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Early decision question (from a parent of a junior)
Stellaluna27
Registered User Posts: 22 Junior Member
My daughter will be applying to college this fall. She has a definite top-choice dream school, plus will be applying to about 5-6 other schools that are less competitive. She's saying she wants to apply ED. I'm nervous about it because the potential for scholarship money is much greater at all of the schools except her top choice (of course, it's the most competitive). I'm nervous letting her apply ED and being forced to pay $45K a year when she would be pretty likely to get large scholarships from her other schools and we'd pay half that or less. Am I missing something, or is that how it's supposed to work? Should the kid want to go to a school so badly they are committed to paying full price, no matter what the $$$ is like elsewhere?
Replies to: Early decision question (from a parent of a junior)
Run the Net Price Calculator (NPC) for each of the colleges under consideration, and print out the results. That's about the amount for which the college will put your family on the hook. Then sit down with your daughter, explain what the NPC does, and show her the printouts. Explain that there are additional costs not covered by the NPC (travel costs, money to go out with friends, snacks for the dorm room, a laptop, books, phone bills, etc.). Tell her what you can afford to pay or are willing to pay (those numbers may or may not be different from each other - and different again from the NPC results). Explain that students are limited to $5,500 in loans their first year of college and that you will not jeopardize your retirement by cosigning any additional loans.
At that point it should be abundantly clear to her what she is up against. You can encourage her to apply to the dream school, but you need to make it crystal clear that you have laid it all out honestly in terms of finances, so if financial aid isn't forthcoming she is going to have to turn down that school.
If your daughter applies ED, she can turn the school down if it is unaffordable. Run the NPC before she applies, and print out the results. If the financial aid offer doesn't come close to the NPC, you'd have grounds to decline the ED offer. Insist that your daughter apply EA (if no conflict with ED agreement) or rolling admissions to one of the other schools before the ED app is submitted. This could turn into an ugly situation, which is why I suggest spelling everything out for DD up front. She may not be happy, but she can't say you aren't being fair.
https://finaid.vt.edu/content/dam/finaid_vt_edu/Cost_of_Attendance/Final COA OutState 1819_UG.pdf
On my kid's list are a school with guaranteed merit, three with competitive merit, and one with need-based only - and that last one is the most expensive even if no merit is awarded anywhere. There's a $30k difference between the bottom and the top, but we could afford the most expensive without debt. It took a lot of hard parental discussion before we decided (and explained) what role price was going to play in the final decision.
The next thought some have is "what if we don't withdraw the other apps to see what they offer?" For many ED programs the GC is required to sign as well as the student and parent. The GC can notify the other schools of the ED offer, can refuse to send out official transcripts to other schools if the ED offer is not declined. Colleges may also exchange info about ED offers.