Negotiate for better scholarships

foolishpleasure
Wed, 23 Jan 2008 12:42:20 +0000

I too have a friend who successfully bumped up his D’s finaid (not scholarship) award by $2K “just for the asking.” He made his pitch to all 7 schools that had accepted his D and only one increased the award. He quoted offers from other schools and was told different institution calculate ned differently; also, more compet schools were not interested in meeting offers of less compet schools. His D did not attend sch that increased the award; she opted for more compet sch offering slightly less finaid pkg.

In all other cases of which I have personal knowl, the awards increased were increase b/c the parents demonstrated addit need (most often unreimbursed med expenses).

As for scholarships, I believe either Northeastmom or Northstarmon recently posted that the result of her attemt to get S’s scholarship increase resulted in an increase in not only the $$ but the gpa required to keep the award - - a less attractive package overall, in her view. The increas in $$ wasn’t worth risking the award by maintaining the higher gpa.