DS is our first child and is a junior next year... what scholarships should he start pursuing?

[Dianne-TX]

We were given a list of scholarships by a recruitment rep from a college at a homeschool conference 2 years ago.  My son is not interested in attending that particular college, but the rep gave it to us anyway just as a courtesy from one parent to another.  He has compiled it over time and adds to it when needed.  Out of his three children, only one had to pay $3,000 back in student debt.  The list he sent is overwhelming, though, because it is so long!!  Where to start?  What would be the best 5-10 to begin (not on my list, but just in general)?  This is our first time.  Thanks!

[Lori D.]

First, you might want to read these 2 past threads -- you need to know about BOTH of these processes:
- "Preparing for college: what grants and scholarships should we apply for?" -- explanation of the scholarship process
- "Scholarships" -- explanation of the overall financial aid process

Quick definition of terms:

The vast majority of scholarships are "inside" scholarships -- money awarded directly by the school your student is admitted to. The bulk of "inside" scholarships are awarded to incoming college freshmen -- freshman scholarships are the largest sums, and are frequently renewable -- i.e., as long as the student keeps up the the scholarship eligibility requirements -- like a minimum amount of credits or GPA -- the student can reapply for that scholarship in subsequent years.

In contrast, "outside" scholarships are ones awarded by people or organizations that are NOT the school. These scholarships are usually for smaller amounts, and are usually 1-time awards. The list your friend gave you is going to be a list of "outside" scholarships.

To be able to answer you question of which scholarships should your student pursue, it's important to first know what universities will your DS be applying to, and to understand the financial aid policies of these schools -- especially find out if these schools allow "stacking" of scholarships or not.

A school that does NOT allow stacking reduces the offer of financial aid in the financial aid package by the amount of those outside scholarships being brought in by your student -- and usually the first part of the financial aid package to be withdrawn are scholarships that the school would have awarded.

And, because "outside" scholarships are usually just 1-time / 1-year scholarships, if "stacking" of scholarships is not allowed, your student will end up losing out on potential scholarship money for the remaining 3 years of college. So it may not be worthwhile to look into "outside" scholarships, unless they are for a large amount and/or they are renewable.

A school that allows "stacking" means that the school does NOT reduce* the financial aid package (or remove their offer of scholarships). If your DS ends up attending a school that allow "stacking", then looking into these "outside" scholarships is much more useful for you.

* NOTE: there are federal regulations about "over-awards" which *require* schools to reduce the size of need-based aid package whenever the student receives "outside" scholarships that exceed financial need by more than $300

Probably the best thing to be doing right now is to figure out what your EFC number will be (from the FAFSA form), and then use that EFC number and plug in your family's financial information into the net price calculator at each of the schools your son is interested in applying to. (Read through the "Scholarships" thread linked above to understand what the EFC number is all about.)

This will give you an idea of how much you can expect to pay, how much your son might be eligible in federal financial aid (grants and work study money -- money you don't have to pay back), and then you can also look in to what kind of scholarships the school offers for need (low EFC number) and for merit (good grades/high GPA/high test scores). Also look in to whether or not these schools allow "stacking" of scholarships, and then from there, you can start looking at the scholarship list your friend gave you and see if your student is eligible to apply for any of these scholarships.

Buckle up -- scholarships, financial aid, and paying for college is a gigantic, tangled snarl of information and paperwork that you are about to plunge in to!  :eek:  :willy_nilly: BEST of luck as you get started, and fire away with more specific questions once you've read those 2 threads I linked at the top of this post. ? Warmest regards, Lori D.

Edited September 17, 2018 by Lori D.

[8filltheheart]

I am not sure what sort of list you were given, but the best scholarships come from the universities themselves.  The best approach to scholarship $$ is to match your student to schools where they are competitive for large merit awards.  Jr yr should focus on getting the highest test scores possible, the best grades possible, exploring college options, and pursuing what they love.  I would not waste time pursuing scholarships as a high school jr. 

 

Since incoming freshman receive the best scholarships, I would encourage you to take on the role of guidance counselor and start researching schools that offer merit and sorting through them to find good academic matches for scholarships awards and career goals.

[fourisenough]

It has been our experience that chasing outside scholarships isn't worth the time. They are usually very small and non-renewable. Like 8 said above, the best use of your energy is improving test scores and GPA in the hopes of qualifying for the most merit-aid at your student's carefully selected list of schools.

