There is no school like Tulane! That said, when DS applied, he also applied to Emory, Vandy and Ch Hill. He chose Tulane.
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These are some private schools in warmer climates where their net prices seemed to be pretty similar to Tulaneās, at least for the lower income levels, which means they may have a shot at providing an affordable NPC. They all have film programs that seem to have a decently-sized cohort as well as the other areas of interst.
- Belmont (TN): About 7400 undergrads with a pretty big film program
- Californai Lutheran: About 2500 undergrads
- Lipscomb (TN): About 3k undergrads in Nashville
- Loyola New Orleans: About 3300 undergrads and adjacent to Tulaneās campus and can cross-register for classes there
- Southern Methodist (TX): About 7100 undergrads
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Just curious- if your friend needs generous need based aid, is it safe for them to apply to Tulane ED? Do they qualify for the NOLA scholarship? That would require an AGI below $75K
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Need-based aid isnāt affected by ED/EA/RD, so yes itās safe to apply ED. Tulane TikTok just mentioned this today in fact! I donāt know about the NOLA scholarship though 
Unless they cannot afford the school (with whatever FA is offered), they are signing a binding contract to accept an ED acceptance. And hopefully this year the FAFSA mess will be straightened out so they will be able to get correct information about FA in a timely fashion. And Tulane is a profile school so they may calculate ādemonstrated needā with their criteria. So must respectfully disagree with the above post. ED is unwise if they need significant aid, unless they will qualify for the no loan assistance.
** eta I just listened to the tik tok mentioned above. They make it very clear that merit aid is lower for ED students. Need based aid is of course consistent across all application types, but a student should run the NPC to see if they can afford the school (they cannot bank on merit $). This is VERY important to see if itās unwise to apply ED. They recommend EA for students who cannot be sure.
To add that - though not universal (Tulane or otherwise) - unless there are select merit scholarships that explicitly state that they will stack with need aid, expect any merit award to be considered as part of the aid package to get the student to the EFC.
I believe it was mentioned and validated above that the student did run the NPC and it gave a number that was within budget. I personally would take screen shots of all the data and output from the NPC so in case it came time for award and there was a dramatically different number it would give a foundation to contest the award but thatās just me.
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OP said Tulaneās NPC result was $9K, in post #8 above.
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Tulane is a CSS profile school. Sometimes the estimated COA can vary based on the full FA information.
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This
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What do they like about Tulane? I thought this would be about finding a fun party school but you didnāt mention that. āNot super selectiveā and āgenerous need-based aid to out of state studentsā is super broad. You will also need to define āaverage studentā and āgreat test scores.ā Sorry.
Can you point to a specific texas or texas college website where it says this? I heard this in a forum once but this is only the second time Iām reading this and Iām very active on several college group forums. Thanks
Hereās the page for the program at UT-Dallas:
Note that A&M has this also, but the minimum scholarship to qualify there is $4,000, not $1,000.
Thank you, and wow, Iām blown away that nobody really talks about this. I researched merit aid heavily for my older DD, who ended up with a full ride (not in TX). For OOS students, what is the best state school after UT Austin which is not a commuter campus?
This is a little off-topic here, as none of these schools are much like Tulane, so mods may want to move this.
It depends on what you mean by ābest,ā as I think that could be different for different students. The most highly regarded academically, particularly for STEM and business, would generally be Texas A&M, but A&M is enormous and has a very particular vibe that isnāt everyoneās cup of tea. Texas Tech offers the big-school, Greek-and-football type of experience along with very solid programs in many areas - the location in Lubbock (5+hr. drive from any major city) can be a little too remote for some. U of Houston has a strong honors program and also offers Big 12 sports right in the middle of a giant city. UT-Dallas was once a commuter school but is trying to build a more residential campus, and they now have a significant number of Natl Merit Scholars on campus due to generous scholarships. U of North Texas is nationally recognized in library sciences and music, particularly jazz music, though itās still kind of a commuter school in some respects.
Beyond that, itās mostly regional public schools in both the UT and A&M systems that draw students from nearby areas and focus on marketable degree programs in nursing, K-12 education, accounting, etc. - few out-of-staters except for schools in border areas like UT-El Paso (NM students) and Texas A&M-Texarkana (30% of students from AR).
We are WAY off topic here. Please get back to the original question or start a new thread. Thank you.
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