<p>I am the OP and the bottom line is that I don’t even know if this is the top choice for my daughter. She doesn’t know either - she has never seen the campus and only knows what can be found on the website/brochures. I think that it would be a stretch financially. My feeling at the time I started this thread was what if I just told my daughter that she shouldn’t go on this trip? So that she didn’t fall in love with a school that would be difficult to afford. However, I think that it is worth it to have her go and check it out - I don’t want her to think later “what if”. (By the way, I never mentioned to her that she shouldn’t go on the trip, I was just using CC to think about the options).</p>
<p>I am not ready to negotiate with the financial aid office because at this time the college is like #3 or #4 on my daughters list - she may not even like the school once she gets onto the campus (which happened a few times when we went on college visits). Once she picks a school (or at least narrows it down to a few colleges), then I will look at the financial aid offers and see if we need to start negotiating. </p>
<p>By the way, my daughter is fully aware of the financial aid side of the college selection process. She originally had planned to pick her school by accepting the best financial aid offer. I am trying to get her to look at these schools and base her choice on more than $$…if I told her that she needed to choose school A due to finances she would be in complete agreement.</p>