[teachermom2834]

If your employer offers a scholarship program for dependents that is one to definitely pursue. My ds won one from my dh's company and it has made a huge difference. His university allows him to stack it with other financial aid and it is renewable for up to 5 years. If you have access to that or belong to any special group that grants scholarships, those are worth pursuing but not something to worry about junior year.

 

I agree that the biggest source of scholarships is the schools themselves. For my family (good students but nothing super special about them on paper), we look for schools that offer automatic aid based on test scores/gpa.

 

For us what we learned is that ACT = $$$ and that for our late bloomer, GPA was raised by taking de classes which were weighted by our umbrella school.

 

As in all things on the college board, this discussion is going to be seen through different eyes depending on what kinds of schools your student is pursuing and what your budget is. To some on this board a $25,000 scholarship to a private school with a $50,000 price tag is a great deal. To others of us, that $25,000 scholarship is worthless because the bottom line is still so high. A good hard look at the budget and test scores/gpa is a first step.

[DoraBora]

I am not sure what sort of list you were given, but the best scholarships come from the universities themselves.  The best approach to scholarship $$ is to match your student to schools where they are competitive for large merit awards.  Jr yr should focus on getting the highest test scores possible, the best grades possible, exploring college options, and pursuing what they love.  I would not waste time pursuing scholarships as a high school jr. 

 

Since incoming freshman receive the best scholarships, I would encourage you to take on the role of guidance counselor and start researching schools that offer merit and sorting through them to find good academic matches for scholarships awards and career goals.

 

Question about the bolded part of quote above...  How exactly do you figure out where your particular student might be competitive for large merit awards?

[Lori D.]

On 6/2/2017 at 11:19 AM, DoraBora said:

Question about the bolded part of quote above...  How exactly do you figure out where your particular student might be competitive for large merit awards?

For figuring out what merit aid (based on high ACT/SAT test scores and high GPA) your student might be eligible for requires a lot of brain-busting research and understanding of financial data, but here's an overview of how I compared:

1. Check out lists of schools that guarantee scholarships for certain ACT/SAT scores
- Guaranteed Scholarships website list
- Prep Scholar blog: "Guaranteed Scholarships Based on SAT/ACT Scores"
- College Matchmaker website: "134 College Scholarships Awarded Solely for High Grades and SAT/ACT Scores"
- College Prep website: 81 Colleges With Full Ride Scholarships 
- Search Engine website -- $8 registration fee for list of automatic scholarships (partial and full) based on student test scores and GPA

2. Check out lists of colleges that award big merit aid to  students scoring in the the 99% on the PSAT/NMSQT test in 11th grade:
- Automatic Full Tuition / Full Ride Scholarship list of colleges (PSAT National Merit finalists/semi-finalists)

3. Check out the financial aid statistics (see below) for specific colleges, and see what the ACT/SAT score is for the *average* incoming freshman, and what the ACT/SAT score is for the top 10% of test scores for incoming freshmen. Applying to schools where  your student's test scores are in the top 10% boosts the school's statistics and so makes the school much more eager to pursue your student with good merit aid.

4. Finally, check out the individual college websites for the schools your student is interested in, and look at how many scholarships are awarded, and what the criteria is. Even the merit-based aid often has additional criteria attached: some scholarships are for certain degree programs; some are for students who are the first in their family to attend college; some are just for females or for certain ethnic groups. So it's a good idea to check out in advance if your student will even be eligible for some of the college's merit aid, even if your student DOES have high tests scores and a high GPA.

You really have to look at merit-based scholarships in context with the whole financial aid picture. What is your EFC number from the FAFSA, and when you plug in the EFC number and your specific financial information into a specific college's Net Price Calculator, what overall Financial Need does it show, and how much does it suggest the school would offer?

Remember that merit-based aid is just one piece of this Financial Need Aid package the school will offer -- if your EFC number is low enough, your student may qualify for Federal Aid of "free" money that does not have to be paid back (grants), or Work Study (federal money that is worked for by the student, and not paid back).

And, all students are offered loans as part of a financial aid package. It doesn't mean you have to accept the loans, but just realize that is part of how the federal government and the school will "meet need", so it is useful to look at those statistics (see the College Data statistics examples below) to get a feel for how much merit-based aid a school has to offer -- the percent of merit aid, compared to federal grants/work study and federal loans, is much smaller, but at some schools there is very little merit-based aid. Just as a side note: private schools tend to have more endowments for awarding merit aid than state public schools.

