<p>My son received a $10K/year scholarship, but only around $7K/year Alumni award. Not counting the student loans he can get, it still leaves about $47K/year we have to pay out of pocket. Over 4 years, this amounts to us basically buying another house. This is his dream school, but I don’t know how we can make it work on this relatively small amount of “free” money. Has anyone ever received any sort of additional financial aid?</p>
<p>@Babbott I am a current student at George Washington, and all I can say is that you should reach out to the Office of Financial Assistance and see if you can come to a compromise for more aid. The need-based aid is granted on the basis of financial need, so the less need your family has—the smaller the award. I would say that most of the time these awards are final offers. There might be some slight adjustments by getting in touch with them, but the numbers you have now are good estimates of all they’re willing to give you.</p>
<p>Everything else is essentially out of pocket or paid through external funding. </p>
I agree with @GWU2018 in that there’s probably not much more than what they already offered. You should definitely talk to them, however, because your son might qualify for aid that the Financial Aid office didn’t know he was eligible for. For me, I was eligible for more money than initially offered because the Financial Aid office found out I was a veteran. Apparently the school had two lesser-known scholarships that few qualified for.
Good luck! I really hope your son gets a chance to attend his dream school, but don’t let it be a financial burden!