muskratsam

"Even if it's not subsidized, the student plan is often much better and/or cheaper than a "market" plan because the insurance company knows that, in general, a group of students in their 20s are much less likely to have high medical bills than the open market, which includes people of all ages! " This isn't really how it works under the ACA. Plans are priced by age groups, so even in the open market right now, you are still priced along with other people your age. A 22 year old pays a lot less than 50 year old in the current market. I would look carefully at the coverage offered by a school plan before accepting it. If it isn't sufficient for your needs, that could be a big problem if the individual market falls apart in the next couple of years (as it very well might).

Starting out: Montana State - Feb 23-26

I have been mulling this, and am unclear on how to best calculate this. Let's say I have an offer with a $20K stipend in a location with a Cost of Living Index of 97. And I have one for $24K from a location with a COL of 110. How do I turn those into "like for like" dollars for comparison purposes? It certainly isn't the main way I plan to pick a program, but I'd like to be able to compare them, and the calculation is not obvious to me. The range of COLs for the programs I applied to is really wide (89-148). Can anyone help? Thanks!

I went ahead and resent them everywhere. One school required paper (not parchment), and a couple days after I had them mailed they contacted me to see my fall semester grade. So I guess I might be on the cusp of being considered. They took an unofficial copy so they could see the grades, so fingers crossed that it is a good sign that they asked!

So my fall grades are significantly better this semester than previous semesters (think 3.7 vs low 3s before). Adding this semester in pulls up my overall and major GPA by over .1 each. My college is P/F first semester of freshman year, so maybe one semester can have a bigger impact for us than at other colleges (fewer semesters counted in the GPA). Many of my applications were due by Jan. 1, and grades come out formally on Jan. 3. I went ahead and applied with the old transcript to make the funding deadline. But I think it makes sense to send along a new one (ideally through parchment so it gets there ASAP) as soon as the grades are out, or upload the new transcipt if the school allows uploads after the application is submitted. Are there any reasons that I wouldn't do this? GPA is the weakest part of my app -- I have strong GREs, subject test GREs, research experience, and recommendations. As an aside, it is frustrating that schools don't clearly indicate the email address where Parchment versions of transcripts should be sent. Seems like this question would come up a lot.

Some of the other majors have started a running list of when the visit weekends are for various programs. This seems super helpful (so even if you have not heard back, you could know when the programs are having those visit times so you can try to figure out if you might have conflicts depending on your acceptances). I don't have any knowledge of any specific ones yet. But if anyone else does and could start the list, we can all just add them as we find out. Just copy the list into your new post each time, and add whatever you know to it, so the last post always has the most up to date list. Thanks, everyone, and good luck!

I think it would be okay to say that the financial offer was miscommunicated and not workable. That is not a lie.