What kind of colleges can an ~80th percentile kid get merit aid at versus where she'd get in but get none?

[Anonymous]

Wait. PP here. Not Northwestern! I meant Northeastern!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Honest question, with all due respect:

Why should a student with those credentials deserve "merit" aid? Where's the "merit?"

My understanding is that many schools give merit aid to try to draw in kids who would be above-average level for their particular school, right? Trying to figure out how low down you need to go for schools to be interested in doing that for a kid like this.

A kid who is basically a 3.5 student with a 1200-1300 is not going to be above-average at any college anywhere. Do you qualify for financial aid? If not, I think you should expect to pay full pay and not chase merit at all.

You are not only incorrect you have shown yourself to be an absolute idiot....actually stupid. Just shut up and observe because you aren't ready for adult conversations.

[Anonymous]

Lots of the smaller LACs that are not in the Swarthmore/Williams orbit. Places like Wooster and Dayton and Coe (in Iowa) and Gettysburg and York and maybe Elon? and Beloit (in Wisconsin). If your child is interested in smaller schools they will have LOTS of options and merit aid offers from the not tippy top small liberal arts colleges.

To the PP who is like- 80% is not worthy of merit, please go away. This student would bring a lot to the table and at many schools would be and should be! offered merit aid.

Good question, OP. Don’t let the mean people scare you off.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Lots of the smaller LACs that are not in the Swarthmore/Williams orbit. Places like Wooster and Dayton and Coe (in Iowa) and Gettysburg and York and maybe Elon? and Beloit (in Wisconsin). If your child is interested in smaller schools they will have LOTS of options and merit aid offers from the not tippy top small liberal arts colleges.

To the PP who is like- 80% is not worthy of merit, please go away. This student would bring a lot to the table and at many schools would be and should be! offered merit aid.

Good question, OP. Don’t let the mean people scare you off.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do a google search of colleges that give merit aid to nearly all accepted students, and you will get a list of like 100 colleges.

It's all bullshit and these schools should just cut their tuition by 50%...but they think keeping a high rack rate has some value.

Some colleges have experimented with resetting their tution/not playing the merit-aid game and it didn't work out favorably. Like it or not, college pricing is emotional. You just have to understand the game.

OP - read "The Price You Pay for College" by Ron Lieber and Jeff Selingo's "buyers and sellers" list. https://jeffselingo.com/which-colleges-are-really-buyers-and-which-are-sellers

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do a google search of colleges that give merit aid to nearly all accepted students, and you will get a list of like 100 colleges.

It's all bullshit and these schools should just cut their tuition by 50%...but they think keeping a high rack rate has some value.

Some colleges have experimented with resetting their tution/not playing the merit-aid game and it didn't work out favorably. Like it or not, college pricing is emotional. You just have to understand the game.

OP - read "The Price You Pay for College" by Ron Lieber and Jeff Selingo's "buyers and sellers" list. https://jeffselingo.com/which-colleges-are-really-buyers-and-which-are-sellers

Bridgewater College reduced tuition by 62% and it seems to be working for them. They had their largest class since 2012 in the year after cutting tuition and it looks like overall enrollment is now increasing to 2,000 students up from like 1400.

https://rocktownnow.com/news/218812-bridgewater-colleges-tuition-transparency-effort-brings-in-nearly-500-new-students/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Honest question, with all due respect:

Why should a student with those credentials deserve "merit" aid? Where's the "merit?"

Not only is this a rude and asinine comment, it reflects complete ignorance as to what merit aid actually is at most schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

2). What kinds of colleges would she likely be able to get into without any merit aid?

If you're talking about LACs (which is my area of knowledge) the interesting thing is that the answer to your question No. 2 is "very few." The LACs beyond the top 30 or so offer merit aid to essentially everyone, and most of the LACs in the top 30 offer merit aid to no one. And a kid like you're describing is unlikely to be able to get into those LACs that don't offer merit aid, because they're very selective. Essentially, everyone is trying to get into the same 20 or so LACs, and those LACs can afford not to offer merit aid, and every other LAC is fighting for people and handing out substantial merit aid to kids like yours.

We found this with my kid, who sounds similar to your 80th percentile kid (though his SAT score was 1460.). He wound up EDing to Conn College, which gave him a substantial merit scholarship. But I'm not sure he could have "done better" if we'd been willing to do full-pay. Maybe he could have gotten into, say, Bates, ED. But WASP, Bowdoin, Wesleyan, Vassar, Hamilton, Carleton? I don't think he would have.

Also, I would add that in terms of getting the COA down to $40,000 with merit aid, that would be very hard at any top 50-60 LAC for a kid with those stats. The schools in the 40-60 range will liberally hand out aid that gets the cost down to $50,000 or $55,000, but they know what their break-even line is. It is maybe possible at schools in very low cost of living areas.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Midwest flagships

But not Michigan or Wisconsin.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Honest question, with all due respect:

Why should a student with those credentials deserve "merit" aid? Where's the "merit?"

Obnoxious question.

Schools award merit aid for different reasons. Usually/often when a student's credentials are above their average and they're eager to recruit that applicant to choose their school.

There are many schools for which the credentials OP shared are above average.

OP - You'll want to double check this, of course, but the first two schools that jumped to mind for me were Loyola MD and Marist. We know kids at both schools with similar stats that were offered good merit aid.

[Anonymous]

Thread from 2024-25 with a lot of helpful information and examples:

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/25/1181115.page

You could always bump it to see if people have more recent updates to share.

[Anonymous]

Midwest privates give a lot of aid.

[Anonymous]

If you are looking at bottom line cost the best deal even with merit at other schools will be in state non-flagships so Towson, Umbc, Salisbury. No way any merit at others with touch the affordability of those.

[Anonymous]

Case Western. I believe they give almost all accepted students some merit. Could be 30K or 50K, depending on your stats.

[Anonymous]

https://admissions.mvsu.edu/presidential-academic-scholarship