Underrated tactic – apply to lots of schools

College Search & Lists
1

<p>There seems to be a huge backlash against this – but I think it is extremely beneficial to apply to lots of schools. Most low-income students are reluctant to do this because of application fees but its money well spent. The low income students I know that applied to lots of schools were basically able to compare essential free rides (due to financial aid). </p>

<p>I applied to around 20 schools and I would definitely recommend it – most of these schools are on the common application, it gives you more options to choose from, and gives you the opportunity to compare massive financial aid packages. If a top four year private schools pays for you – this is worth around $200k, this makes the $1k in app fees money well spent.</p>

2

<p>A better tactic would be carefully build the application list to maximize the chances of good need-based aid and/or good merit scholarships, depending on the student’s family financial situation, while not bothering to apply to schools which have no chance of being affordable.</p>

3

<p>Yeah, obviously its important to research and avoid schools that give out bad financial aid (NYU, etc.)</p>

4

<p>Probably the more common mistakes in building application lists (from an affordability standpoint) involve applying to out-of-state public schools which do not satisfy at least one of the following conditions:</p>

<ul>
<li>Out-of-state list price (including regional discounts, if applicable) is affordable.</li>
<li>Large enough merit scholarship is in-reach.</li>
<li>Good need-based financial aid is available to out-of-state students (very rare, probably only UNC-CH and UVA).</li>
</ul>

<p>Consider [this</a> thread](<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/1482652-having-trouble-balancing-finances-caliber-acaemics.html]this”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/1482652-having-trouble-balancing-finances-caliber-acaemics.html) where the student’s application list yielded six admissions but only one (maybe two) of which were affordable without unreasonable debt (fortunately, that one school is a good choice for the student). It is not hard to see that the application list could have been structured better.</p>