hopkins was just out of the park). I am fortunate to have the most affordable option be in a location (Cambridge) that has many job/internship opportunities. </p>
<p>I have no experience with finances from an adult standpoint, but I think you should choose out of the schools that are the most affordable out of all the options (even if they are a little stretchy). Then crunch the numbers and see if after the 5500 federal loans, if the out of pocket cost is doable or not. That’s what really helped my family. But we also didn’t forget that although maybe my mom could have paid the remaining cost with no/minimal loans, there would still be $20,000+ of loans when I graduate that I will have to pay back. And my mom and I want me to try and live on my own when I graduate from college/graduate school, and that much money in debt would be difficult while straddling living costs. </p>
<p>Good luck! Hope everything works out and let us know what you ultimately decide.</p>
<p>Thank you for your advice CPU. You are right about crunching numbers. With Vanderbilt, travel will be a big consideration. And the cost is not totally free – she is still accountable for room and board. But the relief of not having to apply yearly for financial aid would be heavenly.</p>
<p>I don’t know your entire story, but when I was going to college, I was the last of 4 out of 6 who went to college. None of us had any money as my mom was divorced and raising 6 kids on a cafeteria cook’s salary (something like 11k a year). The older kids had nothing but government grants and loans. I was fortunate enough to get an academic scholarship to our state school for which I was truly grateful.</p>
<p>Again, congratulations to you and I truly wish you well.</p>
<p>You’re welcome! </p>
<p>What a journey you’ve had. I am fortunate enough that my mom started her career in the medical field as an RN a few years ago, so we do have a little $ saved. But she is a single parent, so it’s not an enormous amount. I almost cried when I saw Brown’s package. I loved that school for a while and the cost was just unbelievable. But, we also almost cried when we saw Harvard’s package; because it was so amazing. If Brown was my only option, my mom told me, “We’ll make it work,” but it still made me uncomfortable. </p>
<p>Congrats to your daughter on all the great choices she has.</p>
<p>Razzyreb,</p>
<p>Congratulations to your daughter on all her fine choices!She sounds amazing! I am sure you are very proud of her. How wonderful to be able to look at each school (though it can be daunting, I know) from a variety of aspects. My question for you might be, what are you <em>willing</em> to pay for your daughter’s college? Or, what can you <em>reasonably</em> pay? Is she willing to take out loans, and if so, how much per year? Did you have a predetermined amount that you were willing to pay?</p>
<p>Our story is similar. My son was accepted to 10 out of 10 colleges; we were so astonished and grateful! He also is a NM Corporate scholarship winner but we are waiting to see what the amount will be.</p>
<p>My son’s school list looks very similar to your D’s: Pitt, UT Dallas (full ride), Baylor, WUSTL, Vanderbilt, MIT, Caltech, U Penn, Harvey Mudd, and Princeton.</p>
<p>The difference would be that we are also middle class but maybe on the lower end (under 80K), so my son’s financial aid packages are mostly within a target amount (except for WU, and he withdrew from there).</p>
<p>We are looking at a spread of about $7,500 from most inexpensive to most expensive schools my son is still considering (about 5 schools). We will be going over the numbers with someone from our church who is familiar with financial aid. Some of the offers are straight forward, some less so.</p>
<p>We had settled on an amount that we thought we could pay each year (3K). Beyond that, our son will need to be responsible for the rest. He has a small 529 account and some savings. He plans on working, as well. We would like to see him go debt free for two years, if possible, but it will be his decision. Several schools would make it fairly easy to be debt free, but I want him to find the best fit, even if it’s the school that costs more.</p>
<p>I hope some of this is helpful as you walk through the decision making process with your daughter. Let us know how it turns out, ok?</p>
<p>Thank you for your post sbjdorlo. It is extremely helpful. What are we willing to pay? My D has asked me that question and honestly, I don’t have a good answer. Her NM scholarship is very small. Her dad does not work for a corporation – he’s government. And there is not NM money that I am aware of. So the 2500 is a one time scholarship.</p>
