Full Ride or Great School

ucbalumnus
Fri, 04 Mar 2016 04:54:52 +0000

One other variable to consider is whether you get direct admission to the CS major at UIUC. If you get general admission, be aware that getting into the CS major later is very competitive. You need a 3.76 college GPA with at least A- grades in two prerequisite CS courses just to be eligible to apply.
https://cs.illinois.edu/prospective-students/undergraduates/transfer-students/transferring-another-university-illinois-major

Nfisher32:

My dad says go to Bama and save money. Mom says UIUC because it’s a top ranked school for engineering

You can only borrow $5,500 without a cosigner (cosigned student loans are a bad idea) and earn a few thousand dollars from work. A net price of about $10,000 per year is probably the maximum you can reasonably be expected to self-fund. Note that even Alabama with a full tuition scholarship may be too expensive (non-tuition costs are often up to $15,000); you may need a full ride scholarship or equivalent financial aid.

https://secure.osfa.illinois.edu/NPC/NPC.asp is UIUC’s net price calculator. For an Illinois resident with parental income of $65,000, $7,400 in federal and state income tax paid, no siblings, and CS major, the net price shown is $27,298, far too high for you to self-fund (and unrealistically high even with parental contribution – UIUC has poor financial aid even for Illinois residents).

If you make NMF, you can try this list:
http://nmfscholarships.yolasite.com/
There are also these lists:
http://automaticfulltuition.yolasite.com/
http://competitivefulltuition.yolasite.com/
Check each school for whether the scholarships are still available when you apply, and note that you probably need more than full tuition to get the net price under $10,000. Also pay attention to college GPA thresholds needed to renew the scholarship and enter the CS major.