<p>Female engineering students are in demand. If she has the academic qualifications for admission to the most selective of the schools you’ve mentioned, I think it could be good for her to focus on well-endowed schools with generous FA. Such schools (private, not public) can be responsive to compelling personal situations and are not bound by formulas because it is their own money. For instance, the FA at Bowdoin College, in Maine, is all grants, and although the school is a small LAC, there is a 3-2 Engineering program invoving additional study at either Columbia, Caltech, UMaine or Dartmouth. [Engineering</a> Programs (Bowdoin, Physics and Astronomy)](<a href=“http://www.bowdoin.edu/physics/engineering/index.shtml]Engineering”>http://www.bowdoin.edu/physics/engineering/index.shtml). Whatever she does, I recommend writing to point out the family situation so it is not just the PROFILE and FAFSA that are submitted. I wish her the best.</p>