<p>We have saved the last 4 years of her education for college by foregoing a 2nd car. So if she accepted her state school which gave her full tuition, she could survive without debt for at least 3 or 4 years with just her 529. She may need to work to get extra money for study abroad. </p>
<p>You are fortunate to have someone in your church who is familiar with these types of issues. Just completing the FAFSA and CSS was eye-opening for me.</p>
<p>I am going to try to see if we can get more aid for her. All of the schools are excellent, but we’re not sure if they are worth getting loans in amounts equivalent to a mortgage for an average new purchased northeast home.</p>
<p>She’s still applying for scholarships. If you or any other reader have any suggestions, please reply. Thanks.</p>
<p>My daughter got into:
U Penn
MIT
Carnegie Mellon
Boston U
UVA
Johns Hopkins
UMD - College Park
(and was wait listed at Columbia)</p>
<p>About the guilt…she got a full ride to UMD - Banneker Key Scholarship. She received little significant financial aid for the other schools - (5K from MIT, 26K Johns Hopkins, 17,500 from BU - and around 10k from the rest). She’d love to go to MIT or CMU but we can’t swing it without taking on HUGE debt. We planned for $25k a year & the closest to that is JHU (after FA$ it would be 34K - and she’d rather go to UMD than JHU). We were very up front with her…you can go anywhere as long as it is equivalent to in state tuition. We live in MD so, going to UMD is not really like going away which is the one thing she’d really like. Ultimately, she’ll end up going to UMD. Any thoughts on how to lose the guilt of feeling like we’ve failed her? I run into person after person who thinks we should make MIT work at all cost…but I just can’t see taking on over 100K in debt. Any thoughts would be appreciated - other than why on earth did you let her apply to those schools??? I keep asking myself that…</p>
<p>In terms of why “you let her” apply to those schools. I would interject that nothing is guaranteed. Students are encouraged in high school to apply to “Reach, Match, and Safety” schools. She did what everyone else was doing. I don’t see any fault in that and you should not feel guilty.</p>
<p>I’m going to do my best to get my D in the school she wants, keeping in mind that we will not jeopardize our other two children’s small funds.</p>
<p>I’m going to appeal the financial aid and speak with anyone who is willing to hear me out to get her in where she wants to go. Of course I hope she makes the right decision because most of the loans will be in her name. We will pay contribute what we can to see to it that her debt is not too much.</p>
<p>Good luck to you. I would urge you to speak with school counselors, other parents with college kids, or anyone else who may offer you some advice before you send in your final decision.</p>
<p>mc,</p>
<p>Absolutely appeal at MIT and Penn. It can’t hurt, correct? My understanding of both schools, particularly Penn, is that they might indeed come back with significantly more aid. If my son decides either Penn or MIT are his top choice, I will definitely appeal as those two schools are the most expensive on his list.</p>
<p>No failure on your part and no guilt.</p>
<p>My son’s list had three safeties where we knew he had a good shot and some great aid being NM. However, we also knew if he got rejected everywhere, he would just go back to the community college and transfer to a UC. We had no expectations and it didn’t matter what others were saying. I was the most doubtful (which made my son a little, like, “Hey, don’t you believe in me?”), but I didn’t want anyone to get hopes or expectations up.</p>
<p>I don’t know anything about UMD but the full ride and fabulous scholarship (and I’m guessing an invite to the honors program) is wonderful! I know someone who’s son graduated from, oh maybe UMBC or one of the UM schools, and he went onto both MIT and Harvard for grad school.</p>
<p>Hang in there and let us know if you get anywhere with the appeals.</p>
<p>mccuerob, given the schools she applied to, I’m guessing she plans to major in something for which a higher degree is desirable. U of Maryland is well thought of and would certainly be a good springboard to a top graduate school, assuming she does well there. If she does go to graduate school, that then becomes what people primarily look at and where the professors she does research with become really important. If she plans on going to grad school, I think it’s a no brainer to go to UMD and take the loans later if necessary. Easy for me to say, I know.</p>
<p>I might add that someone I know that works at MIT told us that telling a school that they’re your number one choice and that the only thing holding you back is the cost definitely gets a better deal sometimes.</p>
<p>Hello everyone…My first post, but I have been a long time reader of these posts and they have been so helpful to me as a parent. It is so nice to hear all the excitement and accomplishments of your children.</p>