BEST of luck as you start your scholarship search! Warmest regards, Lori D.

_________________________________

How to find these financial aid statistics for step #3:

COLLEGE BOARD BIG FUTURE website
- go to the search engine page, and enter the name of the school you want to check out
- once that college is pulled up, click on the "print complete college profile" option
- this brings up a full page of all the school's statistics
- scroll down a bit over halfway to the "Applying" section, and look for the sub-headings about ACT and SAT test scores
- also under the "Applying" section are the GPA statistics of incoming freshmen

For example, below are the statistics for 4 state universities in different parts of the country for comparison. Let's pretend a hypothetical student has an ACT score in the 30-32 range.

As you can see, the University of Virginia is much more selective/competitive and requires a much higher GPA and test scores to even get in -- and with that many top scholars competing for the merit aid, it will be much harder to land a substantial scholarship -- in fact, because UV is so competitive/selective, an ACT score of 30-32 is not even a guarantee of being accepted! University of Washington also has higher statistics (although not as high as UV). So if your student has an ACT score of 30-32, while the student may be admitted, the student is not likely to get much merit aid, unless the student qualifies with other special criteria (like: a top athlete).

In contrast, the University of New Mexico has lower statistics, and a student's score of 30-32 would likely land the student excellent merit aid. In fact, an ACT score of 28-29 is sure to earn the student some merit aid, when compared to the *average* ACT score of 25! The University of Iowa has somewhat higher statistics, but again, an ACT of 30-32 is likely to land good merit aid.

University of New Mexico
GPA: 23% incoming freshman have a GPA of 3.75+
ACT score 30-36 = top 5% of incoming freshmen have a composite ACT score of 30-36
ACT score 19-25 = middle 50% of first-year students (i.e., the average incoming freshman)
(so, scoring 28-30 or above on ACT will likely land good merit aid at UNM)

University of Iowa
GPA: 44% incoming freshman have a GPA of 3.75+
ACT score 30-36 = top 19% of incoming freshmen have a composite ACT score of 30-36
ACT score 23-28 = middle 50% of first-year students (i.e., the average incoming freshman)
(so, scoring 30 or above on ACT will likely land good merit aid at UI)

University of Washington
GPA: 65% incoming freshman have a GPA of 3.75+
ACT score 30-36 = top 45% of incoming freshmen have a composite ACT score of 30-36
ACT score 26-32 = middle 50% of first-year students (i.e., the average incoming freshman)
(so, need a score of 33 or above on ACT to land good merit aid at UW)
(plus, will likely need a 4.0 GPA, or need a few Honors or AP courses for weighted GPA to boost GPA)

University of Virginia
GPA: 94% incoming freshman have a GPA of 3.75+
ACT score 30-26 = top 69% of incoming freshmen have a composite ACT score of 30-36
ACT score 29-33 = middle 50% of first-year students (i.e., the average incoming freshman)
(so, need a score of 34-36 on ACT to even begin to be competitive for merit aid at UV)
(plus, will likely need Honors and AP courses for weighted GPA to have a competitive GPA)

COLLEGE DATA website
- go to the "College 411 Match Search" option for the search engine, and enter the school name
- click on the "Money Matters" option for financial information about how money is awarded
- this page also gives you a comparison chart for SAT and ACT test scores AND weighted/unweighted GPA
- this page also gives you the College Net Price Calculator to find out how much financial aid you are likely to be offered (need to register and log in to use this feature)

For example, here is the detailed break-down on what aid is awarded from each of the same four schools from the above example. This shows that University of Iowa gives out a lot of merit-based aid, and that a good percent of that merit aid is NOT also tied to NEED-based students.

University of New Mexico  - financial aid info:
Costs per year
$21,360 (in state) / $36,346 (out of state) = COST (tuition, fees, room & board, books & supplies, expenses)
Financial Need / Awards / Loans
not reported for this school

University of Iowa - financial aid info:

Financial Need

76.7% of freshmen = apply for financial aid

66.4% of those applying = found to have financial need

100% of those with need = receive financial aid

35% = have need fully met

70% = average amount of need met

Costs/Awards

$21,625 (in state) / $41,713 (out of state) = COST (tuition, fees, room & board, books & supplies, expenses)

$16,368 = average award

$8,698 = average amount of need-based gift (received by 77% of aid recipients)

