goonymom

Sybbie, I didn't mean to imply that I thought YOU had posted about applying to the state schools, but I have seen that type of comment posted a number of times.

In my personal experience, it was MUCH cheaper to go to the private school than it would have been to go to the local state school. That has proved true for my child as well, except not the *much* part. My child has known right along that finances will play a huge part, and she's definitely weeding out colleges that are LEAST affordable. However, all of them are going to stretch our resources, and that's where *I* have to really make some decisions about how much debt I'm willing to take on for my children, and how much they will have to take on.

I have found your posts very informative, and I read the link someone posted to the long paper on the college board website, but again, I think until you have firm numbers to apply to your own individual situation, it's very hard to wrap your head around the calculators and theories and statistics.

pdoshi88

MY EFC is 13k and BU offered me 16,500....how do they expect me to pay more than double my EFC??

LIMOMOF2

I am one of those parents who started researching financial aid options early. Like Curmudgeon was, I am afraid of my high-achieving D falling through the cracks when it comes to financial aid. Together we have come up with a few good options, but I'm still working on it (D is a hs sophomore, so I have a little more time). She really isn't excited about any of our state schools which would be the financial safeties (although as Sybbie pointed out, it may cost less to send her to a private since our state schools are not generous with their aid packages).

Anyway, I just wanted to say thanks to everybody for posting their information - I'm finding it all very helpful. Realistically, I do not want to saddle either my D or myself with too many loans - I just can't see the sense in that, even for a dream school. At least now I know that schools may include loans when they say they meet 100% of a student's demonstrated need and I can look into which schools are less likely to include loans as part of the package - at least when it comes to crazy loan amounts.

sybbie719

BU is pretty straight up regarding their financial aid policy.

they state:

In addition they tell you the probability of receiving scholarships/need based grants (click on the link)

Boston University - Office of Financial Assistance - Applying for Financial Aid

when looking at the table, do you think that your grades GPA were aligned with the amount of $$ you received from BU?

pdoshi88

I have a 3.27 UW, hardest course load (7 APs and the rest Honors), and a 33 ACT score...and since my EFC is 13,000 and cost to attend BU is 49,000...Estimated need is 49-13 = 36,000...and according to that table I should get at least 30,000 in aid if not more...I don't know what went wrong...

deb922

Even though I expected it Rose Hulman's package was disappointing. Our EFC is $11,000. They expected us to pay $15,000 and gave our D $10,000 worth of loans. We received other packages that have more grants and less loans for our D. I had hoped that RHIT would be more in line with other schools but it's too heavy on loans and she will accept another offer.

purplexed

Tokenadult asks: "What I'm especially looking for are colleges that "gap" in their need-based financial aid, or that imply they have lots of "merit" scholarships but don't always award those even to very high-academic students."

We don't have all the data in at my house, but I suspect this year for merit money is very different than years past, because of the demographics and heavy competition. And I suspect the overall picture on this thread won't emerge for awhile. Some of the schools getting hated right now might not be the worst -- they just might be the earliest.

I think -- and hope -- the merit money will remain quite fluid, with multiple offers in hand for some top top students. Many schools imply they have lots of "merit" scholarships and use them to increase cultural and geographic diversity and compete at the moment for the top 1-percenter students. When those students turn down some offers, what will happen to that merit money? Have the accountants already figured out that "actuarial nightmare?"

The process is not over, and won't be until those top 1-percent students make their commitments. Will there be "trickle down" then? We'll see.

tokenadult

I think that's right. This discussion will have to continue for a while to take into account the colleges that haven't announced any offers yet this year.

purplexed

Question dear moderator:
I haven't seen a thread yet that explores the admit and merit award successes based on gender. I know it's off-topic for this thread, and I don't mean to be divisive, but the kids (especially the girls) are talking about it at school when they compare results.
Would a separate thread exploring that question be fruitful in terms of trying to determine facts? Or does it just have to wait until statistics are released by the schools later?

thumper1

I will weigh in on the public instate university issue. IF your EFC is in excess of the cost of attendance at most private schools, and you do not receive merit aid (from those privates that DO offer it), your in state public university will be your best bet financially. The reality is that if your EFC is in the $40,000 range (and with two parents working in professional jobs, that is not an unrealistic amount), you aren't going to get huge aid at the private schools either. For families with more modest incomes and lower EFC's, it is very possible that the need based aid provided by the privates will bring their cost down to the same amount or less than these folks would be paying out of pocket to attend the public U. Public U's don't have a lot of their own institutional money (in most cases).

