ugadog99

I'm curious as to what kind of aid some of the colleges on my daughter's list might give. Before anyone suggests, I have used the Financial Calculator on each school's site. However, I would like some first hand knowledge, or maybe second hand knowledge.

If you know how generous...or not, any of these schools are, please let me know. My daughter's GPA will end in the 3.3 ish range with not good test scores. I don't think academic merit will be in her package. We are probably looking at more need based and talent based aid, I think.

Here are the schools:
Point Park
Purchase
Virginia Commonwealth
Shenandoah
Webster
Evansville
University of Central Florida
UNCSA
Otterbein

Thanks!

OperaDad

I have no idea. But, the school's financial aid website should tell you whether they:

1) Meet need with all grants (some say no loans); and
2) Award Merit aid.

Most schools will give you a package to meet Need (difference between Cost to Attend and EFC - Expected Family Contribution). Your EFC will be the same for all the colleges, so the difference is how the school meets the need (you don't want loans).

Then, you want to find out if they offer merit scholarships. Those schools are the ones that can cut down how much of the EFC you have to come up with.

aunt bea

It doesn't appear she'll qualify for Merit aid which is given for high gpa's and test scores. Need based aid is based on income and formula's for arriving at those numbers. Most aid is in the form of loans.

NJTheatreMOM

Generally, the most selective auditioned BFA programs don't offer talent grants because they don't need to do so in order to attract highly qualified applicants. For example, I doubt that SUNY Purchase and UNCSA would award talent grants.

I have seen posts here about NYU talent grants, but very few posts about talent grants from other schools. Probably this is something you should contact the individual schools about, if you don't see the information on their website.

ugadog99

Interesting information, thank you all. I'll go back and look at the websites and message if needed. Thanks!

theater mom

Just a note in response to NJTheaterMOM. Schools don't need to attract talented acting students but they may need to attract the best tech students.

ugadog99

That is what we have heard, theater mom, in regards to tech kids. That's what I'm hoping, anyway.

madbean

Let us know, ugadog99. Anecdotally, we found being a design kid with strong portfolio and strong stats seemed to make admissions to even the top programs matches. However, merit aid is never easy, alas, for most everyone. However, my son's experience was not with the schools on your list so I'm sure it would be helpful to many to hear about merit at those schools. And best of luck. You are doing a lot of good research.

AdaQuince

It seems kind of a bummer that schools are trending away from talent-based scholarships. Maybe this is a wrong assumption, but based on the comments above, as well as a similar statement made by an admissions rep at Syracuse, it appears to be true. This only means that the top conservatories, most with very high price tags, are really only for those students who have parents with deep pockets or qualify for massive financial aid packages or are willing to go into mountain-loads of debt. This is quite a disappointment for some very talented students who's parents work to make enough to pay the bills and sock some money away, though not enough to pay for most of these schools--yet are millionaires according to FAFSA standards and only qualify for student loans.

madbean

It is a shame, AdaQ. It appears that the schools who offer the best/most merit aid are a) well endowed (heh) and b) in a race to climb the USNews rankings. They use their merit aid to enroll highly statted (affects rankings) kids. Alas, there is not a ranking criteria that rewards universities for having talented students in the arts. If there was, I suspect we'd see a sudden increase in merit awards. It is to sigh.

stagemum

My son is at UArts, where he received a fairly generous talent scholarship. He did not have good grades, although his SAT scores were solid (with one stellar Critical Reading score). We can assume that his audition was good, but he used the same monologue, with more rehearsal time, at DePaul and Mason Gross, and was not even called back (I name those two schools specifically, because they base admissions overwhelmingly on talent, so his academic record would not have been much of an issue). He has heard that UArts is even more generous with students in its visual arts programs; his friends in those departments seem to have received larger scholarships. The talent award would not cover all need by itself, or even in conjunction with a Stafford Loan, but it certainly brought the price-tag down significantly.