Any elite school grads/parents care to chime in?
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Anonymous
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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 (moved two years ago from DC area) single parent family, family income 125k.
He's considering a couple of majors. 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 DC area 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. |
Anonymous
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Each school is required to have a Net Price Calculator on their website. We played around with the them at the schools where DC was applying. It is supposed to give ball park figures.
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Anonymous
| Just know that Ivies don't provide merit aid, only financial aid. Where FA is concerned, the tops schools with the biggest endowments can afford to be the most generous. Harvard has the best FA. As PP said, check the net price calculators. |
Anonymous
| Also, if you look outside the top 10 schools (but top 50 in the USNews rankings) there will be a higher chance of merit aid. |
Anonymous
Not worth it. The good faculty flock to the top schools. It will be unusual to find good faculty in a program that is not top 10. |
Anonymous
There are many "good faculty" outside the top 10 schools. There are more "good faculty" than there are spots for them to work. The positions with the most prestige are in the top 10, but there are good faculty and many, many schools. And for undergraduates, good teachers are more important than good researchers. |
Anonymous
Agree. " It will be unusual to find good faculty in a program that is not top 10" is a completely absurd remark. |
Anonymous
Okay, so is it just "not worth it" to go to college if you're not in a top ten program? |
Anonymous
I don't know what planet you are living on, but it's not Planet Earth. Every small private school, even the no-name ones, way down on the list, has great faculty. The top 50 schools have faculty with PhDs from all the Ivies, top public universities, top everything. It's almost impossible to get a job in higher education, so you will find the very best educated faculty all over the US in schools that are not selective. This PP is completely ignorant. The "top" schools are the most selective schools in terms of students, not faculty. Competition for jobs at HYP versus competition for jobs at Grinnel or Babson is nearly as fierce. You will find fantastic faculty at nearly every college or university in the US, including community colleges. |
Anonymous
Ignore the idiot poster. It's "not worth it" to read such stupidity. |
Anonymous
There's plenty of options in that case. A common option is to re-assess credentials and re-apply. Another option is to apply to other schools. There is a gentleman across the street from me who did not get into the undergrad bio program at JHU. He decided to intern at Cleveland Clinic for a year and re-applied. He got in the second time around. He could have easily just applied to Stanford or another school. But he was determined to get into a particular program and he didn't give up. Should student's who don't go to a top 10 program just not go? It depends on what they are looking for out of a college. If the student wants to go to an "elite school", then he/she should exhaust their options for that before settling for something else. |
Anonymous
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OP, fill out the Net Price Calculator at Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Williams, Amherst, Wesleyan, Haverford, Hamilton, Bowdoin, Middlebury. It takes about 10 minutes, so it will be well worth a couple hours of your time to get numbers from each of these schools. Just google Net Price Calculator and the name of the school. Each school is required to have a Net Price Calculator on its website.
You ought to be eligible for FA at most of the top private schools, especially the "need blind" schools. But they will look at other factors besides income, including equity in your home, savings, investments, even the value of your cars. Some of the schools that are lower on the USNews list will offer merit aid, so it's worth looking at those too. Google merit aid, and you'll find a number of lists. USNews had one recently, and the NYT had one also. They aren't absolutely up to date, and "merit aid" can mean a school that costs $62K gives $1K merit aid to National Merit Finalists, but it's worth checking. Also look on College Confidential, where there are a lot of threads about schools that offer merit aid. Generally, the better the student, the more likely he/she is to get merit aid. Look at Colleges that Change Lives, which lists some of the less selective schools. I know kids who have gone to these schools and had great experiences, and several have gotten great aid packages too. Good luck to you and your son, OP! |
Anonymous
There are thousands of students who didn't get into Harvard/Yale/etc (or whatever school is top ten in their program) and "settled" on schools like Northwestern, Notre Dame, Vanderbilt or their state flagship (Michigan, Virginia, etc.) and it's absolutely ridiculous and patently false to claim that they are not getting access to top, or even good, faculty. |
Anonymous
All those schools you just mentioned have top 10 programs. Michigan is a great university with many top 10 programs. I never said that good faculty wouldn't be at these schools. Either you're not familiar with the schools you just mentioned, or you failed to comprehend my post. |
Anonymous
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many private schools have academic full tuition and half tuition scholarships, then fill in the room & board costs with other scholarships.
good luck! |