So...if your EFC is very high, and your instate U costs in the $18K-$20K range, it might well turn out to be your financial safety.

If your EFC is lower, and your income and assets are also in a lower range, the private universities that meet a high percentage of need could cost you less than a public university.

The key here is you need to know the %age of aid the private school will meet. If it's less than 100%, all bets are off...or as they say YMMV.

ucacheer2213

It really sucks ,when you get in to really good schools ,but can't attend due to high costs!! There are many schools I would like to attend, but can't, because I will still have to fork out around 25k a year. There is no way I can afford that, since I want to be a teacher after college and I have little college savings.

momwith3

First of all, I think many of these posts can be very deceiving. Many people are presenting their Federal EFC and then discussing how a school that used the profile "gapped" their aid. My federal EFC is 7200, when I ran it as an estimate that's exactly where it came in at. When I ran the calculator to determine my institutional EFC it came up at about 23K. That was the number I used to determine if the profile schools met our need. I certainly don't like the fact that I live on Long Island and my home is overvalued, but everyone has at least one problem with the way financial aid is calculated.

Anyway, FASFA schools - Pretty much what I expected:

Penn State COA 34K, $2000 scholarship, $3500 subsidized loan
SUNY at Buffalo COA 18ish- 2500 scholarship, 4300 loans
Alfred State (more of a moral booster than a safety) full-ride (not going though)

Profile School:

Tulane COA 50K, 18500 need based scholarship, 2500 WS, 5000 loans
total aid $26000, our cost $24000, gapped us by 1K based on institutional methodology.
Unfortunately my husband lost his job in November so we no longer have the option of borrowing against our home so we will not accept this offer. But even though the gap was $17K from our federal EFC it's a very fair offer using institutional methodology (EFC 23K).

One note about BU. In addition to using the chart, they also use the profile which probably explains the gap.

sybbie719

momwith3 ,

Sorry to hear about your husband's job loss. If you have not already done so, before you take it off the table, you should definitely contact Tulane regarding a financial review (especially if it is high on your child's list) since the loss of job is a change in circumstance for which they will certainly grant you a financial review.

Just have no shame and totally lay out your financial situation out to them. You have nothing to lose at least if they can bring it in line with what it would cost your family out of pocket to attend buffalo, would it then be a feasible option for your family?

all the best

S

Muffy333

momwith3-You're absolutely right, I guess it would be helpful to know how actual aid compares to what people were expecting when they ran numbers on one of the website calculators showing institutional methodology. There's a difference of about $18,000 for me between FAFSA estimate and the "institutional methodology estimate" so I shouldn't be shocked if a private school expected me to pay $18,000 over my FAFSA EFC.

I'm sorry about your husband's job. SUNY Buffalo is really popular at my kids' hs; I'm feeling guilty about letting my daughter look at non-SUNYs because so many of our wealthier neighbors' kids love Buffalo!

aunt bea

IF your EFC is in excess of the cost of attendance at most private schools, and you do not receive merit aid (from those privates that DO offer it), your in state public university will be your best bet financially.

What if you live in California and have paid high California taxes for 25-30 years, and your public in-state schools don't admit you? My daughter was rejected from several UC campuses-4.0 top 10%, 6 AP classes. Her friend applied to 6 UC campuses, was rejected at 5, and was waitlisted at UCI only to be told on Friday that she was not admitted. I agree that our public in-state schools are the best bet for our California kids, but when they can't even get in, it makes you really angry.