Strategies for the Ages
Sticker-shock survival: the right moves for families to make
Sophomores should also start preparing for Advanced Placement classes. Many colleges will allow students with enough passing grades on the AP tests to enter as sophomores, thus saving an entire year's worth of tuition. Even one or two credits might help the student finish a little sooner. If the AP classes don't work out, the student can study on his or her own for other college credit tests such as the CLEPs or DSSTs.
Early in the junior year, Annalee Nissenholtz, a college counselor at Ladue Horton Watkins High School in St. Louis, says parents should have a heart-to-heart with their child. Encourage the student to aim high, but also lay out the costs of college and the family's finances. Parents worried that a student is focusing on expensive schools should call the colleges' admissions and financial aid offices and describe their kid's grades and the family's resources. The staffers are usually happy to give a ballpark idea of whether the student would be eligible for any merit or need aid, Nissenholtz says. "This should be a completely honest process," Nissenholtz adds. "If the kid has got a 2.8 average, you should say: 'You haven't shown me that you have put forth the effort' " to justify spending very much on college. "This is a two-way street."
Students should also start spending extra time prepping for the SAT s. Kids "don't understand how important the tests are," says Cliff Neel, head of financial aid for Baylor University. A look at Baylor's aid rules will wise students up: Baylor gives acceptees who score 1110 on the SAT s $1,500 a year in merit grants. If a student retakes the test and scores just 90 points higher, or 1200, Baylor will increase the annual merit grant by $2,000 a year to $3,500. Students who rack up 60 more points to score 1260 will get $6,500 a year.
Smart juniors will also start researching private scholarships at their high school's counseling office and online at sites like that of the College Board. Early birds get a jump on the many scholarships with fall deadlines and get a head start on things they'll need for their applications such as activity lists and essays, says Ben Kaplan, publisher of Scholarshipcoach.com.
Senior year is, of course, the most critical. To maximize aid, counselors say students should apply to about six colleges: one or two "reach" schools, one or two in-state public universities, and a couple of private colleges in which their grades and test scores place them in the top 25 percent of the student body. (To save big bucks, students can spend two years at a community college and transfer to a four-year school.) They should also search out schools in which some other quality would make them a hot commodity. Girls talented in math or science, for example, might try male-dominated technical schools such as Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y. Boys might try liberal arts colleges where males are in short supply. Students hoping to maximize aid should avoid the temptation to apply to their dream school early, since that reduces their leverage and options, says independent adviser Ward. Getting scholarships "is a matter of leverage and finding the right fit for the kid," he says. Concurs high school counselor Nissenholtz, "It is not necessarily our top kids who get the most money. Lots of times it is the decent student who is willing to look at a school where they are highly recruited."
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