<p>momofthreeboys, I enjoy reading your posts and I hope things work out for you.</p>
<p>Younghoss, the consequence for pulling out of ED is that the college may circulate the student’s name on a list that will be honored by other colleges, which may prevent admission elsewhere. That’s it.</p>
<p>If a tenant backs out of a lease, they aren’t stuck for the whole lease term - just the type of expenses you listed. If a car is returned undamaged to a lot, whatever the purchaser owes will not be the full sticker price on the vehicle. </p>
<p>If I had a kid who applied ED to a school and had serious reservations about attending after acceptance, whether or not finances were involved, I’d be very comfortable allowing my kid to back out. </p>
<p>The college choice is potentially 4 years of the student’s life – and if finances are part of the concern - tens of thousands of dollars worth of debt – weighed against no harm whatsoever to the college, which will fill the slot on the RD round. If they want the slot filled sooner, the college could call up some student deferred ED and invite them to take the slot. </p>
<p>If I had a kid who was engaged to be married – and right on the eve of the wedding the kid voiced serious reservations… I’d also encourage the kid to seriously consider backing out. You are weighing the value of a “promise” against a choice that will have substantial impact on a person’s life and long-term ramifications. Its just not a quid pro quo situation.</p>
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<p>Of course it would be a lot more helpful to some folks if she was accurate</p>
<p>Poetgrl, they suggest you use the “institutional” calculators. We are full pay (but w/merit) at a FAFSA school for S1, but son 2 has three colleges on his list that utilize CSS and one of the three has their “own” on line system (not CSS) and only one is “no-loan”. None of the colleges have a calculator on their website but “suggest” that you use “available” calculators. All the schools have “example” packages of what family “might” receive but the examples are based on income and “normal” assets, but “normal” is not defined, so the examples are of little value to me. I did several of the calculators and the outcomes varied over $10,000 dollars and the outcomes were also well over our federal EFC because of the structure of what is considered “assets.” I don’t like the system, I don’t think it’s “unethical” to quote other posters. Perhaps not transparent. We won’t go “ED” but S2 doesn’t have a “clear favorite” either and the kids are pretty ingrained about our cost tolerances. We’ve managed to save a decent amount of money and will not take out a new mortgage (we own our home) so we’ve been straight with the kids about the budget.</p>
<p>Poetgrl, there are 2 types of calculators online. One are FAFSA (“federal methodology”) calculators and they are usually very accurate. </p>
<p>The other are deemed “institutional methodology” and they purport to weigh in other factors, but I think basically all they do is tack in home equity and raise the expected contribution from the student slightly. Since every college is different, the “institutional methodology” is really guesswork, and not at all useful for predicting financial aid.</p>
<p>calmom:</p>
<p>I do know that different colleges provide different finaid packages. Way back when, someone I know got admitted to both Princeton and MIT (RD). When told of the superior Princeton offer, MIT upped its own a bit, but did not match it. The result was still a $7k per year gap. The student went to Princeton.</p>
<p>My argument is not that colleges offer the same level of aid or that students should know in advance how much they should expect to get. I do not know which, in the end, your D chose to attend. If she is attending the more expensive one, you, she and the college must have determined that while “not too terrific” the finaid package was “not too horrific,” either and that you could afford it with some belt-tightening. If, however, you felt that the belt-tightening would be so extreme as to be unacceptable, then presumably, you would have taken the offer from the more generous college.
