alej414

I was disappointed by Duke as well. $3500 loan, and thats it. I have no idea how they expect my family to pay the rest.. I guess I'll have to stay local for college.

KryptoniteMan

if only the u.s. government actually allocated money into helping students pay for college instead of paying for death in iraq ...

Texasmama

I'll second that, Kryptonite.

tokenadult

It does and it has for most of my lifetime--all of my lifetime, for sure, if federal support for research activities at colleges and the G.I. Bill are included. But some economists argue that a lot of third-party payment for any kind of service just tends to drive up the list price, because the ultimate customers are less price-conscious than they would be if they were paying directly out of pocket.

ch3micalboy

Franklin Pierce University. Awarded B 13,000. Did not even attempt to meet my EFC of 4000. If B wants to attend, we would have to pay 20,000+ yearly.

sybbie719

One of the main themes that I see here is a lack of understanding for what exactly EFC (Expected FAMILY Contribution) means.

NO school is going to meet your EFC.

finnancial aid is based on the following premise:

Cost of attendance - EFC (Expected FAMILY Contribution) = demonstrated need.

If your EFC is $4,000, this is how much the school expects you and your family (based on the income & assets of you, your parent and in cases of divorce and remarriage, your stepparents) to pay toward your education and barring a full ride (where everything is covered) no school in the country is going to pay this for you.

northeastmom

sybbie, I understood post # 65 to mean that with an efc of 4,000, they were gapped and were being asked to pay 20,000 rather than 4,000 (which only schools meeting 100% of need are likely to offer, and that can be in the form of loans, w/s, and grants in various combinations). Interestingly, in USNews FP does not have its endowment listed, nor any financial aid information.

citrusbelt

Yes, the fafsa assumes your parents have been saving. Many parents can't/don't. If nothing has been saved don't be surprised at the number it spits out.

My D was given sad FA to Smith. It is really quite incongruent when looking at the wonderful offers she has received at other, equally nice schools. Her offers have varied over 22K! Amazing.

Sybbie, some schools DO meet the need even if it is really high. Some meet the need all in grant with no loans. It depends entirely on the whims of the school. Everyone should have a financial safety that they could pay for without any help. For some (like those with a 4K fafsa efc) that would be a community college.

LOoBnEr

i got absolutely nothing from yale, northwestern and duke

sybbie719

Of course every schools meet need s your need however, the vast majority of them do not meet 100% of your demonstrated need. From the school's perspective giving loans are considered need (while I don't agree with this concept, this is their beleif)

Amongst the schools that meet 100% demonstrated need giving large amounts of grant aid or having low income/no loan inititatives, these are amongest the most competitive to gain admission.

However, my comment goes to the belief that schools should meet their EFC which is totally different from meeting their demonstrated need.

Regarding ch3micalboy's post #65...

According to the college board the FA stats of Franklin Pierce are as follows:

In-state tuition and fees: $26,816
Out-of-state tuition and fees: $26,816
Room and board: $8,640
Books and supplies: $896
Estimated personal expenses: $1,200
Transportation expense: $572

Cost of attendance $38,124

EFC = 4000

Need $32,124

Student probably eligible for very little Pell based on EFC. Possible package
ch3micalboy received may be as follows:

Minimum pell 400
possible ACG 750
Stafford Loan 3500
Possilbe Perkins loan 4000 (if family is not eligible for PLUS, this amount could we swapped out for unsubsidized Stafford loan)
Work study 1500
Merit $ 13,000

FA Package $22,750

22,750/32,124 = 70.81%

unmet need + EFC = 9374+ 4000 (efc) = $13,374


Looks like Franklin Pierce did pretty close to what they said they would do.

goaliedad

Uh, Yale is need-only FA. Checking your posting history, you have income listed as 220,000. I would think that with that level of income, unless there is something else going on (like 3 other siblings in college), you wouldn't be expecting need-based aid from Yale. Could have seen that one coming. No reason to be surprised or disappointed.