$5,831 = "need-based self-help" (i.e., loans and/or Federal Work Study) (82.6% of aid recipients)

  71.4% = amount of financial aid recipients receiving merit-based aid

$4,714 = average amount of merit-based gift (received by 17% of freshmen who had no financial need)

Loans

15% = parents who took out Parent PLUS loans

51% = students who graduated who took out loans

$28,771 = average total debt of students who graduated

 

University of Washington - financial aid info:

Financial Need

68.1% of freshmen = apply for financial aid

60.2% of those applying = found to have financial need

93.4% of those with need = receive financial aid

42.8% = have need fully met

82% = average amount of need met

Costs/Awards

$25,948 (in state) / $49,986 (out of state) = COST (tuition, fees, room & board, books & supplies, expenses)

$17,500 = average award

$15,000 = average amount of need-based gift (received by 79.7% of aid recipients)

$5,900 = "need-based self-help" (i.e., loans and/or Federal Work Study) (75.8% of aid recipients)

 11.7% = amount of financial aid recipients receiving merit-based aid

$6,400 = average amount of merit-based gift (received by 4.9% of freshmen who had no financial need)

Loans

9% = parents who took out Parent PLUS loans

40% = students who graduated who took out loans

$21,180 = average total debt of students who graduated

 

University of Virginia - financial aid info:

Financial Need

71.8% of freshmen = apply for financial aid

48.3% of those applying = found to have financial need

100% of those with need = receive financial aid

100% = have need fully met

100% = average amount of need met

Costs/Awards

$30,490 (in state) / $59,834 (out of state) = COST (tuition, fees, room & board, books & supplies, expenses)

$25,679 = average award

$19,470 = average amount of need-based gift (received by 84.9% of aid recipients)

$5,846 = "need-based self-help" (i.e., loans and/or Federal Work Study) (62% of aid recipients)

   9.5% = amount of financial aid recipients receiving merit-based aid

$6,793 = average amount of merit-based gift (received by 3.2% of freshmen who had NO financial need)

Loans

3% = parents who took out Parent PLUS loans

35% = students who graduated who took out loans

$24,905 = average total debt of students who graduated

 

Edited September 17, 2018 by Lori D.

[DoraBora]

Wow!  Thank you, Lori, for all of this wonderful information!  The college board website how-to's are particularly helpful -- I had seen the "At a Glance" college profile before in posts on this website, but I didn't know where to find it!   :001_smile:

 

I have played around a bit with the net price calculators on a couple of college websites.  Our EFC is depressingly high.,, 

[Lori D.]

On 6/2/2017 at 3:51 PM, DoraBora said:

...Our EFC is depressingly high.,, 

Same here. And on top of that, our students are very caucasian, very male, not stand-out athletes, AND don't have ACT/SAT scores in the top range -- so we didn't have much hope for a lot of aid here.

We had to go an alternative route.

Fortunately, we have a very low-cost community college (CC) with excellent courses and a good transfer agreement with all of the state's universities, which enables students to knock out 2 years of a 4-year degree at 1/3 the cost, and then transfer to the university in our city, and live at home while knocking out the rest of the degree.

Also, DS#1 managed an extremely high GPA at the CC, which landed him a couple of scholarships at the CC -- which also translated into a renewable 1/2 tuition scholarship at the 4-year university. And he was able to add a second partial leadership-based scholarship his 2nd year at the 4-year university.

So there are alternatives, even if your student doesn't have top test scores. You might browse this past thread for ideas: "s/o: Cautionary Tale: High Cost of College -- a brainstorm $$ ideas thread!"

Good luck! Warmest regards, Lori D.

Edited September 17, 2018 by Lori D.

[dereksurfs]

Same here. And on top of that, our students are very caucasian, very male, not stand-out athletes, AND don't have ACT/SAT scores in the top range -- so we didn't have much hope for a lot of aid here.

 

We had to go an alternative route.

 

Fortunately, we have a very low-cost community college (CC) with excellent courses and a good transfer agreement with all of the state's universities, which enables students to knock out 2 years of a 4-year degree at 1/3 the cost, and then transfer to the university in our city, and live at home while knocking out the rest of the degree.

 

Also, DS#1 managed an extremely high GPA at the CC, which landed him a couple of scholarships at the CC -- which also translated into a renewable 1/2 tuition scholarship at the 4-year university. And he was able to add a second partial leadership-based scholarship his 2nd year at the 4-year university.

