Suggest some International Universities

International Students
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So I’m a student from rural America, but I’m an Indian citizen and don’t hold a green card. I also need financial aid. I didn’t realize how hard it would be to get accepted to top universities. Come march, I found myself waitlisted at 6 top 20 universities( I wanted to get off the waitlist at princeton so bad, but that sadly didn’t happen) and accepted to 4 colelges. I failed to apply for a scholarship at my safety school and I was staring at a tution of $25,000 there and tuition upwards of 50,000 the other 3. I couldn’t convince myself to go attend my safety, knowing that I could have got much more scholarships there. Also I never took the entrance exams required for indian colleges, so I was left with few options. So, I chose to take a gap year and work on publishing my research paper and some other stuff… Feel free to suggest universities in canada, europe, india, and southeast asia.

1550 SAT: 800 Math, 750 English, 18 for essay.760 Phsyics, 800 Biology, 790 World History, 800 Math II
1/300 rank

AP Macro (5) , AP Lang (5), AP US (4), AP Bio (5), AP Chem (4) , AP Micro(5) , AP Stats (4), AP Calc BC( 5), AP Physics 1 (4), AP Government (5), AP Physics C: Mechanics(5), AP Psychology (5), APES 5
)Last Year’s Course Work: AP Psychology, AP Comp Sci A, AP Comp Sci. A, AP Environmental, AP Physics C both electricity and mechanics, Multivariable Calculus, French 4, AP US Gov, Engineering Internship

Extracurricular:Varsity Tennis & Baseball, started my own tutoring program for students in the community, independent research in high schools under stem mentor, President of Interact Club, SGA Treasurer, NHS, Mathematics Club President, Know to play piano,

State Math Competition, Economics Bowl state second, some minor essay competitions, National Merit Semifinalist, AP National Scholar, and a few local awards, Bio Olympiad State level.

Probable Major: Materials Science, BME, Biophysics, also econ& math at LACs would be interesting to study.

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Any Universities in Europe?

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If you weren’t so picky about attending only a “top” institution, you could be starting this fall at one of the places in the US that did offer significant merit aid for international students with your stats last year. Some of them probably will again this year. Start with this thread. Check out each of the scholarships listed. Yes, they aren’t outside the US, but some of the places might turn out to be affordable for you. http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/2006094-2017-automatic-full-tuition-full-ride-scholarships-p1.html Also, consider re-applying to that safety from last year but filing the scholarship application on time.

Why aren’t you admissible anywhere in India? What would you need to do to take the appropriate exams? Don’t forget to work on that as well.

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@happymomof1

I wished I wasn’t obsessed with rankings last year and to be honest I really didn’t know how difficult it was for international students to get fin aid at a lot of those universities. I just looked at students in nearby towns with lower stats and mediocre essays getting into some “top” institutions, so I thought I would get into at least one. I’m definitely going to apply to schools with automatic scholarships and make I’m not too obsessed with rankings and such.

I’m not admissible in India, because I didn’t do any of my secondary schooling in India and I didn’t take the exam required to apply for some of them. I’ll try to take these exams this year. Thanks for the advice.

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If you didn’t attend school in India don’t waste time trying to get into a college there. Most students prepare entrance exams for years.

Look at British universities - but they’ll be 20-25k a year (aim for universities outside of London - lots of them are highly ranked).
Look into the Polytechnique Bachelor’s program; tuition is 12k I think.
Trinity Dublin may be a possibility too.

Apply to many in-state universities since you attended school there and graduated from high school : the in-state discount is available to help graduates in many states and equivalent to a huge scholarship.

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@MYOS1634 20-25K isn’t too bad I guess for studying in the UK. Hmm, I’ll look at some of them. Yeah, I’m planning to apply to a lot more state schools and less competitive schools with automatic and not-so-competitive scholarships.

Studying in India would be a last resort option, as the exams are extremely competitive like you said

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The UK schools would be $20K-$25K pa for tuition. Add another $10K-$15K pa for living expenses. But many courses in England are 3 years so you might end up with a total bill of $100K-$120K if you pick carefully.

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@twoin18 Will I be able to work in the UK?

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The UK student visa details are here: https://www.gov.uk/tier-4-general-visa
You can work during your course, but staying afterwards would be more difficult.