Congratulations on the free-ride from USC, though. It is well-earned merit money.

tokenadult

I see various kinds of replies in this thread, and I'll make some friendly suggestions here about what kind of information I'm looking for, which I think will be helpful to other readers. 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.

For example, in the need-based aid situation, it would be helpful to lay out basic facts such as this example (based on what I know about my own family size and children's assets, hypothetical as to what our income and taxes will be in the application year and what some college would do about the facts):

My family fits within the scope of the 2006 Harvard financial aid announcement.

http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/...30-finaid.html

[If your family had a higher income, you could say you don't fit in that range.]

Our FAFSA EFC is in the range of

< 3,000

Our Institutional Method (PROFILE) EFC is in the range of

< 3,000

according to the College Board website. [If you filed forms this year, you should have a reported EFC by one method or both for this year. Parents like me who have to plan ahead can use the College Board EFC calculator

http://apps.collegeboard.com/fincalc/efc_welcome.jsp

with as many real numbers as we know will be true in the application year and whatever is a reasonable estimate to get a ballpark figure.]

The aid offer from [College X, by an online estimator] had our family paying out of pocket a figure within the range of our EFC, with our child paying about $2,000 from summer earnings and a portion of assets (gifts to minors account).

[You would, of course, write something like "The aid offer from College X has our family paying $20,000 more out of pocket next year than what our EFC is," or whatever the facts are.]

In the case of disappointment about merit scholarships, maybe the statement of facts would be along the lines of "Our child has SAT scores above the college's enrolled class 75th percentile on all three sections, an ACT composite score above the college's 75th percentile, a 4.0 unweighted high school grade average in honors courses, an AP scholar award, and merit scholarship offers from other colleges, but Skinflint College only offered us a $5,000 Presidential One-Year Grant, and we still have to pay $20,000 out of pocket this year after all grants and loans are considered." Or whatever.

And of course YOU get to decide what level of detail to share, if any at all. I don't mean to pry, but I'm trying to make sure I'm comparing facts about different colleges on a comparable basis.

beltwaymom

Does anyone know if the new financial aid practices put into place by Harvard --financial aid for upper mid income 200K and under--and copied- or atleast marketed by other ivies and elite LACs-- is really working?

We have mid income of 150 K, asib in 20k high school and live in expensive major metro area- downside we have lots of home equity--anyone know if there's a chance in the sky that we could get aid?

goaliedad

tokenadult,

I think that many posters here didn't do the level of research you did in their college search, or the data on which to make their judgement was not available (not all schools have good FA data available).

That being said, the idea of this thread being here to discuss the variability in grants is valid, as it is seen in many threads in various colleges alredy mentioned in this thread. Bringing them all together isn't a bad thing, but can often lead to a large and hard to manage thread. My $.02

sueinphilly

the problem is that people didn't research what the EFC is about and how financial aid SHOULD impact their college search before the applications go in.

fwiw, ANYBODY with income of 150K is not middle class. that is the top 5% or less of ALL incomes. Living in a high cost area isn't part of the equation. Home equity doesn't count on the FAFSA.

WAY too many people with 20K EFC (and claiming they can not afford that) applying to 50K colleges and expecting 'free money' to make up the difference. Yes, there are grants and scholarships given out to SOME. But there is no way that everyone who 'needs' it is going to get that much.

Parents should be running EFC numbers nlt the beginning of junior year so they can get a clue. Better yet, at the beginning of high school.

Middle class people (and that means less than 1/2 of 150K) need to live frugally for many many many years to save up to pay an EFC of 10-12K a year.

Truly low income families who qualify for pell grants may seem like they get more free govt money, but I am not jealous of them. Heck I WAS them 10 years ago.

Either get lucky and get a huge scholarship or be prepared to pay up.

In the past 8 years my income went from 40 to 65K. yet I was able to save 60K. Live below your means. If you have food, clothing and shelter, anything else is a WANT, not a need.