<p>Also look into Miss St.</p>
<p>no, schools don’t usually make exceptions. I’ve never heard of any. </p>
<p>The reason is this:</p>
<p>Schools offer the money to incoming frosh because they want the incoming frosh class to have the highest stats possible. That’s what rankings are based on, and it influence the reported middle quartiles…so schools will buy high stats frosh.</p>
<p>It does them no good to “buy” sophomores and juniors. </p>
<p>That’s what I figured. So because of my GC’s negligence… assuming I don’t just make bank out of the gate, I’m going to get to work an extra year just to pay off my education with said year’s salary? Sweet lol.</p>
<p>I think mom2collegekids made some good recommendations. I would also suggest looking at Mississippi State, Louisiana Tech, and Illinois-Chicago.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>SDSU and SDSMT do have higher OOS prices – but even their OOS prices are quite low.
<a href=“http://www.sdstate.edu/admissions/financing/undergrad/cost/index.cfm”>http://www.sdstate.edu/admissions/financing/undergrad/cost/index.cfm</a> (does not include misc and travel costs)
<a href=“Full Time Undergraduate Students”>HPC Page; (includes $4,000 of misc and travel costs)</p>
<p>With special agreements with IL, UND and NDSU are also relatively low cost:
<a href=“Freshmen Admissions | Undergraduate | University of North Dakota”>Freshmen Admissions | Undergraduate | University of North Dakota; (does not include misc and travel costs)
<a href=“http://www.ndsu.edu/admission/cost_tuition/cost/”>http://www.ndsu.edu/admission/cost_tuition/cost/</a> (does not include misc and travel costs)</p>
<p>At list price, you would be looking at about $20,000 to $23,000 per year at these schools, if you assume $4,000 of misc and travel costs like in the SDSMT estimate. Frugal living might cut the costs somewhat. However, there might still be a gap between that and what you can come up with from a Pell grant, direct loan, and work earnings.</p>
<p>Beau, you have not shared your family’s financial situation with us. I may be jumping the gun, but let’s take a different approach for a minute. Go to the websites of Rice, Emory, and Johns Hopkins (as examples) and complete their NET PRICE CALCULATORS. It is a long shot, but if the NPC numbers make sense for your family, I would put my very best application package together for these schools. This could turn into a blessing in disguise.</p>
<p>Disclaimer: don’t get your hopes up too high, admissions to these schools is very difficult. But why not try?</p>
<p>What are the deadlines for those schools for transfers? Have they passed?</p>
<p>When you use the NPCs, be sure to note whether there are any mentions that the estimates are only for incoming frosh. Some schools that meet need for frosh do not meet need for transfers. </p>
<p>Look to see what the transfer deadlines are for Rice, WashU, USC, UMiami…and run their NPCs.</p>
<p>How much will your parents pay each year towards college?</p>
<p>Did you submit FAFSA for this past school year? what was your EFC? </p>
<p>I feel for you, because my son has similar stats, and thanks to my finding this website last summer, we learned of the merit aid opps at Alabama (two campuses), LA Tech, and Ole Miss and my son is going to be able to make a choice to attend one of these schools. But for the merit aid, he would not be going out of state, and thanks to the merit aid, it will end up to be equal or less to staying in-state. That said, if he chooses Tuscaloosa, with the full tuition plus engineering awards, we will still have over $10k in costs per year (not including travel and books and misc, and maybe less for housing after freshman year.). If Huntsville, around $9k. Ole Miss around $5k. LA Tech only travel and books (scholarship includes room and board.)</p>
<p>So, yes, you would have qualified for those scholarships, too, but there would have still been expenses in most cases. What have you saved by staying in town and going to the community college? A lot in room and board as well as tuition, I hope. And it sounds like you have had a lot of success building your college transcript so when you do transfer, you will be a very competitive applicant. Before you get too carried away with regret over the missed merit aid opps, consider whether you would have wanted to attend any of those schools even with the merit aid.</p>
<p>LA Tech does have a great engineering program and a very friendly, welcoming environment with a lot of tradition and the school’s price is hard to argue with. Even as a transfer, you would get in-state tuition and they do offer some transfer scholarships in addition. The tuition is so low that the scholarship dollars go far, and housing is comparatively inexpensive, too. Plus there is an awesome local BBQ restaurant there, Dowlings, that I thought was actually going to be the make or break factor for my son (who is still deciding, but also still brings up the sandwich he ate there :). You should definitely consider LA Tech if finances are a top concern along with having access to a very reputable engineering school. Alabama Tuscaloosa and Huntsville are great, too, but tuition is so much higher and out-of-state transfer scholarships don’t make much of a dent.</p>