Now, with ED, applicants are presumed not to have a means of comparing offers, so their remedy is to discuss the situation with the finaid officer. If these discussions do not resolve the financial issues, then the applicants are released from their ED commitments and free to apply elsewhere. If they then apply to peer institutions, the ED college may have a conniption on the supposition that the peer institution’s finaid package is unlikely to be more generous (not a necessarily accurate supposition).<br>
It looks, however, that ED colleges are not upset over applicants choosing state unis, or colleges that give merit money (at least Columbia is not; Moravian College may be).</p>
<p>Here is what I found on the Moravian website:</p>
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<p>I just reread my post and it reminded me that dstark asked pages ago “what is normal?” with regard to assets. It’s a very, very good question because it is often used by colleges in their materials. I’m just a middle class girl who has led a marginally frugal life with my husband - are we normal? Are we abnormal? I’m not going to bother digging up links as I suspect we’ve all seen the use of that word.</p>
<p>JHS - very nice post (#1058). You really nailed some of the main issues in the FA process.</p>
<p>Talking to some friends involved in the FA process at a few area colleges, the 3 areas of greatest intentional cheating or unintended mistakes in the financial aid process involve:</p>
<ol>
<li>Self employed individuals</li>
<li>Savings and assets</li>
<li>Non-custodial parents</li>
</ol>
<p>These are the same three areas we see in the private school world (I am lucky to sit on our FA committee). You would be amazed at what some people report in these areas</p>
<p>I like that Moravian gives an early read. We have seen that with a few colleges. It is a very consumer friendly thing and I’m sure appreciated by many families even if it requires more work by the institutions. Give those institutions a “thumbs up.”</p>
<p>Thank you Marite, Calmom, and Momofthree for your posts. </p>
<p>Good luck to you all.</p>
<p>Hearing the finaid calculation situation, I am absolutely convinced that colleges are doing the right thing in allowing students the opportunity to evaluate their FA offer before signing on to attend. It seems as if there is a tremendous variance among offers and that the colleges know this, as well, and still would like less financially well-off students to apply ED.</p>
<p>I think this might be a confusing maze to run through as a student without real and expert adult guidance. It is good your kids have your advice!</p>
<p>Good luck to you all.</p>
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<p>So many pages, so many hours spent debating whether/if/how to make binding ED workable and fair, but the boxed quote points out why the entire concept should be round-filed.</p>
<p>High school seniors are not yet grown up (sorry, hs seniors). Often their college choices are just as much a reflection of what their parents or friends want as what is right for them. It is backwards to expect to hold them to a college choice made no more than a couple of months into their senior year of high school. From the students’ perspective, a few more months of maturing and considering options is very valuable.</p>
<p>My oldest kid was a very focused, very independent hs student, and even he changed his mind about his first-choice EA school by the end of April. </p>
<p>None of that is meant as a comment on the OP or the ethics of using loopholes, etc. I just don’t think the ED system is sustainable, and I don’t think there is any merit, from the students’ perspective, in working to sustain it.</p>
<p>Except that schools like locking in top students and money, and students like getting a boost to their dream schools and getting the stress over early. And if needy students know that declining the FA offer is easy, they will apply, making the system mostly fair to all.</p>
<p>When all is said and done I have to agree with you Midmo. I think the concept that it was a benefit to students was pretty much marketing. It’s not unethical, however. The real benefit lies with the institutions. Is there a slight tip to the students? If there is, it is secondary to the institution’s benefit. I’m in marketing and understanding the target market (17 and 18 year olds and their nervous parents) I came to this conclusion pretty quickly. I suspect it’s the flavor of the decade (notice Harvard’s shift already) and will come and go eventually or will be tweaked and formed to conform to the institutions desired results as opposed to the family needs.</p>
<p>
Actually, I think the ED system IS sustainable, precisely because students who change their mind or can’t afford the college are able to back out. It works because only a tiny percentage of students want out – the vast majority are applying ED because they really do want to attend the college, and either they are in fact full pay students or they are satisfied with their financial aid awards. </p>
<p>So the fact that the agreement is unenforceable other than the possibility that the colleges might share their lists creates a safety valve that keeps the system from functional. </p>
<p>The colleges don’t need students who don’t want to be there or who can’t pay the bills. </p>
<p>The purpose of ED for the colleges is simply to fill a large segment of the class early with a high-yield group. They don’t expect 100% enrollment of the ED group and never have. If they have to let a handful of students go each year, that’s partly what keeps the system afloat.</p>
<p>Midmo: Indeed, 17 year-olds are not knowledgeable enough to navigate the ED system. But it is not they, ordinarily, who pay the COA; and both they, parents and GCs must sign off on the application.</p>
<p>poetgrl: Thanks for the good wishes. My kids are out of college though we are still paying down the debt we took on to pay both full fares.</p>
<p>Agree with Calmom #1074.
