It's really not hard to get a free ride even if you're not top 0.00001%.
I did not give a crap about high school. I graduated with a 3.3 GPA, 1910 SAT (taken once sophomore year and should have retaken), and a 34 ACT.
I got a full ride honors program scholarship to a second tier state university that is still a very good school, just not nationally known.
Kids that know their limits (self-imposed or natural) are much more likely to get a free ride to an appropriate school. I did apply for a couple high end private liberal arts colleges and got either waitlisted or accepted with no aid. I did not apply to any Ivies because there was no point.
It's all about finding the best fit. Ironically my honors program school ended up not being the best fit, and I later ended up at a community college, where I also got a free ride, through a combination of federal grants, state grants, merit aid from the school, and a private scholarship I wrote an essay for.
It's really not all that difficult as long as you're applying to/attending a school that matches up with your previous academic achievements and put a little effort into apply for aid and selling yourself. Even if you don't have the academic record to back it up. I had a friend who did terribly in high school, worked for several years, and returned to college at 26 or 27. He received multiple scholarships at the community college I ended up at, but he did have to put a significant amount of effort into writing essays explaining why he deserved them.
And as much as this is a bit painful for me to admit, there are some kids who should not be in college. As a 17 year old freshman with no idea what career path to take, I was one of those kids. I learned that the hard way and spent a year working minimum wage after dropping out before I realized that I was not prepared for that to be the rest of my life. Since then, I have worked significantly harder at school and various jobs because I know what my future would look like without a college education. In my classes, I am constantly annoyed by kids (lol I'm only 23 but...) who have the same attitude I did -- and I wonder WHY they're actually in school. It's because in many towns, especially in the Northeast (at least that's my experience), going to college is seen as the only legitimate step after high school. It's something that's expected and never questioned -- I remember planning college course schedules in middle school (before I got off the high-achiever bandwagon). This is not a sustainable situation. Perhaps, if your kid hasn't qualified for a single penny of school-granted merit aid, hasn't put a single ounce of effort into applying for separate scholarships, and hasn't worked a minute to save up for college, you should be asking yourself if they really WANT to go or if they're really READY for it?