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Reply to "Patience or panic"

You are in a familiar situation that my 2017 C/RHP went through.  I'm glad you found the Net Price Calculators, but a word of caution that while it is pretty close to accurate for some schools (the ones where you can input the ACT and SAT scores and GPAs) it is not as much for those that go strictly off financial need on the NPC.  My son's acceptance letters had varying amounts of merit money than what the NPC estimate was.  And one other thing to do is to do some what ifs on the test scores...you'd be amazed how much more shows up if the scores improve.  My son went up 200 points on the old SAT on the retest and 2 on the ACT retest and the merit money went up thousands of dollars on some of the calculations.  He also had a strong Fall Senior GPA that helped, so don't completely eliminate schools yet if the merit money is not enough yet if your son is willing to put in the work to improve his chances.

I take it like most of us, the government considers you "rich" and not eligible for financial aid.  Have a good laugh when they tell you your expected family contribution is $60K a year and then imagine your family not eating or buying gasoline or paying utilities while your kid is in school for four years!  Then do as you are doing and accept that the really high academic D3s like Claremont and Pomona-Pitzer are not an option.  Coach Pericolosi (PP) even told my son that he knows he will not be able to recruit most of the kids he wants because they won't qualify for financial aid and there is no merit or other way to offset the costs.  He understood when I said we could not afford $250K for his education.  But consider those other D3 SoCal schools (including Redlands) because they do indeed have some merit options.  And beyond Trinity, take a look at UT-Dallas, who offers a lot of academic money to offer and has a strong D3 program.

In the end, my son was blessed with a high academic D2 with in state tuition to save the day, but he weighed all of the same things you are looking at and all the way through the California schools acceptance letter timeframe into April of his Senior year.  So there is no need to panic yet, but you and your son have a lot of work and persistence ahead to get there.  Good luck!

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