<p>Fallgirl… Are you by any chance referring to me?</p>
<p>No…another poster on another thread who got upset at the suggestion that NYU has many affluent kids or kids who have relatives that help pay.</p>
<p>Fallgirl… Are you by any chance referring to me?</p>
<p>No…another poster on another thread who got upset at the suggestion that NYU has many affluent kids or kids who have relatives that help pay.</p>
<p>To go back to the original question- I don’t think that schools need to “watch out” for families wallets", but they * should* be transparent & if a school offers a scholarship that is not going to be repeated- they should make that plain & when there are criteria that need to be in place to recieve money- besides need- then that needs to be plain as well.</p>
<p>Families are able to figure out when an aid package doesn’t suit- for instance, my older D attended Reed- which meets 100% of need- we were able to make it work for us.
Although her sister’s roommate at a another school,found that even with 100% need met- it didn’t work for them.</p>
<p>College board cites the amount of loans at graduation- families should note- this does not include parent loans. ;)</p>
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<p>It is expensive and known for lousy aid, so I would guess that this is true for many (but not all) of the students.</p>
<p>I don’t think that schools need to “watch out” for families wallets", but they should be transparent & if a school offers a scholarship that is not going to be repeated- they should make that plain & when there are criteria that need to be in place to recieve money- besides need- then that needs to be plain as well.</p>
<p>Very true.</p>
<p>Should a school be transparent if it practices “preferential packaging” for FA? Should a school let students/parents know ahead of time that if the students’ stats fall below - say the top 25% of students - it’s likely that they won’t get a scholarship or good FA?</p>
<p>My D received an unsolicited letter from Sallie Mae today, inviting her to apply for “Smart Option” student loan. It came addressed to her nickname, so I’m not sure what list it came from (not her school, which uses her formal name). It listed several benefits of having student loans from them - get the money you need!, only takes 20 minutes!, build credit for a bright future!, graduate with less debt! (because it has a 7 year repayment period). Lots of fine print on the back. I was surprised because she doesn’t have any loans and hasn’t been investigating them, this was just them marketing loans to her.</p>
<p>Should a school be transparent if it practices “preferential packaging” for FA?</p>
<p>Sure- to pick on NYU- they state that academic criteria are important for both need and merit based aid.
Apparently after admittance- but whether they are clear about the translation of GPA into grants, I don’t know.
I am sure it would help students if they knew specifics- are they competing against other students in the class for aid, or do they have to maintain certain GPA?</p>
<p>I agree with the transparency. I also think it should be unlawful to include Parent Plus loans as “student aid.” I think students would more easily grasp the immediate out of pocket costs for themselves or their parent(s) if they were to see only the direct payments: merit, scholarship, Federal student aid and the cost of attendance. </p>
<p>I do not think it is the responsibility of the college to decide who can make it work and who cannot. This, I think, is especially true of FAFSA colleges where the finaid information supplied is not as complete as CSS. </p>
<p>As far as preferential packaging, tuition discounting in the form of merit etc. I’m not in “love” with this system of college financing as it reminds me too much of buying a car during the days before the fall of cash backs, buyer incentives, etc…however, that is the current market. I would love to see college financials be more cut and dried. Unfortunately with costs where they are and so many kids pointing toward college and so few families that have managed to save enough I don’t see an end in sight quite yet.</p>