Has she been accepted to STARS or any other special Yale program?
Great points, @Bill_Marsh, thank you! D25 does favor the residential colleges, as well as the greater number of trees and green space at Yale. Not necessarily a deal breaker, but something to consider. The old canal route sounds great!
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Hi @Muu9, no she has not. I hadnāt heard of the STARS program before your commentā¦I donāt think D qualifies for that.
Almost exactly one year after my first post, we near the end of D25ās college application process. I wanted to circle back with some reflections in case itās helpful for anyone in a similar position.
Iām happy to elaborate on D25ās stats/profile if anyone is interested, but Iāll keep things relatively brief here. D25 was looking to stay in the northeast, attend a medium-sized university, and study applied math (potentially with CS). Since she mentioned āengineeringā a few times, we decided to focus on schools that also offered an accredited engineering degree (in the event she decides to go in that direction). Financially, we are a donut-hole family and want to keep the cost under 32k/yr.
Taking advice from the knowledgeable and generous posters on this site, we began our search by running the NPC for every school on our list. That quickly ruled out most places on our list! We identified MIT and Princeton as the most generous with financial aid (and, of course, the hardest to gain admission to). Public universities tended to be more financially viable than private ones, and D25 liked the idea of an honors college experience or living-learning community at a public university. We eliminated every school that the NPC indicated was unaffordable - unless D25 planned to pursue a special scholarship. For example, Northeastern and BU were immediately crossed off the list, along with all LACs that lacked an engineering option. (Most LACs in the northeast do not offer engineering and are completely out of reach for us financially.)
Altogether, D25 applied to 11 schools. She chose to apply EA to Yale, and after being admitted, she decided not to apply to Princeton, as she had already determined she would choose Yale over Princeton.
Final results:
Admitted:
Yale
MIT
Brown
Georgia Tech: invitation to honors; STAMPs semifinalist (did not pursue)
UNC Chapel Hill: accepted to Accelerated Research Program; Morehead-Cain semifinalist (did not progress to finalist)
NC State: Honors Program; Parks semifinalist (did not pursue)
UMass Amhurst: Commonwealth Honors College
URI: Honors Program
U Conn: invitation to Honors Program, STEM Scholar Community
WPI
RPI
Unfortunately, WPI, RPI and Brown all ended up costing more than we are willing (able) to spend. Georgia Tech would have been a financial stretch, as well, though a STAMPS scholarship might have changed that (she did not pursue this after being admitted to Yale). UNC, NC State and GT were ultimately ruled out due to distance, however, I think they would have been wonderful contenders if Ds options in the northeast were different.
Reflecting on the process, I think putting the time in curating a realistic college list that included a couple likely admits that were also financially viable was key. I often see this advice posted on cc (thank you!), but it took us a bit to get on board and really put the time and research into it.
Thanks again to everyone here who generously shares their time and knowledge to guide others through the process. Iāve learned so much from this community, and though Iām way too shy to post regularly, I appreciate the support and encouragement in this space.
I wish everyone starting this process, or finishing it, a positive experience. At the end of the day, this process is not just about college admissions - it is a time of self-discovery for our kids as they step into young adulthood. Itās been a privilege for me to be a small part of that journey.
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In the midst of the maelstrom of emotions that so many are feeling, this was so beautifully stated:
Thank you for sharing your perspective and for circling back with the final results. Wishing your D a wonderful time where she decides to enroll!
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Thank you for sharing!
Has she made a final decision yet?
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I hope youāll consider chiming in more often. Itās often the shy people who have the most thoughtful and insightful perspectives to contribute.
Huge congratulations to your daughter, and best of luck with the final decision!
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Hi @MMRose - No decision yet! She changes her mind almost every day, if not a couple times a dayā¦ I love the teenage mind! 
She will attend both admitted student days and then weāll see!
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Itās an exciting time!
