Brown University Financial Aid Family contribution differences

UrbanMum
Fri, 15 Jun 2018 20:00:16 +0000

@MrAmerican15 ~

I’m starting to wonder if there is something wrong with Brown’s financial aid calculator. I went to the following college websites and input into the calculator exactly the same data (income, home equity etc) and here are the results for expected family contribution:

$21,891 Haverford
$24,412 Georgetown
$19,224 Swarthmore
$24,924 Cornell
$20,600 Amherst
$45,809 Brown

Note how they are all close with the exception of Brown.

A week later, I did another comparison for an upcoming college seminar at D’s school. I ran the numbers for a low income family of 4, non homeowners. Not only was the expected contribution for Brown twice as much as the others, the Pell Grant was calculated at half the amount every other college used. I understand each school has their own formula but this strikes me as odd.