Choosing
The Right School
By: Rocio Villalobos
It
wasn’t until the beginning of senior year that I began to feel
a greater amount of pressure weighing me down than usual. All I could
think about was the fact that there were college applications to fill
out, SAT’s and maybe SAT II’s to take, scholarships to apply
for, and classes and grades to worry about. At this point I had no idea
where I wanted to go to school or what I wanted to study. The only thing
that I did know was that I had to make a final decision about college
as soon as possible, or things wouldn’t be looking too good for
me.
Unlike a lot of students, I am fortunate enough to live in a city that
has an excellent university: The University of Texas at Austin. It was
mainly because of this that going to an out-of-state university wasn’t
that big of a deal. I had one of two options: I could pay a lot and
go into debt just to get away from home, or I could pay next to nothing
and get as good of an education at a university that is only 15 minutes
away from my house. Given the two choices, I opted for staying in Austin.
The way I look at it is that I can always go to an out-of-state university
for grad school. By then I’ll have more money to my name and the
possibility of going into debt won’t be as great.
A lot of times people tell you that your financial background shouldn’t
affect what college you decide to go to, but it actually plays a humongous
role. When I enter this fall as a freshman, I will be the third Villalobos
kid that is currently attending a university. Needless to say, it’s
causing somewhat of a financial strain on my family. My brother is also
at UT at Austin, but my sister chose to go to Southwestern, which is
a private university in Georgetown. Despite the fact that Georgetown
is only about 45 minutes away from Austin, since it’s a private
school there’s a difference in tuition of about $15,000 when compared
to UT. Going to a costly school will mean loans and a ton of scholarships
you have to worry about if you aren’t financially well off.
Some of the added benefits of going to UT are that thanks to FAFSA they’re
actually paying most of my college tuition, giving me a total of approximately
$8,400 for my freshman year. Whatever else I need to pay for (i.e. books)
can probably be taken care of by a scholarship I received earlier in
the year. Additionally, they’re not even requiring me to take the
SAT II for Math until orientation. Not having to worry about filling
out various college and scholarship applications or taking SAT II’s
was such a relief. Compared to the first semester, the second semester
of my senior year was a lot less stressful, all things taken into consideration.
Before you completely blow off the idea of attending a university in
your city or state, make sure you have all the details and that you
know what you’d be missing by going to one school versus another.
Hasty decisions can ultimately result in transferring to different schools
or just general unhappiness with what you’ve chosen. If your passion
for the school you want to attend is strong enough, work hard to achieve
your goal of going there. And please, whatever you do, DO NOT FORGET
TO FILL OUT FAFSA! If you’re determined to go to whichever university
you want, financial aid is going to be extremely important if you’re
lacking in the money department.
