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Definitely look into Michigan if you qualify for the Rackham Merit Fellowship. Ann Arbor is cheap, and the school has a lot of resources.

It is disappointing if "involvement with minorities" in the sense of having lab partners who happen to be minorities is somehow equivalent to working as a Teach for America teacher in the inner city. To me, the former simply indicates that one is not a blatant racist, while the latter indicates one's personal commitment to "broader impacts." Again, I am knocking NSF's rather weak "commitment" to this particular standard, not the applicant's.

The first year of grad school is hard. In my top-5 social science program, no one will hold your hand or tell you what to do. You have to take all the initiative to line up professors, funding, conferences and external training. This is exactly what the rest of your career as an academic will be like. It ain't undergrad. Maybe other programs are different. Go ahead and pull together applications and whatnot but I highly suggest getting some counseling or therapy now. It may help you differentiate between what is hard about grad school (for everyone) versus your unique situation, and help you assess whether an academic like is even appropriate for you. It is certainly not for everyone. Academia favors the persistent, not the flighty.

With all due respect, I am baffled as to how this could possibly count as "broader impacts." You happened to have done research with minorities and a few of your students happen to be non-traditional students? To me, this indicates a random coincidence of events, by no stretch an active effort to reach out to a diverse community. It is like saying "Gossip Girl" is a diverse TV show because a few of the minor characters happen to be Asian. I am not trying to tear down your work, honestly, but I hope NSF's standards for broader impacts are little more meaningful.

I agree, that's a pretty broad list without knowing exactly what you want to do. Quant, qual, modeling / conflict, institutions, democracy, etc. I would, however, be wary of the California publics as they are facing a long-term state budget crisis that is affecting their faculty and students. Ask hard questions about funding guarantees and watch closely for placement of recent grads and movement of faculty.