GWU/American and Merit Aid

DCforMe
Tue, 10 Jun 2008 15:25:21 +0000

cpt, I’m not 100% sure anymore, since I only really put into my spreadsheet how much was grants, scholarships, work study, or loans, etc., and didn’t keep track of what was merit. I know from GW $15K was labeled scholarship (which sounds like merit based on what Elysium said), and a sum of money higher than that was labeled as a grant (probably FA), while at AU I got the $27K merit money, and a very small grant on top of that. Work Study was almost identical between the two. Both offered me a $3.5K subsidized student loan (Stafford?), and GW tacked a small Perkins loan on top too. Free money was bigger at GW, but so was COA, and in the end, AU had the better COA after free money.