Harvard abandoned SCEA because it can rely on high yield. Not every college can count on such high yield. The benefit to the ED applicant is higher admit rate. For the college, it is not just high yield, but a better estimate of the numbers of students to whom it can make RD offers and of the amount of money it will still have to make finaid offers.</p>
<p>You rascal calmom! Your paragraph 2, calmom assumes facts not in evidence. In my car example, I didn’t say how much the car buyer bought the car for or how much was borrowed. Buyer may have been upside down. You found a loophole in my example, and that is my fault for not being clearer. Please let me amend my example to better demonstrate my point.
A car buyer buys a new car, finances 100% of the vehicle over 4 yrs. After 6 months changes his mind. Buyer returns the car to the lot in same condition he bought it, minus normal mileage and wear. He can change his mind; it isn’t illegal. But there is a consequence to doing so.</p>
<p>Let me ask this calmom, given the School A and school B examples you posted. Balance due of School A appears too much to me to say they met 100% of need. I could see that if you had applied ED under those conditions, you’d have every right to ask school to take a second look at numbers, and if unchanged, you could ethically withdraw. I think we agree there. May I offer a slightly different scenario? Suppose their first offer had offered 7500 more in loans. In that example, they would be complying with the “met your need” phrase, but probably you would have hoped more of the need had been met with grants/scholarships than loans. In that example, what they offered you would not be horrible, but just not as favorable terms as you hoped. I would expect you to accept that, ethically, if you had applied ED.
I think for me, a part of what makes backing out unethical(if the OP does so) is that an applicant has a duty(here again imo) to have a reasonable expectation of paying the bill. To me, that means family has looked at COA, and money available for bills, and has reasonably determined they can and will pay whatever reasonable offer comes up. Using your numbers, Calmom, if the COA is 47,5k but family has only 5k available and unwilling to borrow, then they are not reasonable to assume school will come up with 42,5 free money. in a case like that, the family would not be reasonable to apply ed. I believe it would be unethical to apply ED under such conditions. Of course that was an extreme example to help show my opinion. But when OP tells us her ED offer was not horrible, I have to believe it is doable- but just not as favorable as she had hoped. imo doable but not as favorable means that financial issues are resolved. Not resolved as well perhaps, as the family might have hoped, but resolved. My goodness, even when a judge resolves a court issue it is rare both parties are completely satisfied; yet, the issue is then considered resolved.</p>
<p>Younghoss, I wouldn’t consider a college financial aid package with $10,000 in loans to be legitimate. That is far beyond the amount of federally allowable stafford or perkins loans, so it wouldn’t be meeting need. (That’s the kind of game a lot of colleges do in the way they package their awards – they include a PLUS loan as if it were financial aid, which it is not – that’s straight out deceptive packaging)</p>
<p>And there is no way in hell that I would let a kid take on $10K per year of debt for college. I think that’s an unconscionable amount of money for a young person to borrow for an undergraduate degree. </p>
<p>
But that is exactly what the colleges are representing that they do when they claim that they meet 100% of need. If the colleges don’t want to give financial aid to needy students, then they can (a) cease claiming to be need-blind in admissions practice and/or (b) stop promising to meet 100% of need to all admitted students.</p>
<p>For some posters here(not calmom), I get a sense that some advocate a feeling that- I’ll play the game as long as the results go my way, but if not, all bets are off.
Or, similarly, when a child flips a coin to determine an outcome, then if the coin comes up on what he considers unfavorable the kid says “2 out of 3!” I did that as a kid.
If you think ED unfair, then don’t choose it. If you can only go through with it only if you get a really really generous offer, then don’t choose it. Maybe even work to ban it. But don’t do it, then if it doesn’t go your way try to justify ignoring it on the grounds that not everyone or every government always behaves ethically at all times.
Some have seen me post before the comment that if integrity was easy we’d all have it.</p>
<p>Loans aren’t financial aid. Loans are loans. Loans should not be included in a line item financial aid letter. They should be separated and indicated but they are not financial aid. I even think it’s borderline for a school to say meets 100% need with Staffords and Perkins, but I can live with it since it’s inherent in the FAFSA system.</p>
<p>Younghoss, I’d also note that Penn claims that it does require students to take out loans in its financial aid packages - so whatever the ethics, if Penn gave an ED student a financial aid award that included loans, they would be in violation of their own representations, and the student would have every right to turn them down.</p>