Bait&Switch

"I fail to understand how it would cost ANYONE $200K unless your parents have an EFC of 50,000 and are not willing to pay. If you're poor, MIT (or any other top school for that matter) has fantastic fin aid."

Agreed, the Ivies etc. DO have great fin.aid- but the OP never mentioned that he was "poor".

I'm an independent student myself... but my younger sisters get the short end of the stick: my dad makes over $200K, but has 5 children still at home, and a wife, and the cost of living where my parents are is high. Divide $200K by 7, and factor in the area's high costs and also TAXES, and his salary just covers the bases. But on paper, my father is "rich". So my sisters get NO financial aid, and as a result, my parents spend over $60K on education ALONE every year(and climbing, as more of my sibs go to college). Someone who makes half as much money in a low cost of living area probably lives more comfortably and has more disposable income available.

See where I'm going with this? If the OP's anything like most of us, he or she probably doesn't have the money to pay for a private like MIT, and they also probably don't qualify for enough aid to really close the gap between MIT and UVA.

Tadd89

Bait&Switch is correct on all accounts. My financial situation is actually opposite his family's, but the outcome is the same. We have a comparatively low income (less than half 200k, you do the math) but rather high assets. The fact that my parents have been saving all their lives and will be retiring in less than five years (and thus drawing from those savings) is apparently not factored into whatever equations fin-aid offices use: all the online calculators we've plugged numbers into have spat out ridiculous EFCs.

I guess by some twisted logic the EFC is correct... could we afford a 200k education? Technically, yes. But realistically, not really.

Of course, in my case the decision will probably be made for me, as I doubt I'll get into MIT. But it's an interesting topic nevertheless. Financial aid is supposed to open up an "elite" education to the widest range of socioeconomic situations possible, right? And yet the prohibitive price tag and lack of aid still excludes a large portion of the middle class from attending, in favor of the much small portions of the population bell curve: the extremely rich (who never needed aid) and the extremely poor (who get full aid).

I guess it makes sense, from a university's point of view. Meet 100% of need and spend the least money doing so. The lower your income, the higher your aid. But lower income also correlates to lower academic opportunities, so very few academically qualified "poor" candidates actually apply.

Am I saying that someone from a low-income family with the stats and aptitude shouldn't get aid to go to a top private? Of course not. Someone who managed to come out of a crappy HS with higher SATs than some rich kid who went to boarding school and had a private tutor certainly deserves the same opportunities.

But the fact remains that a kid who went to a mediocre rural high school and who doesn't want his parents to live in poverty 20 years from now because he broke their retirement savings deserves opportunities too, doesn't he/she?

But whatever. Life isn't fair. Ignore the ramblings of a bored student waiting for his next class to start.