Yep, Emory is Nov 15, Vanderbilt Dec 1, William and Mary is January 5, Tulane is Nov 15, U of Miami and Fordham are November 1 for early action consideration. I think Morehead Cain at UNC is October 1st but probably not really worth applying to unless she is really interested in it.
Don’t let her fall in love….with anywhere.
Fordham is safe - but not $45K safe - which is why I suppose you had it as a reach.
If NYC is a thing for her, look at Hofstra, Seton Hall and Manhattan as privates with potential for $45K. Not sure about Drew - but it might be another. And then New Paltz and Stony Brook as potential SUNYs and Ramapo in NJ as another public that would likely hit (with merit…it’s a tad over). Of course, these schools in some cases are more “local” and not sure why her interest in Fordham - but if it’s NYC - these are some to investigate with better $45K odds.
Someone this AM wrote they got $50K+ from Sarah Lawrence which surprised me.
This is what they wrote - stats were beneath yours - just as a way for comparison to what might help you: Sarah Lawrence stood out. Ursinus (for this student) would also make your budget. URI too - so if not on your list and if they fit, might be three more to check out.
american ea accepted + 8k merit
brandeis ea accepted
slc ea accepted + 50k merit
bard ea accepted
ithaca college ea accepted + 34k merit
emerson college ea accepted + 20k merit
ursinus college ea accepted + 38k merit
uri ea accepted + 14k presidential scholarship
bryn mawr ed2 accepted!!
You want to get these submitted before November 1.
When D25 applied last year she submitted the Fordham app in Jan on the day it was due and was still awarded merit, it was a last minute application. I think if your daughter gets overwhelmed by completing so many apps so early (and 1st semester senior year is demanding) she can maybe push the Fordham one to RD, unless they have set a firm due date to be considered for merit aid. BU also offers merit aid and the due date for that app was/is Dec.1, in case she is interested.
I also remember the Vandy app being long and the actual application had to be submitted before Dec.1 and then the applicants submitted a separate merit application (with different short essays for each scholarship offered) after they were able to create their portal. Again this information is all from the 2024-25 cycle so maybe dates have changed.
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I think you can get away with that at Fordham (even RD) because they need to work hard to get kids that get in to go there.
23,343 non ED admittances happened for domestic students. 1,980 enrolled. So their yield (non ED) is 8.5%….very very low.
So they need you a lot more than you need them - and perhaps that also leads to better merit.
It’s not a knock on Fordham but it’s the reality of the struggle they face converting admits into students, which can often be to the applicant’s advantage.
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In the case of Fordham, it’s sort of the other way around. Their yield is so very low because the aid they offer most families is very poor. Every year there are lots and lots of kids who see Fordham as their dream school, but then they get only $20K of merit aid, leaving the cost at $70K and their parents say no way. Fordham just doesn’t have a big enough endowment to “buy in” all the students they would have to in order to increase their yield.
For Fordham, the exceptions are 1) local low-income students (as an urban Jesuit, this was always their biggest mission) who are often given free tuition but are expected to live at home and commute. 2) the full tuition scholarships that they use to lure a relatively small number of very high stat students who also meet their institutional priorities. These are nowhere near as competitive as at Emory, WashU, Vandy etc., but they also aren’t a guarantee like at some of the big Southern publics.
Anyway, best wishes to OP’s daughter!
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Not to get too far off on a tangent, but I think you are quite right all this stems from the mission (and related finances) of Jesuit colleges, and in fact helps explain why these colleges that seem to check so many of the boxes that many people say they are looking for in a college don’t seem to have quite the selectivity/generic rankings as you might otherwise expect. They just don’t have the mission/funding necessary to compete as effectively as possible for many of the applicants looking for what they offer.
However, this does MAYBE present an opportunity for a particularly savvy kid with high enough numbers to get a really great undergrad experience with enough merit . . . but everything has to line up. And it might not.
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If this is the case and their average merit shows $14.5k, then OP should put in the high reach category. I know they moved to target for their daughter’s app timing but that may also set a false hope.
That they can’t attract enough of these paying students is scary for their future - although they have law and other things for income.
In the end, any school that can’t fill seats - Fordham or otherwise - may have to dig deeper than are comfortable to get students. American, as an example, appears to be offering far more money than they did the past few years. They also had significant enrollment shortages. I’m sure the two go hand in hand.
So you never know -maybe OP will get lucky and that will happen. Since it’s a favorite school but highly unlikely to hit based on reported data, that’s the hope OP needs even if it wouldn’t be a great situation for Fordham.
Fordham actually provides some interesting Admissions data. Holding aside the chaos around COVID, they’ve experience a bit of a drop in yields, but also an increase in applications. As of last cycle they had still had a bit of an increase in acceptance rates, but also I believe a bit of an enrollment increase. And apparently this cycle, they had a big increase in applications and dropped back to a lower (for them) acceptance rate:
This is all pretty complicated to game out, so I think it really comes back to just liking Fordham enough to apply and then find out what happens.
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I know you are asking about reaches, but given your target list, I am wondering if you have considered Elon in NC? Similar in size to many of the reaches you mentioned but does offer merit.
