The best bets for college merit scholarships aren’t necessarily schools you have heard of. But if you’re serious about looking for an affordable education at a good college, does it matter? Don’t think you’ll qualify for any significant need-based financial aid? Then it’s time to begin looking beyond the rankings and paying attention to the data that tells you how much money schools are giving students.
Looking for information on college softball recruiting is a frustrating experience. It seems that there are lot more websites out there interested in selling you their recruiting services than providing information. But such informative sites do exist and some of them are actually recruiting services. However, before you decide to hire a recruiting service, use the following sites to educate yourself on the college softball recruiting process.
(For those looking for colleges with the most merit scholarships, I’m updating this post. Because I’ve updated the spreadsheet several times since I wrote this post, some of the numbers in the text won’t match the results in the graphics. You can see a video demonstration at the end of the post.)
If you’re looking for colleges that provide the most merit scholarships, start with the information the schools report to the Department of Education. This information states how much money institutions distribute in grants and scholarships and the number of students who receive it. In just four easy steps you can use this data to find colleges most likely to provide generous merit scholarships. These are schools that students with high Expected Family Contributions (EFC) should target for non-need based aid. This is in no way a guarantee. Rather, consider this a way to improve your chances for merit scholarships given the available information. The idea is to use this list as a basis to create the final list of colleges to apply to.
With all the pressure on high school students to create a perfect college list, they really aren’t given the opportunity to develop the skills to do so. It’s the sort of situation that most students will do only once. How often can you “practice” deciding which colleges to apply to? It’s not the same as practicing taking the ACT or SAT. How do you learn to create a list of colleges to apply to?
I’m always amazed at how little players and their families know about athletic scholarships. Given that most of them have been justifying playing their sport for the chance at a college scholarship since middle school, you would think they would be better informed. Depending on the sport and division, scholarships can be very limited. It’s kind of like someone planning a trip to Europe and not realizing they need a passport for traveling. Yes, some of the stuff people are missing is pretty basic.
Your best college financial aid will likely come from the college you attend. This means students need to rethink their college search based on size. Size is probably one of the first limitations students use when searching for colleges, often based on little to no real experience or evidence. And if you’re interested in getting the best college financial aid possible, this is a big mistake.
Recently I was profiling Saint Michael’s College in Vermont and learned about their Ski and Ride program for students. They offer various discounted passes to the Sugarbush ski resort along with a free weekend shuttle. I thought it was a pretty appealing program and did a quick web search for other colleges for skiers. I found several sites claiming their lists had some version of the best schools for skiers. They ranged in length from 10 to 30 schools. Saint Michael’s didn’t show up on a single list. Why not?
There are over 1,600 four-year public and private colleges in the United States. And guess what, they don’t all cost an arm and a leg to attend. With this many colleges, there have to be quality, affordable options available for families who look for them. And there are students attending college without facing the prospect of years of debilitating debt. Yet, attending affordable colleges comes with some trade-offs that not all families are willing to make.
If you want to pay less for college, you need to pay more attention to college statistics. I’m sure many parents and students hip deep in the college admissions process think that they are drowning in college statistics but are still facing the prospect of impossible tuition bills. The problem is that they aren’t paying attention to the right statistics, or at the very least, not considering them in terms of how they affect the cost of going to college.