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In the past, Canada and Australia had good work permission for international students, and relatively flexible work permission for after graduation. I haven’t taken a look at either of those countries recently, so things may have changed.

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@Twoin18 I see

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I personally think as International Student, living in the US and with need of merit based financial aid, you might want to consider applying to private US colleges where you will be Top 5-10% of accepted students, in terms of GPA, Test Scores, EC’s etc. As you learned the hard way, you are unlikely to find this scenario at the schools you primarily applied to last time around, as they predominantly are focused on need based aid for eligible students, excluding Internationals. You will find that there are many excellent schools in this category, where you will be glad to attend. Given your status as International Student with need for merit aid, I would not call them safety schools, as competition for admission with merit aid will be high in almost all cases. The exception to this rule would be those universities/colleges which clearly state that International Students are eligible for institutional need based aid, of which there are very few.

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I don’t see your GPA listed anywhere. What is your unweighted GPA?

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For most unis outside North America, you apply in to a specific major/program, however. Though some like Natural Science at Durham or Art&Science at UCL are flexible.

Canadian unis tend to be more flexible than European ones, however, and the Arts&Science degree at McGill, the Harvard of Canada (OK, it’s more like the UMich of Quebec), isn’t terribly expensive even for internationals.

Roughly what goals do you have after college/uni?

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@HPSCA what are some specific schools that you suggest that I apply to? I’ve already begun my application for the University of Alabama.

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@DadTwoGirls My UW GPA is around 3.98 or 3.99, I had one B in an AP Class.

@PurpleTitan Maybe go to grad school or get a job.

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McGill, UBC, UToronto, Dalhousie, Concordia. Check out costs - the first three are considered the top in canzdand are unlikely to yield emerit aid.

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@mellowfellow67
Check out http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/2006094-2017-automatic-full-tuition-full-ride-scholarships.html for some public universities. Please note that many of them won’t be applicable for International Students.
You will have to do research for private universities/colleges - specific rules will differ, as indicated below, for International Students, i.e. see University of Notre Dame, Northwestern University etc.

Do you hold immigrant or non-immigrant status or are you DACA? Answer to this question will impact on your financial aid and will differ by state for public universities and by institutional finaid rules for private universities/colleges. I am quite sure the US will be your best bet, if you play it right, as you are not eligible to attend university in your home country India, due to the reasons you stated. Best of luck!

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With only one B and 1500+ on the SAT, and assuming that your references are decent, then any university in Canada would be pretty much a safety (not counting the French ones, assuming you don’t speak French). For many majors a slightly lower GPA would be fine. Admissions in Canada is relatively predictable and largely based on grades.

There is however a very large difference in the total price of attendance for international students. The best known ones (McGill, Toronto, UBC) and on the most part the ones in Ontario tend to be a bit more expensive. The others tend to be less expensive. Financial aid would be rare at the top schools and would not cover the full price of attendance. There are quite a few very good universities in Canada, and many that would cost less than US$30k per year for the total price of attendance (note that prices will be listed in Canadian dollars, and that the Canadian dollar has been weak for a while).

You might want to look at the Maclean’s magazine listings to get some ideas.
https://www.macleans.ca/education/university-rankings/university-rankings-2018/

@MYOS1634 suggested Dalhousie and Concordia, which are good universities. The U. of Victoria and Simon Fraser University are also quite good and reasonable priced, and there are quite a few other good schools (Calgary, Alberta, Queens, Ottawa, …).

Most of the universities in Canada are relatively large. There are a few good small ones which are not well known in the US. They are listed in the Maclean’s rankings under “primarily undergraduate”. The “comprehensive” list also contains some very good schools, which tend to be mid-sized to large but without a medical school.

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@DadTwoGirls, note that some degrees at McGill will have an overall cost of around $30K. Also, the MacDonald campus of McGill tends to have small classes. Limited number of majors, though.

@hpcsa, India isn’t the only international option. There are some programs taught in English in Europe that are tuition-free.

There are also American colleges that are fairly cheap even for OOS, granted (total costs below $30K/year). Some are even pretty good like NM Tech, Truman State, and SD Mines.

In general, the Dakota publics tend to have low OOS costs.