Reply to “Colleges That Change Lives”

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][b]I cannot believe I am reading a post from an in-state Virginia resident saying that that would rather have their kids go to a  CTLC school instead of W&M.  What a mistake.  [/quote][/b]

Seriously, Kalamazoo at 60K over W&M at $40?  Even with a $36K scholarship, the difference in prestige is enormous.  UVA is $31K - $32K.[/quote]

She's applying to both (and others). Admission is more certain at Kalamazoo and likely will have a total cost of attendance of 28K so the 60k sticker price is meaningless to us. That's 12K/yr less than W&M. For her that's the difference between having student loans or not based on the W&M NPC. (Our EFC is 32k which means her aid at W&M would likely be just student loans and work study).  And going on study abroad would cost even less whereas at W&M it adds cost.  She'll also apply to UVA which is not as likely an admit for her because though she's got SATs above their 75th% but her GPA is a below what Naviance suggests she'd get in with from her school--it looks like weighted 4.3 is the cut-off where almost no one else gets in and she's just under 4.2.  She's deciding between VT and JMU for financial safeties. But she prefers SLACS. She dreams about places like Grinnell and Carleton but they are reaches academically and financially.

Kalamazoo rose up as the most viable option for her from the CTCL schools-- great in her major for Phd production and jobs, financially stable (Forbes A-), good endowment (150k per capita),65 in USNWR National liberal arts ranking--a hair better than Wooster, great merit aid, great study abroad,good graduation rates etc. She likes the location.   I think she might be more likely to stay in a science major if she's one of the top students.  But I also wonder how getting a degree from a place like W&M would open opportunities that she'd have to fight for more if she graduated from a less known/prestigious school.  The choices don't seem easy, so she's applying widely. For now she's decided against doing early decision at W&M because of finances. UVA now has a ED option so that will be a test of whether she's truly not that interested if she decides not to use it.

Anyway, I'm signing off-- any more info on our specific case would not be helpful to OP and I don't want to argue about quality of schools and why kids go to them. I'm middle of the road on the concept of CTCL schools, but found it helpful in our case. [/quote]

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