If Bill did that well on his PSAT, it shouldn't be too tough for him to find a school that will let him go free, or nearly so. I don't know about your state, but I know that the University of Maryland system is pretty good about offering attractive merit-based scholarships to Maryland students who do really well on the PSAT/SAT and have good grades (and they have processes to evaluate fairly homeschoolers).
Our older son is actually a Semi-Finalist (and I expect will be a Finalist in the spring), and he gets unsolicited offers every week for merit-based scholarships for all sorts of out-of-state schools that basically say, “Apply - if you're half as good as your PSAT/SAT score - you can come here for free or almost free.”
A couple of schools have offered tuition, room, board, and a stipend, as well.
As well, the really top schools (I don't know if Bill has an interest in them) also give the best financial aid. And they count family size when figuring out aid packages!
As we've looked for the older son, we've found that schools like Harvard, Princeton and Yale offer the best financial aid packages, and schools like Notre Dame, Washington University in St. Louis, University of Virginia and Johns Hopkins aren't slouches in that department, either.
It's not too late for Bill to apply to some really good schools, if that's what he'd like to do!
sitetest
Thank you! One of my friends is a database consultant, or something of that nature, part-time, and one of the databases she keeps up is a national scholarship listing: everything from your “left-handed low-income American Indian from Wyoming” to the Gatling Gun scholarship (anyone named Gatling or Gatlin who meets the basic standards can go to East Carolina University for free).
Bill is limited only by his own motivation. He probably could get into Yale or University of Chicago - they’ve been sending him stuff since his PSAT score was posted - but he might be paralyzed if he wound up in such an alien environment. He doesn’t handle new things well! If he wanted to try it, we’d support him, but I think he’s the best judge of what challenges he’s ready to face.
One of his friends from Boy Scouts - Eagle Scout, all the right grades and scores and AP exams, big star at Butler High - went to UNC-Chapel Hill and just wasn’t ready to deal with the independence. He only passed three or four classes in a year. I saw the same thing with some kids who got into Trinity on scholarship back in ‘84-’85, and it happened when my brother went to Duke in 1982. (He eventually had an outstanding Air Force career and got his Master’s from U of Md overseas extension while posted in England.)
I think it’s a lot easier, personally and financially, to take off from a cautious start than it is to recover from a disastrous overreach. Obviously that’s not every student’s position, but they show us what they’re really ready to tackle *right now*, if we’re paying attention. If Bill is ready to tackle Yale or Clemson or Appalachian State next fall, he’ll show us by getting the applications started (as we’ve mentioned many times ;-), just like Anoreth said, “I’m a graduate!” when she was 17, and went over to Central Piedmont, took the placement tests, signed up, and then called me to come over and write a check.