 

So there are alternatives, even if your student doesn't have top test scores. You might browse this past thread for ideas: "s/o: Cautionary Tale: High Cost of College -- a brainstorm $$ ideas thread!"

 

Good luck! Warmest regards, Lori D.

 

Hi Lori,

 

I always appreciate your very informative posts on the forum. The prior ones above are helpful in understanding the overall complex landscape of college scholarships. However, this last post in which you shared personal experiences is especially relevant to us. We are in a similar situation due to 'landing in the middle' financially speaking as a family.  In addition, we would like our son to live here in CA for at least his first couple of years. We have a local CC that has a good reputation and is close enough for him to ride his bike to. So CC makes a lot of sense for us with the intent of transferring.

 

From a purely practical side it would seem best to apply to 'any' location which offered the most aide, period. But quite honestly, we have no real desire to send him to 'any' location even if they offer full ride scholarships. If at all possible we would like him to remain in-state or at least within the Western States due to the alliance for lower tuition costs - Western Undergraduate Exchange.

 

A question regarding CC scholarships from your experience. Were those primarily merit based as opposed to need based? And if they were internal to the school, how do they transfer to a another institution? I guess I wasn't even thinking about looking at CC scholarships as the cost is relatively low when compared with typical university costs.

 

Lastly, it is always mentioned that the majority of scholarships are offered to freshman. So where does that leave the transfer student? Does that mean that receiving a scholarship as transfer is highly unlikely?

 

Thanks,

[Lori D.]

Sent you a private message, so as to not derail this thread. :)

[8filltheheart]

Question about the bolded part of quote above...  How exactly do you figure out where your particular student might be competitive for large merit awards?

 

Your student needs to be a top student that that school really wants.  If look at the common data set and your student is in their mid-50th% for test scores, the odds of a scholarship are nil.  If they are the top of the upper quartile, have a high GPA, and offer the school something that they want, that increases their odds of a scholarship.

 

If you are unfamiliar with CDS info, just google the name of the school plus common data set.  I had NCSU's open from another discussion I was having, so here is it as an example: https://oirp.ncsu.edu/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/CDS_2016-2017.v10.pdf

 

ACT Composite 25%=27, 75%=31

30-36=41.67%

 

That tells you that the upper quartile scored a 31+ and that almost 42% of all students scored between a 30-36.  A student with a 30/31 ACT score is unlikely to get competitive merit at NCSU.  

 

But, that is just a superficial exploration.  I spend hours reading school websites and descriptions of who and how students are awarded top scholarships.  For example, my ds was accepted into a specialized research program and awarded a scholarship from that program.  As a high school student, he had been to 2 research oriented summer programs, worked for a professor at our local university, and had a stack of thought experiment notebooks. At another school, I had read that they wanted self-motivated, creative thinkers and that essays played a huge role in their selecting candidates for interviews.  I knew that that was a profile that meshed well with my dd's approach to learning and her strengths.

 

If you spend time researching schools, you can start to see the threshold that needs to crossed to be competitive and then you need to explore the university's goals for itself, what its current area of expansion might be, etc.  Does your student fit that profile?

 

FWIW, we have had the greatest success by dropping down in ranking.  We have been able to get enough scholarships at schools ranked 60 up to bring our costs down to just room, board, books or that plus around $5000-8000.  That is still way outside of comfort zone ability to pay.  By dropping down to schools ranked around 100, they have been able to attend on full scholarship or on partial scholarships that still kept our total costs per yr well under $10,000/yr. 

[JanetC]

The other section to read carefully in the PDF example above is section H2A -- is anybody getting merit aid or does the school just do need-based aid?

 

I would add that this kind of detailed research is time consuming. You need to narrow down the universe a bit. Knowing your major or general field of study, regions of the country you're willing to travel to, etc will hellp. Then dig into the websites of a smaller list of schools.

 

I like to use CollegeData.com which has most of the common data set information available in a search engine to get a first look at a school.

[lllll]

nm

Edited June 5, 2017 by tentwelve

[Lori D.]

On 6/2/2017 at 10:19 PM, dereksurfs said:

Lastly, it is always mentioned that the majority of scholarships are offered to freshman. So where does that leave the transfer student? Does that mean that receiving a scholarship as transfer is highly unlikely?

You need to check out each university you are interested in to find out what they offer in the way of transfer scholarships.

