<p>since you dont tell them how much you would be willing to pay and how much you want them to pay, will they decide that themselves? also do you have to tell them if you would like a work-study job on campus (i dont know if these are available for international students) or do they have to initiate whether they’ll give that to you themselves?</p>
<p>You don’t tell them how much you’d be willing to pay, but they determine that using forms like FAFSA and the CSS profile. It’s based on your family income; if you make $100,000, you can probably afford to pay Columbia $40,000/year. If you make $40,000/year, you probably can’t afford to pay them anything. And so on. Once you submit FAFSA and CSS, the Financial Aid Office runs the numbers and (if you get in) sends you an estimate of how much you’ll pay. </p>
<p>Columbia’s financial aid assumes that everyone does work-study during the year and summer jobs, so if you don’t do those, your parents will have to make up that difference.</p>