Currently a Senior - Thinking too much about College.

Yeah I'll have to just apply for scholarships up the butt, cause I know my mom isn't paying jack for my housing + education.

Apply for work study. It'll ease up on the tuition,give you work experience, and allow you to attend school full time as well. Unfortunately for people like me, I happen to be in the exact middle of income, where there are like 0 scholarships based on financial situations, and also almost 0 for academic merit based ones (and I'm just an average student, so It'snot like my grades are so spectacular either). So basically there are like 3 scholarships that i could apply to, absolutely no grants that i could get, no financial aid, or anything of the kind. I'm just lucky my grandparents and my parents are money wise and saved up for some of my college education (hoping to get a job around town to ease up on the burden of that).

I mean, I knew my class valedictorian got a full scholarship to MIT and she was decently well off. I also know a girl who wasn't so well off and she could pay off an entire years worth of tuition to Stanford. Scholarships are really dependent on how much effort you put into finding them and applying (like the job market unfortunately).

As per your school- you seem to be able to afford at least a couple of years of university (goddamn budget cuts and tuition raises >.>). This gives you time to be able to figure out where you can apply to (if you base your decision off financials). Cal State universities are cheaper in comparison to the UCs for an approximately the same education levels; UCs are mainly for prestige later on (for example: I go to UCB- Employers will look at that and say "WOW he graduated with a decent GPA. He must be good at something" in comparison to someone who went to say a CC only- yeah it's not supposed to happen, but we all know it does).

Never let money or anything of the like discourage you from going to a school you really want. My cousin didn't apply to CAL because he thought he wouldn't be able to make it in the environment. Some people at my school didn't apply to CAL because they thought their application was gonna be crap compared to everyone else's. The only way you never get in is if you don't apply.

For qualifications- your 17xx would be an amazing grade back in my day (hell i only had an 1860 and got into CAL- Pretty much everyone i know at CAL got 2000+). With budgets in question, the university WILL cap their freshmen class. Since everyone applying will probably be just like you, the higher the better, but it is your personal statement that is a testament to who you are and what makes you an individual. I cannot stress that fact enough. Make a killer statement and have a bunch of your friends and family read it, refine it, and proofread it.