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What is your son considering, school-wise? Is he exclusively shooting for Ivies, or is he considering other schools with rigorous academic programming as well?
We are just working through the process now so it's up in the air. He will not be going anywhere mediocre and there are a number of very good public universities with top notch individual programs in the area where he'd pretty much get a full-ride.
If the program is solid, I would have a hard time turning down a full ride at a public university, unless there was something about the school or program that was so antithetical to who I am that I felt I absolutely could not succeed there.
While, personally, I'm a huge fan of small private schools, atmosphere-wise, assuming that quality of programming was equal, turning down a free education would probably not happen.
None. Your income is too high, his test scores are too low, nothing interesting as a candidate (that you have mentioned). The top private schools (Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford etc) do not offer undergrad business or finance majors.
I'm not sure I would concur with this. First, the income is not too high for elite colleges, many of which will offer substantial need-based aid to households with income under $200k.
It's a little unfair to declare any student "nothing special" based on a two-line recitation of their background. The admissions process is a crapshoot, and while I don't see anything "stellar" from the description, I also see no reason such a student shouldn't be considering a range of elite and top-tier colleges.
He will have many choices, but nice to have a full tuition paid guarantee as a backup. He qualifies for the University of Alabama Presidential Scholarship. If he has a 32-36 ACT or 1400-1600 GPA and at least a 3.5 cumulative GPA required – he would be automatically selected as a Presidential Scholar and will receive the value of tuition or $99,800 over 4 years.
Just to echo what others have said, your income is too high and his stats not impressive enough for elite schools (which I count as top 20). While that income might be average for a middle class dual family in New England, as you alluded to, that actually works against you as a single parent making that much in a low cost of living area. Your income, for instance, is about the equivalent of 200K here in Boston.
Your sweet spot for colleges ranked between 30 - 70 (which includes schools like NYU, Carnegie Mellon, Brandeis, Oberlin, etc) - any school that someone applying to the Ivies might consider a prestigious backup. For instance, I got a full tuition merit scholarship to a top 40 university with similar stats. My family's income was much less, but this scholarship was not determined by financial need. It has been close to a decade since I first applied to schools and obviously the financial health of many of these schools is in a different place. At the time, Tulane and Brandeis were the standouts for financial aid. NYU was particularly pathetic in what they offered.
I figured I would have to get down to the nitty gritty and talk to schools specifically but wanted to just get a general feasibility.
The Ivys (I believe) don't give merit scholarships, but only need based. I don't know about your college savings, but $125K/ year isn't exactly low income, so you may get less based on need than you think.
However, other very good private (and public) universities will give merit based scholarships, which it sounds like your son should qualify for. At the end of the day, it's on a case by case basis.
Not that it matters much as I'm mainly asking generalities around cost.
I meant 1530 out of 1600, not out of 2400.
The PSAT pro-ration to an SAT of 2270 is around average at Harvard and Yale in recent years so I think we are just miscommunicating.
They have other *hooks* besides the state angle that goes beyond your normal band, chorus, abc club but again it's moot.
Wow. I just saw that Harvard's students.....14% have household income >500k. That's interesting.
I knew what you meant.
I got 1570 on my SAT, 34 on ACT and was not Harvard material 20 years ago. I did not have any AP classes in my school nor did I do anything particularly impressive in regards to extracurriculars. The best school I got into was Chicago, and I think they just liked me because I lead my high school to quiz bowl championship and they were (are?) obsessed with quiz bowl there. I did end up getting a full ride with room and board to a decent small private school and went to MIT for graduate school.
The Ivies, Stanford and the top engineering schools have gotten even more competitive since then. They are turning down kids with perfect scores. Your kid is competing with the top academic 1% of college bound kids globally and legacy kids of the 1% financially who can donate millions of dollars. My asian-american friends who went to Stanford and MIT as undergrad started prepping for the SAT when they were 12 and went to elite private high schools. (Poly in Pasadena, Philips Andover and Stuy) They also did a lot of other stuff to work the pre-ivy system, like meeting with alumni, joining the proper clubs, going to various feeder summer camps, etc. I don't know what it's like where you're at in Kansas but in NYC, Boston, LA and other areas there are all these activities that all the pre-elite college people know about and participate in. Where I grew up nobody knew about anything like that.
I didn't mean to be insulting just realistic. The bar is extremely high these days. It's one of those situations where if the kid is already a junior and you're just now asking if they are competitive the answer is no. However, there are plenty of other colleges and universities which will likely offer great packages.
Many of these schools have a net price calculator where you can plug in your income, assets, number of kids in school, etc to get a rough estimate of what kind of financial aid you would receive:
Ok, my oldest is a junior...tons of extra curriculars...top 3 class rank (Good school 450ish in class), will be natl. merit finalist, taking SAT soon but PSAT equates to 1530ish. Solid extra curriculars etc. Caucasian from the state of KS, single parent family, family income 125k.
He's considering a couple of majors, one of which a public university in the area is as good as anybody in and that would likely be a full-ride (or close enough). It's also in a field where you don't go to gradschool so no concerns about that aspect.
I'm naive to what (if any financial help) you can get at some of the top private schools (very rough idea, ball-park) if he were to look at them for something like a business or finance major.
Normally I would think "not much" but the income level is pretty modest if not chump change by many dual-income standards in the higher cost northeast so I didn't know if that impacted anything.
I know there are many other variables but in a general case I looking for something rough like if Harvard is 65k a year would them maybe let him in for 1/2 price? 75%? Etc.
Sorry if this seems like a dumb question for you and yes I will be filling out the FAFSA and so forth but I just doing a quick "smell test" if anyone happens to be able to ballpark.
Does your oldest have another living parent? In order to complete the FAFSA you will have to include the financial information from the other parent if that parent is alive.
$125K per year is not chump change. Median household income in the US is around $54K per year.
There are many private universities in the top 50, but not the top 10 that give merit based awards. My oldest is currently enrolled at a school that gave him a scholarship that covers roughly half of his expenses. You will do better if you target schools that give merit based scholarships.
My son and his wife both graduated from UPenn. UPenn's financial aid was very generous at the time. In calculating their cost of attendance, they included miscellaneous expenses such as travel between home and campus and school supplies.
Sometime around the time my son was graduating, UPenn improved their financial aid to cover 100% of the financial need as determined by the FAFSA and their own financial aid form. I understand that Harvard also covers 100%, but I don't know if it is calculated in a similar method.
OTOH, at the time my son was applying to schools, Carnegie Mellon offered very little in financial aid. My son said their was a direct correlation between the financial aid that a school offered and the size of the school's endowment.
Ruth,
UPenn is not a state university and I've never heard they make any distinction between in-state and out-state students in calculating financial aid.
They have a relatively new commitment to paying all of students' tuition (for those demonstrating financial need) from non-loan sources. Scholarships, grants, work-study. At some point, I read that they make a special commitment to in-state students in that regard, but I can't find that at the moment.
From their website:
Penn Meets Full Need Like other Ivy League universities, Penn does not offer aid based on academic or athletic merit. Aid is based solely on financial need, and Penn is committed to meeting 100% of a student’s determined need.
All-Grant, No-Loan Penn is the nation’s largest university with a program that enables all dependent undergraduates eligible for aid to receive all-grants, loan-free aid packages, regardless of family income. Penn makes it possible to graduate debt-free.
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