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Would your daughter like a geographically challenged LAC? We have heard good things from friends about merit at places like St Olaf, Oberlin, Carleton, Elon
We got back from touring Emory a couple of weeks ago and met one of the Woodruff scholars. He got into Yale early. One of the full ride recipients at WashU from last year was accepted to Stanford and Yale. If the goal is to get a good aid package, aiming lower might be a better strategy, as a previous commenter noted.
Have you considered wealthy private schools? You can qualify for generous financial aid at some of those schools with pretty high income levels. Look at Middlebury or Carleton, for example:
https://www.middlebury.edu/student-financial-services/estimate-your-cost
I would just say that the competition out there is brutal these days and that you may need to look at lower ranked schools. A good friend of ours had a kid with a 1500 SAT, strong grades, volunteer at a historical museum, selective Stanford program , environmental internship, high level jazz musician. Rejected from Vandy, Michigan, USC, UCLA, Berkeley, Northwestern, WashU, NYU, McGill, Pomona, Amherst. WL at UVA, BU, Emory, 6 LACs. Accepted to UCSB, UCSC, Kenyon. It’s rough out there! Good luck!
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Yes, definitely not counting on long shots for the bulk of her list. Just wondering if it was even worth the effort for applying for full tuition scholarships such as Woodruff and Cornelius Vanderbilt. And we’re “high earners not rich yet” so I think the expectation from private schools is that we take out high interest private loans to fund sticker price, so no thanks. It’s so crazy; she has a 36 composite on retake this April. Back in my day, that was a ticket to the most selective schools. Now, the “targets” on her list are made up mostly of schools that I would have considered safe schools. But they’re solid schools nonetheless, and maybe the high scores will result in merit aid.
Always worth it if the student wants to put in the effort and they have at least one, but preferably, two schools to hit the cost.
This is a controllable if you include schools that share the $$ up front.
Nonetheless, especially in the privates, a lot of schools are buyers today. It’s take you at a ridiculously low cost that does nothing to keep them solvent - or get no revenue at all.
But remember, focus on cost, not merit per se. Some schools full pay are cheaper than others with merit.
I agree with virtually all of this - just wanted to note for the record that Carleton generally doesn’t offer merit aid. There are a tiny number of non-need merit aid recipients shown in the CDS (usually around 4%) with an average award of under $8k, which I surmise to be grants for summer programs and study abroad and the like. In lieu of merit aid, they disregard home equity in their aid algorithm (per YCBK podcast), so middle-class and upper-middle class families tend to qualify for more need-based aid than they expect. I will also say that nearby St. Olaf is remarkably generous with aid for middle-class families, despite not having the endowment of the top-ranked LACs. Hats off to them.
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I’m a teacher, and I’ve had a few students offered the big Emory & WashU scholarships. They were all students with really unusual levels of community engagement & leadership; activists/advocates whose work was recognized far beyond the school level (and all were accepted to Harvard and/or Yale as well). If she feels overwhelmed by applications/supplemental essays, Emory & WashU are the ones I’d cut.
Fordham is delightful & imo worth a shot; my S25 had similar credentials as your D & did not get one of their big scholarships, but kids with similar-seeming profiles did.
You might consider adding Brandeis, which would probably be a target for her–R1 university, 20 minutes from Boston, giving generous merit to top students these days (according to our guidance counselor). Also Case Western. Both schools with great academics & no supplemental essays.
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When you say that you do not qualify for need-based aid, does this mean that you have completed a FAFSA (or simulator) and know that your SAI is over the COA for these schools? I’m asking mainly because I found that the schools all came very close to the SAI, and I assumed that we would not qualify based on family size (2–child+parent) plus income. The CSS seems to complicate it all as well.
When families think that they earn too much money to qualify for need-based aid, I suggest that they fill out the Net Price Calculator (NPC) at Princeton. Princeton is arguably the most generous school in defining need, so if you don’t qualify for need-based aid there, you won’t qualify for it anywhere. But many schools of its ilk will tout free tuition for families earning $200k or less or similar, so it’s at least worth a flyer to check. (Note that these schools also look at assets and don’t necessarily set a financially advisable limit to match up with the salary.)
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I have filled out a few. I think I qualified at Princeton for a 4k grant but I also may have filled it out wrong. Usually it comes out to paying full freight. Alas, the plight of the high income not rich yet earner I guess. Not complaining but it’s just not financially sound for us to take out a second mortgage or loans when we just paid off my own student loans in 2022. I know people go into debt for their kids but I would be a nervous wreck, especially in this climate where many mid-career professionals are getting laid off.
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You are smart not to take on debt for college - which in essence is a commodity. There will be a boatload of schools $45k or less. Likely not these but a boatload. There will certainly be ‘“like” schools to any big or small -.theres zero reason to take on any debt. Taking on debt is a choice- and as someone who took many years to pay it off, you know it’s an overhang.
As long as you maintain discipline to hold to your principles, you will have a very successful search.
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I disagree that a four-year college experience is a commodity, in fact they are textbook examples of a differentiated product. But I agree that you should not take on a lot of debt for undergrad.
Fortunately one can reconcile these propositions by doing what you are doing, and reasonably chasing merit at a variety of colleges by selectivity, all of which are also particularly suitable for your individual kid qualitatively.
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