Do finances sometimes affect merit aid awards?

lisares
Sun, 01 Feb 2009 11:56:55 +0000

DD applied to one school mostly because they were sending us letters noting that “her academic record may make her eligible for our outstanding merit awards, etc.” and they mentioned their named scholarships that ran from $10,000 to $17,000. The scholarships had certain academic requirements attached to them, and DD’s record qualified her for any of these including the top award. However. In a sort of bait-and-switch, her acceptance came with an award that was identified as a “leadership” award, not an “academic” award, for around $7000. What I find interesting is that this is the only school that asked for the CSS profile along with the EA application. So I am wondering if they take a look at the family’s finances and award their merit aid based on what they think you might be able to pay, and what they think you might need to be enticed to accept – and not a penny more. Of course, the reason she didn’t get a higher, “academic” award might also be that they had an unusually high number of applicants with the required stats, or perhaps they are cutting back on their merit awards because of endowment losses and awarding fewer, then giving the rest of the qualified applicants a lesser amount. I just wondered what CC people think/know about this. DD got merit awards at two other schools EA, neither of which asked for CSS or FAFSA with the application. In one case she got their top award, in the other a mid-level award. It’s interesting.