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Finding a Financial Safety School
By
Will Geiger
Will Geiger is the co-founder of Scholarships360 and has a decade of experience in college admissions and financial aid. He is a former Senior Assistant Director of Admissions at Kenyon College where he personally reviewed 10,000 admissions applications and essays. Will also managed the Kenyon College merit scholarship program and served on the financial aid appeals committee. He has also worked as an Associate Director of College Counseling at a high school in New Haven, Connecticut. Will earned his master’s in education from the University of Pennsylvania and received his undergraduate degree in history from Wake Forest University.
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Bill Jack has over a decade of experience in college admissions and financial aid. Since 2008, he has worked at Colby College, Wesleyan University, University of Maine at Farmington, and Bates College.
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Maria Geiger is Director of Content at Scholarships360. She is a former online educational technology instructor and adjunct writing instructor. In addition to education reform, Maria’s interests include viewpoint diversity, blended/flipped learning, digital communication, and integrating media/web tools into the curriculum to better facilitate student engagement. Maria earned both a B.A. and an M.A. in English Literature from Monmouth University, an M. Ed. in Education from Monmouth University, and a Virtual Online Teaching Certificate (VOLT) from the University of Pennsylvania.
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When you start putting together your college list, safety schools are usually an after-thought. Safeties are a just-in-case, a backup, something you (probably) won’t need.
However, finding a best-fit safety school, especially one with strong financial aid, is one of the most important decisions that you will make as a student. After all, what’s the point in having a safety school if it’s not affordable?
The tricky part of this is that you won’t receive your official financial aid award letter until after you’re admitted. Luckily, we’ll be discussing some of the ways that you can predict financial aid and scholarships before you receive your decision!
Don’t miss: Scholarships360 scholarship search tool
What is a safety school?
First things first, what is a safety school? As a former high school college counselor, I have never been a fan of the term safety school.
Instead, I think of these types of schools as “likely” or “predictable.” These are colleges that you have a very good shot at being admitted to because your academic achievements and credits exceed the college’s average for first year freshman students.
Also see: What are safety, reach, and match schools?
Choosing a safety school
Two of the most important factors for college admission are grades and test scores, so you should use them to assess your admissions chances. Try asking your admissions counselor what percentile your grades and scores fall under for your chosen schools.
Until then, you can also try other approaches as well. As a very general rule of thumb, you should be looking for the following in a safety or likely school:
- Colleges that accept more students than they deny (acceptance rates > 50%)
- College and universities where your GPA and test scores are above the upper 75%
Admissions scattergrams can be a great tool to figure out your admissions chances. Of course, this is also an area where your high school counselor may be able to help and provide suggestions.
Choosing a financial safety
Every single student should have a safety school or two that offers good financial aid. These colleges will be affordable, but should also be institutions that a student is excited to attend and that fit their desired academic, community, and other criteria.
For instance, if you are intent on going to college in a big city, it will not be useful to have a financial safety school that’s in a rural location. Your financial safety should be a place where you’ll be happy and can accomplish your goals.
For the sake of simplicity, I am going to break this down into two separate situations: students who are interested in need-based aid and merit-based aid. Most students are going to fall somewhere on the spectrum between these two situations, but the lessons are applicable.
Related: Need-based vs Merit-based Aid
Need-based financial safety schools
On the need-based side, your best friend is going to be the Net Price Calculator (NPC). This tool is on the website of every college and university and helps determine how much a school will cost after need-based aid is given out. If you have any trouble finding the NPC on a specific school’s website, get in touch with their financial aid department.
Some of the things that the NPC takes into account include:
- Household income
- Savings
- Mortgage
- Number of family members in college
In addition to need-based financial aid, some Net Price Calculators may also include questions about your grades and testing so that the college can estimate merit scholarships too! This is not going to be the case at every college.
See also: How to complete the FAFSA
Merit-based financial safety schools
As we mentioned above, the NPC is still worth using because some colleges will estimate merit scholarships. Especially if you have limited need-based aid options for college.
First things first, you will want to start with colleges that offer merit-based scholarships to a high percentage of students. Next, you can go through the process of analyzing your admissions chances via scattergrams to see where your academic credentials fall in the context of the applicant pool.
Don’t miss: How many colleges should I apply to?
In-state public colleges and universities
I suppose I could have started with this, but there is a trick to this whole lesson. Every student in the United States of America (sorry again, international folks) has a financial safety school, literally right in their own backyard.
In-state public schools exist to support the residents of the state where they are located. This means that they offer low and affordable rates of tuition for in-state students (and select out-of-state students).
These schools also run the scope of selectivity, so there should be something for every student. From the “Public Ivies” to schools with open admissions policies, there is something for everyone’s version of a safety school.
In-state tuition for non-residents
If you are interested in public colleges that are out-of-state, you may be in luck! There are several ways to get in-state tuition as an out-of-state student including tuition exchanges and specific non-resident scholarships.
Two-year colleges
Another option is taking a hard look at public two-year colleges in your state. This can be a great option for improving students who may not be competitive for much merit-based aid. Many two-year colleges have agreements with four-year institutions for transferring.
Some states even have programs that pay your tuition to the two-year college!
One of these programs is New Jersey’s NJ STARS Program. New Jersey high school students in the top 15% of their class can attend any NJ two-year college for free. Students who transfer to one of the partner schools, including Rutgers University, Stevens Institute of Technology, and The College of New Jersey, will receive a renewable $2,500 scholarship.
Next Steps
Frequently asked questions about finding a financial safety school
What counts as a safety school?
Should I apply to a safety school early decision?
What acceptance rate is considered a safety school?
