I think that outside of the CC world, people don’t differentiate between need based aid and merit aid. Financial aid includes both. When people speak of transfer aid, I think they do mean merit aid. Need based aid at our state publics are entitlements. Families already know if they qualify for those grants. It’s the merit aid offered by the schools that they aren’t sure about.
Are there a lot of colleges that offer great merit aid to transfers? I don’t mean the highly selective schools that meet need. I mean colleges that students have reasonable acceptance rates. Why would they be willing to pay for transfers? I thought the purpose of merit aid was to buy freshman stats to help their ratings.