<p>To make a very long story short, my daughter joined her choir her sophomore year. She was very quite, always putting almost all her time into her school work. She made all A’s throughout her school years. We assumed she would be a math major since this was her strongest subject. She loved dance and piano and to our knowledge never opened her mouth until joining choir. She was nominated for Governor’s school, got in, and her life changed. </p>
<p>She was told by many that she had a beautiful voice, but it took more time for us to realize what was about to happen. She came back from GS and applied to 8 universities for vocal performance. Furman was top on the list.</p>
<p>She got in and received very generous scholarships including nice music ones as well.</p>
<p>Her pick: A small/middle size school in llama and goat country and one stop light. She will be attending Gardner-Webb University in the fall and was totally led there. </p>
<p>For those still searching, the saying, you will know, holds true. She left that day, and knew that is where she wanted to go. I feel the stress parents… Some days I did not think we were going to get through the process. In a 11 day stretch she had 8 interviews/auditions. </p>
<p>In the end, there was no doubt, and it was never about the money. Being the frugal girl she is, she knew she could get a great education at state schools and, as another poster stated, we instructed her that if she could get the costs competitive with a state university, it would ultimately be her choice. In this economy, I feel debt should be your last choice. </p>
<p>For those of you that have a strong faith, you know what I mean by “you will know.” God lead her not only to the right school, but away from the others. The big surprise and blessing, she received a full scholarship. </p>
<p>We don’t know what is down the road, but for the next 4 years, she won’t have to sing for her supper!!</p>
<p>We need to start a post for all of us to update their progress and let everyone know how they are adjusting to college life.</p>
<p>Thank you all for the wonderful posts!</p>
<p>My d is going to Boston College (honors)! She is thrilled. (She was also accepted at UW-Madison, Berkeley, and TCU, and she was waitlisted at Northwestern and Notre Dame. She did not get into Brown or Duke.)</p>
<p>Hi. I am a very new newbie. In fact, I just found your site today, while searching for all the info I can get online. I was excited to see mccuerob’s thread, since your daughter sounds very smart and might go to UMd too, even though that’s not her first choice. But, it’s refreshing to know that smart people defintively go there. Congrats to your daughter and to all of you. I really hate this process that they use that decides the futures of our kids. </p>
<p>I have a question for you guys. My d is hoping to go to UMd- (she got rejected from Brown, Harvard, and Cornell, and is ok with it). She loves the campus and was accepted into the Honors program in Biology. She has a 96 average but she didn’t get a merit scholarship. Our problem is a financial one. I know you lucky people from Md. pay only a couple of thousand, but we out-of-state residents get hit with $26,000 before room and board. We really don’t have the money they’re asking for. They left us with a gap of over $16,000 in unmet need. Is UMd. that good a school? We’ve rejected SUNY schools- she was very unhappy there. Has anyone been successful with getting extra money out of them, like a merit scholarship? Have others gotten merit scholarships with her average? Her SAT’s were also good, but they told us that the GPA is what determines academic scholarships. Thanks so much.</p>
<p>Not a newbie but have been a frequent reader on CC. I have twin girls headed off to Rice next year. DD1 got accepted to Texas A&M, Vanderbilt, Harvey Mudd, Rice, Purdue, UTDallas, Colorado School of Mines, Rose Hulman and denied at Brown. DS2 got accepted to TexasA&M, Purdue, Rice and Rose Hulman. The whole college process was interesting with learning about “safeties” and “reach” schools. Learned that you might recieve more money from a private than a public based on merit. Learned over the past 2 years what was DDs 1st choices would change depending on the visits. I’m sure I will be looking for more advice as college get closer.</p>
<p>Spellers</p>
<p>I don’t think that U of Md is all that great. What you have to ask yourself is this----can you/she afford the debt??? What will be her starting salary after she graduates? My niece is graduating from Dartmouth in pre-med. She wants to take a break before applying to med school but so far she can’t find a job. Can your daughter do two years at home and transfer?</p>