Hey, OSUforMe. Well, the article I cited above that says Harvard still has loans is from Dec 8, 2007. The article you cited is dated Dec 11, and says they just eliminated them the day before (the 10th). So, I guess you're right that Harvard no longer has loans. But it just happened two weeks ago and hasn't actually happened for the students yet until a new semester. I just hadn't heard about it yet....
Harvard is most definitely on a different level of fin aid than Duke and is far far more generous to middle and upper middle class students. Families that make up to $180,000 only have to pay 10% of their annual income. Duke's new announcement for lower and lower-middle class is good, but the upper-middle class doesn't seem to be getting that much relief.
Everybody's experience with financial aid seems to be very individualized and packages at one school are not always better than another for every student (although there are exceptions; e.g. Harvard's package > Duke > Northwestern). I guess they take different things into account. Personally, Duke has been very generous to me, although paying back $22,000 is not going to be that much fun....but it's worth it!