<p>Because we have yet to visit Ole Miss, I can only say that Ole Miss offers several community college transfer scholarships, and, again, the school’s tuition is much lower than Alabama’s. You might consider applying there after reviewing their scholarship opps for transfer students.</p>
<p>I really hope you won’t spend too much time fretting over possible lost opportunities. And I don’t find your guidance counselor responsible or negligent. Do we really hold these counselors to those expectations? Yes, too bad she did not know about College Confidential and too bad you did not think to spend some time googling college choices before your senior year. I guess information has become so accessible that we take it for granted these days? And sometimes expect others to do the work for us. Seems like high schools these days need to invest some time teaching some life skills, even to our smartest students, and guidance counselors should have a basic awareness of websites to which to direct students.</p>
<p>While I empathize with you, I am hopeful you have learned one life lesson that I, as a GenXer still heard from the baby boomer hippies I grew up around in California: Question Authority. My kids were taught this early, and were taught to do so with respect, but they have never let a guidance counselor or teacher be the final word. Yes, with both them and me questioning authority all the time, our return to homeschooling was inevitable. So I know questioning your guidance counselor was probably not a common practice at your school. Sorry about that, but now you know. It is your life, so Question authority.</p>
<p>You have to be the final word in your own life. You chose to go with the community college recommendation. You have reaped some rewards from that, and, yes, you may have missed out on other opps, but who knows. Accept your choices - you made the best ones you knew how to at the time - and move on to the next challenge: where to complete your bachelors. All is not lost. As you now know, knowledge is power, so put your intellectual skills to work and find every opportunity you can.</p>
<p>
Have you decide on what kind of engineering you want to study?</p>
<p>Yes, you should let your school board, principal and GC department know. They don’t seem to care about these things, and it’s not just the back woods type schools that make these misses. There is a very fine, or so they tout themselves, private school that did not take into account my friend’s DD situation and she missed out on a full ride to her state school, it would have been an auto for her, because the GC was not on the ball. I called them on it and raised a big stink and that person is still sitting there as college counselor even making news on her great thoughts about college admissions. Makes my stomache turn. Another one whose ears I pinned back is at a top boarding school still advising students and yapping away. It took the discovery a fraudulent resume to shut up and get rid of the MIT admission counselor. So you are in good company when it comes to those who have had bad advise from the pros. As in any position, there are those not good at their jobs. </p>
<p>On a personal level my father was an education advisor, and all I will say on that is that in that case the shoemaker’s kids went barefoot. I got all my college options together myself along with all of the scholarship and fin aid money. Dad just did as I asked. Will give him that much. And as a 17 year old kid, I missed some things and yes, they are missed opportunities. As they were for my DH whose family and school had no idea how to handle the process. So there are a lot of people in the same situation you are.</p>
<p>You have excellent grades, and your highschool record, and test scores are up there. My advice to you is to add some highly selective schools to your list, like some of the ivies. Look at the transfer stats and pick some that take transfers. Tell your story without assigning any blame to anyone but yourself, because college admission or any selection process hate the stench of blame. That could sink you. But the smell and scent will lead to your High school GC without you spelling it out. If you can gain entry to a school that guarantees to meet full need for all, it might work out well. You have not borrowed so you have that available to you. You can borrow your full allotment of Direct Loan this year, need it or not, if your school COA will warrent it and stash that money in an account that is not reportable for FAFSA/fin aid app purposes if you just don’t take any out and put back in–just keep it clear that it’s all fin aid proceeds. I suggest you start doing some real research on schools–does MIT take transfers, Cal Tech, Columbia, any of the top schools that may guarantee to give full need to transfers. I think COrnell does, and I know a couple of kids who did transfer there and get full need met, and they have engineering too.</p>
<p>Good luck. You need to do the scout work and research yourself, really in every endeavor in life. Once you know what’s out there, you can ask others to help you along the way, but you need to find the resources.</p>
<p>M2CK, I should’ve mentioned that the schools I suggested had March deadlines. I checked each site. There are quite a few more possibilities. </p>
<p>Beauing, It might be a good idea to cast a wide net, but time is of the essence and the applications need to be stellar. I would not bring up the guidance counselor issue up with any of these schools.
