<p>Mini, do you happen to have any info on which colleges (public or private) within a 5-6 hour drive of western WA are most generous with aid? I’m trying to help my friend’s daughter work out where she can afford to go–<em>low</em> family income.</p>
<p>Not enough info to tell. Generally speaking, Reed is in the top 10 nationally among “prestige” institutions in institutional aid per student (slightly higher than Princeton). But this assumes the student qualifies, of course. Albertson in Idaho is also said to dole out a lot of aid, but I don’t know much about it.</p>
<p>I think her best bet might be someplace with need and merit based aid.
I have heard people say that Mills offers very good aid ( but whats with the requirement of 5- 6 hours?- that is going to limit schools)
The cheapest would be the instate publics- I have also heard good things about Albertson & Walla Walla College was stalking my daughter- even though she had never requested info.
I have also heard good things about PLU and UPS, but I think it really depends on the student. My daughter had decent aid from Reed but other familes on these boards haven’t been so lucky- D also tells me that Reed isn’t so generous with some of her friends that seem to have as much need.
Oh I have heard Lewis and Clark has good aid too.</p>
<p>from the other mini, I have heard good reports about aid from PLU, less good from UPS. I would suggest that she start with figuring out what kind of school interests her.</p>
<p>Mini–do you know anything about Whitworth college? A friend says her D got good merit aid there (don’t know the actual amount).</p>
<p>Willamette has very good merit aid for students with high GPAs and SATs. If you go to their financial aid website, it basically says what the minimum required for each scholarship level is.</p>
<p>One of D’s best friends is a first-year at PLU, enjoying it and being challenged. I’d categorize DF as something of a fairly bright underachiever in hs, underachieving not in terms of grades–she was co-valedictorian with a 4.0–but ducking AP classes in math and history in favor of regular.
By all accounts, she’s finding PLU rewarding.</p>
<p>Mills definitely offers great aid. My friend, who pretty well off, still got quite a lot of money. I’d look into that. Oakland isn’t as scary as you’d think, either.</p>
<p>What synchronicity in the universe: we had dinner with friends last night whose daughter is transferring from Mills. She’s majoring in Creative Writing and will spend a year at SMC picking up some heretofore un-needed GE requirements before transferring to UC/Riverside.</p>
<p>Her complaints about Mills:</p>
<p>Too small. By the time you subtracted 25 percent of the population as non-traditional (older) students (called “Resumers”) and various militant students of one demographic or another, there weren’t a lot of “None of the Above” kids like herself left. In the CW major, a disproportionate number were Resumers who commuted and were hard to bond with. Of her peers, many were interested in talking about only anime or sex. No one ever wanted to go to a movie, go out to dinner, etc. </p>
<p>But the biggest thing is that for her the classes just weren’t challenging. And I’d say this was for a B+/A- kid as far as academics go. She watched hours and hours of TV a week and was able to do just fine.</p>
<p>I couldn’t help but interject here: (sorry, no offense to anyone)
The worst thing one can do to a college-going kid (or any kid for that matter) is have him/her watch hours of TV and get by just fine! Wow!! I read posts here asking for ‘slacker prestigious ivies’ and I wince! But I suppose everyone is entitled to their opinion without some self-righteous person interjecting like I just did.</p>
<p>Best bets for merit and or financial aid in that geographic circle would be Willamette, University of Puget Sound, Linfield, Albertson College (Idaho), Whitworth and Seattle U. Gonzaga is also decent.</p>
<p>Whitman is a great school but sometimes capricious with their financial aid decisions. Ditto for Lewis & Clark, although I have heard of folks getting nice packages from both schools. The University of Oregon seems to be fairly generous with merit awards for a public school but not sure how their need based aid is. </p>
<p>In California, I would second Mills but also add the University of Redlands to the list of schools that seem to give outstanding financial aid. Dominican University of California, just outside of SF, also seems to give great financial aid and merit money. </p>
<p>Steer clear of Pepperdine if you need aid, however, as their packages tend to rely heavily on loans. </p>
<p>I like Humboldt State in far northern California for folks that want a less expensive school - although it’s a cal state, it has far smaller classes than the typical cal state (and is small for a cal state to begin with), a beautiful campus, and is very, very reasonable for out of staters. Kind of has a hippie vibe that may not be for everyone however.</p>
<p>Achat, I may have been unclear: this girl was able to watch hours and hours of TV <em>at college</em>. Ye flippin’ gods.</p>
<p>My D has not yet pulled an all-nighter. Technically. She was up until 5:30am one night last week and thus got two hours of sleep.</p>
<p>Student will be doing well if she can break 1200 (old SATs). Family income is such (around 15K) that there is no way they can afford air fare beyond maybe SF, even if the rest of aid is great. She’s interested in business or maybe Spanish or maybe “I don’t know.”</p>
<p>Oh, and thank you SO MUCH to all of you for your thoughts on this. I’ve been at a bit of a loss, since neither the transportation or the fin aid was an issue when my kids went through this–and even my kids’ friends weren’t quite so needy.</p>