I’m going to start up this beloved thread again by posting an update about financial aid, in case anyone is interested. Fordham updated my daughter’s offer with her need-based aid. They came in at an affordable number for us (as opposed to the first, mere merit offer), but it is still equally most expensive with Macalester. I don’t want it to be at the top of my daughter’s list–but for a rather weird reason. We’ve never visited, but the students depicted in the catalog and all the videos I’ve seen have a weirdly similar look to each other. It’s not that there isn’t some diversity–it’s just limited within a certain range. It doesn’t look like a flagship public in terms of diversity, for sure. My daughter doesn’t look like any of the students in the pictures (if I had to name the look, I’d say “regional students from the Northeast.”) I never thought that I’d see a school look unvaried in its population, without having somewhat of a stereotype for that. Luckily, my instincts about it are unlikely to be challenged, since Fordham is not in the top 3 for her. I think it’s a great school–I never thought I’d have such a strange feeling about it.