Financial Aid for Upper-Middle Class

cptofthehouse
Sat, 17 Nov 2012 17:48:19 +0000

Most need aware school do the admissions on a need blind basis, and then let the bean counters in financial aid decide who gets the money using some rating system that admissions uses for the kids. So applying for financial aid is not going to have an effect for 1) Top rated kids even with high need 2) Low rated kids with little or no need. The cuts are generally made to the low rated kids with a lot of need. So in most cases, just applying for aid does not affect admissions chances at all. It comes down to whether the school can give students most or close to most of their need as to whether or not they will accept them. A main reason a school is need aware is because it does not want to “waste” its acceptances on kids who can’t afford to go there, so if the school can’t give the close to what they need to go, they simply reject them rather than having the kid reject the school.

You can ask the admissions officers of school if admissions decisions are affected by applying for financial aid if the student ends up not qualifying–if the very act of seeing if one qualifies affect the admissions process in any way. Most colleges, even need aware ones encourage students to go on ahead and apply for financial aid even if they think they will not qualify.

If you are absolutely sure you don’t qualify, you can just complete the FAFSA and qualify for federal loans and other such programs outside of the college itself. You can fill out "no " for appying of aid and still do the FAFSA for funds outside the school’s such as federal loans.

Miafitte, did you not get some estimate of aid from Lawrence with your son’s ED acceptance? Most every ED program does give an estimated package with ED and that is the failsafe escape valve for getting out of the ED commitment.

To answer you question, yes, there is a bit of consideration given to those who are close to retirement, in that your age gives you a certain protection allowance and the older you are the bigger than allowance is for your assets.

As to how any individual school gives aid packages, it’s up to them and it can differ widely even at the same school depending on how much they want your kid and their policies. CMU, for instance, will give ED accepted students a full need met package but not so for all accepted RD. Most schools “rate” the students they accept and the ones rated the highest get the best packages such as full need met, more grants, less loans and work study. You can see the averages in the common data or in the financial aid seciton of the school in the US News and World Report blurb for it. It gives you the percentage of grants, loans etc. BUt they are averages only. A highly desired student will get more grants than one who is not considered as prize of a catch in many cases. Only at schools that guarantee to meet full need and give out grants only does this sort of hierarchy not exist.