Is EFC per child or per family?

[cptofthehouse]

@BelknapPoint

“They” are the calculators at CSSProfile. And there is a typo because I believe the standard percentage is 60% not 69%. So whatever the usual institutional EFC would be for a single student is usually 60% for each student if you have two in college at same time.

“They” are the calculators (whatever that is) at CSS Profile? Nobody/nothing at CSS calculates anything to come up with a student’s EFC. Profile is only a reporting vehicle. Every school that uses Profile has their own EFC formula and does their own calculations. There is no standard practice associated with Profile to determine EFC percentages when the student has siblings in college.

I i was told by three FA directors at PROFILE schools that most institutional calculators using CSS PROFILE uses the 60% for institutional EFC for two kids in school. These are schools that meet full or near full need as they calculate it. 60% is a standard that shows up if you research thus.

All schools have their own ways of meeting need and the fact of the matter is that it’s rare a school will meet FAFSA EFC. Unlike FAFSA, PROFILE does not have an absolute standard of methodology even among the groups of schools that say they do use the same formulas to each other. But some generalities can be made , and I believe 60% of single student EFC is a good rule of thumb in this particular situation though not a fixed rule as the FAFSA

OP can let us know how the institutional EFCs work for each student at her PROFILE schools that guarantee to meet full need. I think 60% is good rule of thumb and will continue to so post in such cases