@GoldenRock With all due respect, I have to disagree with you on this one, as it is not really that complicated and comparison with hip surgery is not appropriate.
The school knows exactly what their invoice will look like, with the exception of some fees. The school also knows how various scholarships are going to be applied and what the final bill will look like, since these are costs completely within their control – tuition, fees, room and board (on campus).
Other costs are within parents’ control – transportation, medical, personal expenses etc. – so I want these separated from the above category. I don’t mind if the school takes a shot to estimate these, but I really want to know what THEIR charges are going to be. Most schools have no issues with that.
Here is a perfect example of what I mean – OU NMF package for 2018:
https://ou.edu/content/dam/recruitment/downloads/NMpackage_2018_NonRes.pdf
The very first line says this: “Waives 100% of non-resident tuition”.
What that means to me is exactly what it says – it waves 100% of non-resident tuition. There is no other way to interprete that!
Under second heading, it says this: “Partial resident tuition waiver of $2,000 per year”.
I cannot make sense of it – can you? It raises more questions than it answers.
Based on feedback of great folks here on CC, it appears that OU is making OOS NMF students IS, and than offering $2K/year scholarship. If that’s indeed the case, than the wording at the top needs to be changed to something like “Waives 100% DIFFERENCE between resident and non-resident tuition”. Than it is clear what they mean. In fact, most public schools offer that type of scholarship, and that’s how it is worded – precisely so that parents cannot later claim they were promised OOS tuition waiver!
Again, I am not whining type of person – all I asked the school was to provide clarification. The school responded with $4.2K room scholarship elimination, and the exact wording on tuition changes from this flyer. When I asked for clarification, I got no answer. What that tells me is that they either don’t care (hard to imagine after wonderful visit), don’t know themselves (though they appeared very competent), or are just affraid to spell out bad news completely (most likely). It’s just bad communication all around…