Search for Affordable Schools

BuckeyeMWDSG
Wed, 08 Aug 2018 13:35:35 +0000

Apply to Ohio State EA, look at the automatic merit aid you qualify for at the regional campuses and pick your alternate campus carefully. Lima offers a degree in Biology or Zoology. Marion offers Biology. Or if you can commute to one and you can get housing from some one you know you might choose that. The regional campuses are roughly $7500/yr tuition and a person with your stats could get $3500/yr automatic merit aid at some of them (look at the specific scholarship pages of each campus before deciding). Your loan could cover the remaining tuition and books - so you’d have to work for room and board. Housing options are cheaper than in Columbus and doable on part time work schedule. If you don’t have a car Marion campus is in walking distance of private student housing, an urgent care center, restaurants/shopping centers (jobs) and grocery stores. http://undergrad.osu.edu/regional-campuses

Hiram College is very generous with aid and offers Environmental Studies. Run their NPC and see if it might work for you. https://www.hiram.edu/

You might consider Hocking College. It is a two-year college, but it does have on campus housing. Their Natural Resource degrees are very career focused. In state tuition and fees are about $5,000/yr but it seems like most students get that covered - the average aid award is around $4,200/yr. An award like that could free up your student loan to cover dorm ($4,000) and books ($1,500). Savings from a summer job could cover meals.
Graduates going into government jobs (natural resource/wildlife management), often get an education benefit, so you could earn an AA/AS from Hocking, but plan to finish your BS degree part-time as you advance your career. https://www.hocking.edu/majors#nr

With a lot of dual credit courses completed you should pay special attention to each programs requirements and plan out the coursework. We found that the semesters required varied from 4-6 depending on the school and especially the way prerequisites lined up and whether or not they were offered every semester or just Fall or Spring. We looked at over all cost to a degree, not just per year cost when deciding. You can get help figuring out a course plan. Just ask. Our impression of the schools was very dependent on the responsiveness of the admissions/advising staff’s ability to help us figure out exactly what classes were needed to obtain a degree. Often our inquiry led to follow up from professors and chairs interested in learning more about the applicant and specific areas of interest. It is a good way to build your network.

With 14 state universities, many with regional campuses you should be able to find an affordable option. I like using the wiki page for the Ohio University System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_System_of_Ohio because it lists them all, along with links and lists their regional campuses.