MikeNdaMaddawg

Hey. I was just looking at NYU Stern (undergrad). Apparently costs are enormously ridiculous, running along the lines of $65,000 for tuition + room and board. Anyone know what kind of financial aid they give/merit based scholarship? If it helps, I'm rank 3rd in my school, 2310 on SAT's, and 234 on PSAT. My family income is around 100,000 a year. My mom got laid off last year, but she recently picked up another job. Would NYU Stern give me any money? Oh and regarding Financial Aid, applying to NYU Stern would be the same as applying to NYU Tisch? Like applying to the different undergrad schools wouldn't affect my financial aid chances would it?

And, I've been talking to my parents about applying to Columbia University early decision. I know early decision hurts your financial aid chances and that Columbia doesn't give merit-based scholarship. But would Columbia give me nothing if I applied there early decision?

garland

Columbia follows the same formula for ED and RD admits as far as FA. I don't know if you'd qualify for FA there, but if you do, ED won't hurt it.

MikeNdaMaddawg

Really. That's interesting. Are you sure about this? Can anyone confirm this? If so, I'm definetly applying to Columbia ED.

garland

I'm not privy to their inner discussions. however, the tiny minority of schools which are meets-full-need schools, who adhere to pretty strict guidelines, follow fairly coherent algorhythms. Many students and parents here have written that the ED packages they receive are similar to what they calculate at good online sites. You can't pledge to meet full need, then manipulate that to stiff ED'ers, and maintain credibility as a full-need school. OTOH, there are other schools who may calculate need differently, so may offer more or less money, and some which offer merit. You lose the ability to compare these with ED.

I have confidence that, if you use a good online calculator honestly with good numbers, you can get an accurate figure of what CU will offer. And that offer will be the same ED or RD. If you can live with that, go ED. If you want the chance to compare, don't.

Edit: to add to this, we didn't apply for FA when S applied. We knew we didn't qualify. But two years later, our circumstances changed, and we did apply. They were under no obligation to give him aid; he was already a CU student. Yet ,we were awarded just about exactly the aid I had calculated we would get.

hmom5

Columbia will give you the same aid ED or RD, but the question is have you figured out if your family can afford it? Columbia meets 100% of need so it shpuld not be hard to calculate what they expect you to pay.

NYU is a wild card. They don't meet need and give their money to students they really want.