(Your note upstream said that she was accepted to Brown but the finances didnāt work. Just an FYI that if you appeal, they are likely to meet Yaleās offer and possibly MITās. Only mentioning this because they have a very well-regarded applied math department, which you had said she was interested in. And if she is also interested in CS, they offer a BA in CS (as an alternative to a BS) which is only 9 courses so could be combined with a double-major and which apparently gets very good job offers. )
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I just came back to read this thread and wanted to congratulate your daughter! Hopefully, you might return to let everyone know her decision!
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Wow! Congratulations. Did you get more financial aid than the NPC? If you donāt mind, please share the Merit amounts received each school.
Thank you @MirandaKnight! And happy May 1 everyone!
It was a thoughtful decision for D25, who spent 5 nights sleeping on a wood dorm room floor between her final two choices. In the end, student culture, campus vibe, and the overall flavor of the undergraduate experience made her final decision feel right and clear.
Every college choice is personal, and D25 placed less emphasis on campus location, rankings, and future outcomes, and instead prioritized a traditional (liberal arts) undergraduate experience - one that she felt offers greater student diversity, an amazing and healthy work-fun balance, and the best chance of finding her people and forming lifelong (lifechanging) friendships.
D25 navigated a flood of opinions and advice, ultimately choosing a path that few around her recommended (especially bold for someone planning to study math).
Itās cheesy, but I recall the lines from Robert Frostās West-Running Brook:
āWhat does it think itās doing running west,
When all the other country brooks flow east
To reach the ocean? It must be the brook
Can trust itself to go by contrariesā¦ā
It has been a treasure to watch D25 not only choose her own path, but to trust in it fully. Although there might be bit of sorrow letting go of the others, D25 is all in and honored to be a bulldog. Yay Yale!
Good luck to all those making decisions right down to the wire todayā¦ And congratulations to all your high schoolers on this milestone!
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Hi @Butterfly2022,
Yes, in the end we received more financial aid than estimated in the NPC. MIT offered the most generous aid, and Yale agreed to match this number. As finances are a significant consideration for us, Yale matching MITs offer leveled the financial playing field. Both of her final choices were affordable.
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Congratulations! For all the reasons youāve stared and for the residential college system, I think this will be a great choice
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Congratulations to your daughter and your family! Hope she has an amazing 4 years as a bulldog!
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Thanks, we are in same situation thatās why I am bothering you again. Your initial budget was ~$35000, as a donut whole family does your financial aid package was close to that amount? I know it might be a too personal question. Also, please list any merit aid at any school you applied.
Just a note that the Ivies and MIT donāt offer merit aid. Just need-based financial aid.
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Hi @Butterfly2022, thanks for reaching out!
Iām not sure how helpful I can be hereā¦ When D25 was accepted early to Yale ā and the financial aid package was affordable ā we decided not to finalize or submit financial aid documents to the other schools on her list. It felt unnecessary to go through all that extra work when she had already been admitted to her top choice at a cost that worked for us (under 35k).
In the event it is helpful, this was our approach: We ran the NPC for dozens of schools when building her college list. Yale and MIT stood out as the most affordable, so they remained top contenders. Many others were eliminated right away because their estimated cost was out of reach. After extensive research, D25 added Georgia Tech, UNC Chapel Hill, and NC State to her list specifically to pursue their highly competitive scholarshipsāSTAMPS, Morehead-Cain, and Park, respectively. To clarify, these schools werenāt affordable based on NPC results alone, but the above scholarships could have made them viable options. (Note: the Morehead-Cain application is due before many Early Action deadlinesāUNC was actually the first application D submitted in early October.)
WPI, RPI, and Brown also came back as unaffordable via the NPC, but D25 kept them on her list due to their strong math/engineering programs and Northeast location. We hoped that being a female in engineering might yield a better-than-expected financial packageā¦
Ultimately, the only schools we know came in as affordable for us were Yale, MIT, and our state flagship (we did submit financial documents to those 3 colleges). As I mentioned, since D25 was accepted early to Yale, we didnāt complete the financial aid process for the others, so I canāt provide numbers for those schools. So sorry for the long boring answer that doesnāt give you a definitive comparison ā but I hope our process is at least somewhat helpful!
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Thanks, does make sense.
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Congratulations to your daughter! I wish her success at Yale.
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