Please run some NPCs and let us know if this is an option for you!</p>
<p>Reading this I feel so lucky that I had the best guidance counselor. I never thought I could go to college. No money and I really slipped in junior year ( hey it was the 70’s) . He had me apply for the EOP program in NY. I got full ride to a SUNY, room, board , and a stipend! Years later I am paying it forward and I am nearly full pay for my kids…all thanks to that guidance counselor back in HS. </p>
<p>Don’t cause a stir with the GC. You likely will need some help. Be the bearer of all this good news with salt and light. </p>
<p>Get his help …and then cause a stink. Nothing will change in your small community unless you make it happen. I know all about the status quos in small towns. I have been living in one for 20 years. Kids always apply to the same schools, not much imagination. recommendations from teachers are hastily done and last minute. Good thing I am a native New Yorker ( and I don’t mean upstate) I cause stinks all the time. I rather be respected and make a stand for positive change then sit on the sidelines and watch the bar be set lower and lower. </p>
<p>Too many GCs are only thinking about schools within their own states. So an IL GC is going to think, “they, our state schools are very expensive and don’t give much merit, so go to a CC first and save $50k”</p>
<p>One of my Calif friends made the same mistake. She had her kids start at CCs thinking she’d only have to pay for the last two years and she thought merit would be offered. </p>
<p>
I disagree 100%. Of course counselors should be held to the expectation of being able to offer basic information about financing college. None of this is rocket science, and GC’s have many resources for their jobs; they hardly need to rely on College Confidential. Even a counselor who is challenged with a large number of students to advise and a heavy load of disciplinary responsibilities–the situation for many GC’s–can get up to speed on the basics of merit opportunities in a matter of a few hours. And a high school student whose family is not sophisticated about college finances has every right to rely on someone the school holds out as a professional without feeling that he or she has to challenge the advice that is provided. </p>
<p>The OP’s GC was worse than negligent–he was offering bad advice and failing at the essence of his job–counseling. That’s plain incompetence. I hope that after OP is settled in a new school he informs the guidance department, principal, and school board of his experience.</p>
<p>Thank you for all of the information and experience-sharing everybody; it’s truly a help, and I hope to examine it more thoroughly soon. Any more that anybody has would also be much appreciated.</p>
<p>To reply to a couple of main questions:
The EFC listed on my FAFSA is 06309. I am now leaning toward either Biomedical or Nuclear Engineering.</p>
<p>On the bright side of all of this… I’m pretty sure I have the highest ACT score of anybody to receive a degree from my CC of ~1100… yay? :P</p>
<p>“am now leaning toward either Biomedical or Nuclear Engineering.”</p>
<p>Not many univs offer those majors. Since you need aid/merit, you may need to do a E discipline that will financially work.</p>
<p>Biomed isn’t necessary for an undergrad degree AT ALL. ChemE or MechE can be a good substitute.</p>
<p>What is your career goal?</p>
<p>How much will your parents pay each year? </p>
<p>Apply to the “full need” schools that are still accepting transfer scholarships.</p>
<p>If UVA is accepting apps, apply there as well.</p>
<p>That’s the thing; I don’t know exactly what kind of engineering interests me most. Several jobs throughout the field interest me, but without actual experience I don’t know how I can rule them out or elevate some above the others.</p>
<p>I agree that given the OP’s situation, that GC was negligent and incompetent. But my own father’s suggestion to me was along the same lines, and he was in the field of education advising too. I remember he was blown away with my college packages, merit awards and financial aid. We qualified for about half aid those days, but aid and merit could often be layered then especially with outside awards. I made money on scholarships my first year. </p>
<p>Beauig, I was 17 and not even in the S when I had to make those decisions. You have to get on the stick and find a direction if you want a good chance for a good transfer. It’s up to you. FOr transfers, what matters the most is that you outgrow your situation and have a direction that the school well fits, when we are talking selective schools. You talk like that, and you aren’t going to get into such school, or get much money. That kind of talk is what landed you in community college, you understand? </p>
<p>"Several jobs throughout the field interest me, "</p>
<p>Which jobs are those? If you tell us, we can tell you which E discipline offers the most flexibility. Often it’s MechE, but not always.</p>