Also check out what department scholarships or degree program scholarships each school may have specifically for juniors and seniors. For example, Engineering and Computer Science very frequently have dept. scholarships. These are usually smaller 1-time awards, or 2-year awards and are awarded to students beyond sophomore level.

Some departments (again STEM most frequently)  have special paid internships. Those are not transfer scholarships, but are only open to upper classmen -- which is the level that a transfer student frequently comes in as.

Also, look for the possibility of leadership scholarships, or scholarships for dorm RA positions, etc., which are only available to students who have been at the school for at least a year. Those are not transfer scholarships, but are only open to older students, and coming in as a transfer student, once the student has a year under their belt, can apply for these awards.

Also, if a student has a good GPA at the CC, the student will be invited to join Phi Theta Kappa honor's society. It's worth joining, because the organization does offer transfer scholarships to its members -- they are usually 1-time awards, and the amount varies from state to state, from a few hundred dollars to several thousand dollars. Critical is to watch for the deadline to apply -- usually in NOVEMBER prior to starting at the university the following FALL -- so about 9-10 months in advance of actually transferring.

Edited September 17, 2018 by Lori D.

[Lori D.]

No matter how hard students work, not every student is able to be in the top 10% or even the top 25%. Some students will try their best and their best will land a 28-29 on the ACT (or in the 1300s for the SAT), and a 3.5 GPA. 

There is still merit aid for these students, but it will most likely be in the form of partial tuition scholarships --from what I am seeing, for these students, the merit aid is topping out at about 1/2 tuition scholarships. So families still need to cover 1/2 tuition + room & board + books + expenses) -- in other words, the scholarship covers maybe 20-25% of the total cost of college.

These families are also often crunched by not having an EFC number that is low enough to qualify for federal grants or work study -- only loans -- so other options need to be considered:

- Sometimes dropping down in college rankings to find a school that's a good match and has more aid helps -- and not just dropping to schools ranked from 100-200, but look at schools ranked 200-500.

- Consider if a tuition-free school is a match for your student (we know a local homeschool family with a son who is very happily attending Berea right now).

- If the student tests well, consider doing a lot of CLEP tests for credit during high school in advance of college (knock out 1-2 years worth of credits at the much cheaper rate of $80-125 per course).

- Again, if the student tests well and is a good self-study student, consider a live at home/all-online degree from Lumerit (formerly College Plus), or other similar organization for a total of about $25,000 for a Bachelor's degree. (I know 2 young ladies who successfully earned their degrees through College Plus.)

- Live at home (cuts $8-$10K per year for room & board), work part time, and attend the in-town college.

- Often if a parent has worked for a university for 2-3 years or more, the students are eligible for significant parent-employee discounts on tuition. (My neighbor was able to use her discount for her son -- the tuition was about 1/4 of full tuition).

- If there's a cheaper tuition CC in-town that offers credits that transfer, start there, knock out 1-2 years and transfer to a university for the last 2 years. (We did this. ? )

- Is the student at all athletic?
   * look into the possibility of Division II partial sports scholarships
   * look into the possibility of financial aid grants for Division III sports

- Or, look in to the possibility of starting a lesser-known sport in high school school to land money for playing Division II or III in college. (I know a young man who took up golf in high school, and a young woman who took up water polo in college and both received partial scholarships for their sports.)

- Consider working for companies with work-for-tuition options -- or work for companies that offer scholarships or straight out help pay for tuition  -- List of 51 Companies to Save You From College Debt, to start your research. (Chipotle did this for the son of a friend working there.)

- A SMART scholarship = work as a civilian researcher for the US Military after graduation in exchange for scholarshipship money.

- Consider if a 4-year Bachelor's degree is even the right choice for this student. What about a 2-year Associate's degree in a high-demand vocational-technical field that is of interest to the student? See the US Labor of Bureau's Occupational Outlook Handbook for a list of jobs only requiring an AAS degree. (I believe one of 8FillTheHeart's DDs went the AAS route and works as an Occupational Therapist.)

Absolutely, families need to look hard at how much merit aid students might be able to land. And families absolutely need to research research research all about financial aid and financial need at the colleges being considered. But especially if a student is not going to be in the top 10% (needed to land full-tuition or full-ride merit aid), and when a family's money situation lands the family in that gray area (too high for federal grants/work study, but too low to realistically pay the cost), then use some of these ideas to start thinking outside the box for other ways to make college affordable.

Good luck, everyone! ? Warmest regards, Lori D.

Edited September 17, 2018 by Lori D.