Stellar College Consulting

The three most generous engineering forward colleges / universities when it comes to merit aid. (not need based)

1. Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY.
This is one of my favorite hidden gem schools. Not only because I have more than one adult friend who has sent their child there for architecture and have rave reviews, but also because so many of my students have attended over the past decade and have not only loved their academic experience, but also have paid little for it due to the massive generosity this school has with merit aid. It is routine that my appeal letters get original awards tripled. If you are a woman in STEM, you will get even more. RPI is also one of the highest recruited engineering schools in the nation, with NASA, Google, and all the rest mining for employees from its graduates.

2. Worcester Polytechnic - Worcester, MA - they consider all incoming freshman applicants for merit aid and routinely award 15 - 30K per year. They are also highly responsive to my appeal letters and routinely double original awards.

3. UT Austin. Austin is hard to get into, but you can get a massive deal on your price of attendance if you win any of their merit scholarships for $1000 or more - of which there are many to win.
Once you win one of these awards, some of which can be thousands of dollars, you qualify for an out of state tuition waiver which would make your total cost of attendance price tag, including room and board, $33K, which is obviously low. UT Austin has an outstanding top tier engineering program and faculty across all engineering disciplines.

The constant refrain these days is "Will my student have no career due to AI is they major in X, Y or Z".

The key to survival in this new era is deep analysis of what humans are going to be searching for in 10 years from now. The demand for things that are authentic and real is going to be high, in a world that will be dominated by synthetic reality. Engineering a career around this demand is a strong move right now, thinking outside the box is necessary. Don't think about what the past 10 years has sparked your child to pursue, that's not going to work anymore. You have to think about what the next 10 years is going to demand.

What I see all over the place is that the engineering is not the big demand right now, it's manufacturing. Larry Ellison, a person who is not ethical in any way, discusses this in the reel, and gives us a foretelling of where the need is in AI over the next 10 years.

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You've got the perfect stats and test score, you've got the perfect list of activities, you've saved the world from cancer, you take your grandma to her doctor appointment every Friday. You didn't get accepted to any Ivies and you got wait listed at the few T20s you applied to as back ups. This is the story of tens of thousands of academically perfect students every year. I am here to tell you why.

Admissions officers at the top colleges are looking for humans who break the mold - not in loud ways, but in subtle and genuine ways; and the way they seek that out is via authenticity.

They recognize immediately when a student has used the application to stuff their resume and tick all the boxes they think officers want to see, rather than doing the things that reflect who they really are. Many high school students don't know who they really are, and listen far too much to the endless comparisons and boasting that takes place in their high school classrooms, alwasy striving to match or surpass what their peers are crowing about. Matching is death. Leaving the beaten path and pursuing who you really are will get you in. Now I know that sounds performative, and it might be so, but to the extent you investigate and pursue who you truly, genuinely are, without an eye on what admissions officers want - is the extent to which you will succeed.

That's why I posted what I did over the weekend about what high school freshman can do right now to prepare for a successful top tier admissions season when they become seniors.

I have seen many times over the past 10 years where a student - even though I consulted them to strengthen their EC profile, did less, and was admitted to the Ivies due to the texture and authenticity of who they are - reflected in the essays and in some cases the video submission.

How to cultivate real authenticity:
1 - Put down your phone. In fact, ban all socials during the school week and read a novel or high quality nonfiction literature instead.
2 - Write thoughtfully without distractions, by hand with a pen and paper - in a journal every single day no matter how brief - go deep if you can.
3- Spend one hour each day, put an alert in your phone if you must, to investigate something outside your normal area of interest, outside your town, outside your country, and learn about it. Get outside your bubble, be deeply curious about the world around you.
4- Be curious about yourself. Spend time while you're journaling, to find out what brings you joy, or about the areas where you might be weak or vulnerable, the areas where your heart is tender, and where it is brave, and write about it.

New York is the ONLY city in the whole wide world, forever.

The companion to my prior post about what high school freshmen students can do now to prepare for greatness in Ivy and T20 college admissions. Here are my top suggestions for the freshman summer reading list, though there are 100s more to choose from.

Fiction

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn - Betty Smith
Cry, The Beloved Country - Alan Paton
The Good Earth - Pearl S. Buck
Hadji Murad - Leo Tolstoy
The Old Man and the Sea - Hemingway

Non-Fiction

River Notes / Desert Notes - Barry Lopez
A People's History of the United States - Howard Zinn
The Fire Next Time - James Baldwin
The Guns of August - Barbara W. Tuchman
Barbarian Days, A Surfing Life - William Finnegan

High school freshmen are in essence, still "babies". This is an exploratory phase where nothing should be off limits, and yes, that includes art and music.

Even at this nascent stage of their educational careers, students can cultivate what is going to lead to greatness in their later high school years, laying a groundwork for elite admissions into Ivy and T20 colleges.

1. Read. Be a serious reader and read everything, Make sure high quality, super rich literary fiction is on your reading list every month. Read periodicals every week from outlets all over the world. You're building your intellect and your reasoning muscles. I recommend reading at least 1 non-assigned high quality literary fiction book every month outisde of class curriculum. During summer - read a minimum of 10 high quality literary fiction and nonfiction books. This step is mighty, and it leads to greatness.

2. Use this high school year to find one thing you really care about. It can be academic, but it doesn't have to be. Find one thing (besides your sport) that you really care about, and go all the way in. Become the GOAT regarding this one thing - go places with it no one has ever gone before - go deeper.

3. Write by hand in a journal every single day. Even on the tough days when you are tired, write 3 sentences. This is vital to keep your literacy quotient growing; this quotient is infinite, there is no way to reach the top, so keep going. It's also very good for mental health - something high school students need to guard vigilantly.

4. Every week, make sure you do 1 thing that brings you joy that has no connection to tehcnology, your phone, or gamging devices. Joy leads to expertise and texture in your life, and that comes through on your college applications.

It's not too late to RSVP for the Intensive Personal Statement Seminar happening tomorrow June 12th at 10 am PST and 1 pm EST on zoom. I will be imparting all the most important strategies to use and pitfalls to avoid for a powerful personal statement essay.
All rising seniors should be there!
My formula has lead 150+ students over the past 10 years to Ivy acceptances, and T20s.
RSVP to [email protected]
subject line PSE SEMINAR
See you there!

It's not too late to RSVP for the Intensive Personal Statement Seminar happening tomorrow June 12th at 10 am PST and 1 pm EST on zoom. I will be imparting all the most important strategies to use and pitfalls to avoid for a powerful personal statement essay.
All rising seniors should be there!
My formula has lead 150+ students over the past 10 years to Ivy acceptances, and T20s.

RSCVP to [email protected]
subject line PSE SEMINAR

See you there!