<p>College2go, Ok, I stand corrected. </p>
<p>As for targeting schools with need based aid, we had no idea, until after the fact, how it would pan out, not to mention that the need based aid school was his highest reach, as would have any other need based only school have been if he applied. In addition, he would not be a URM at many of those schools. Also, we were certainly not going to put all our eggs in that basket, especially given the fact that my DH’s income is over $100K year and our EFC was way more than what his aid turned out to be.</p>
<p>However, it was our experience that the higher the ranking of the school the more merit aid he was given, which flies in the face of suggesting that the amount of merit the OP’s daughter might receive will be less than she would get at a lower ranked school where her stats would make her at the high end of the applicant pool. </p>
<p>My son’s safety and low match schools gave him much less merit money than his high match and reach schools. </p>
<p>I know this seems counter intuitive but when your kid is a URM you cannot go by conventional wisdom.</p>
<p>“Yes, it was the confusing terminology, and the claim regarding merit $ at places that don’t give merit $ that prompted my question. Thanks to 2college and entomom for clearing it up.”</p>
<p>MrK, I never claimed he got merit money at any school which doesn’t give merit aid. Point to where I said that, please.</p>
<p>In addition, there was really nothing confusing about my using the term institutional aid to describe what he is receiving at his NEED ONLY school as the fact that it is need only means no aid is merit.</p>