<p>Marite, yes what I mean is what you said. And what’s wrong with that? Not every smart student with more than $60,000 in annual income has had a privileged upbringing, attended private school, and had private tutors or SAT prep courses to get them into college. There are a fair number of us that make just over that “threshhold” amount which says EFC XXX, knowing full well that it is a ridiculous amount of money. For what it is worth, my husband and I both work, have 2 children, earn approximately 90K a year. My son that is graduating this year has been accepted to an ivy, however, no financial aid there. Valedictorian of a large public high school (over 600 in his class). Tell me how we can afford 47k a year with another son looking at college in another year? This is where credentials, and merit aid would be very helpful.</p>
<p>Your situation is why I’ve said that I still support merit aid.<br>
Ideally, someone in your situation should get financial aid, however it’s called.
It could be that the money saved by eliminating merit money would be a drop in the bucket for families in your situation. This is the conclusion I came to after running some numbers. So I’m not in favor of eliminating merit money absent better funding mechanisms for middle-class kids like your child.
But my take is that finaid is a zero sum game. What is given to one student is not available to be given to another student. Throwing money at kids who don’t need it in order to afford college means that there is less aid available to give to students who actually need it for college–people in your kid’s situation. Remember that this discussion was launched because a millionnaire dad would rather put $200k toward a house for his son rather than “give it to a college.” </p>
<p>I don’t know which Ivy your son has been admitted to (congrats!) but I believe that at Harvard and Princeton, someone with a $90k income would qualify for some aid. In fact, if I remember reading right, at Harvard, people making less than $80k per year get very substantial aid under the HFAI. When your second child attends college, I trust that you WILL qualify for aid at both schools your kids will be attending!</p>
<p>Anything less is bordering on socialism, the way I see it.</p>
<p>Bordering? LOL. Need based aid is the college version of Modern Socialism. Why argue it’s not? What else could it be? Is that a bad thing? Is this 1955? Is someone keeping a list? :eek: LOL. Put me on it. I like lists, no matter the color. ;)</p>
<p>To each according to his needs , from each according to his means. That’s always been the definition I have used. (Even preferential packaging of need aid for starstuds is there in Orwell, “everyone is equal in need based aid but some are more equal than others”. 
)</p>
<p>I personally have no problem with need-based aid or preferential packaging (another term for merit aid). I just have a problem with how it is calculated and how it is meted out. Now do I think there is still a place in the perfect world “full need met for everybody” scenario for merit aid? Dang straight. We should reward excellence when we see it. Can’t you just see Adam Smith cheering?</p>
<p>As usual I have one foot firmly planted on each side of the line. ;)</p>
<p>luvbeach:</p>
<p>only so I can off topic, at $90k income per year, you would be eligible for a LOT of finaid at the Ivies, likely ~$25k per annum, since P’ton even gives aid to folks with income of $150k (by their reports). Obvsiously, there is more there… :)</p>
<p>cur: thanks for joining…I wuz thinkin’ bout the mudgette during drive time home.</p>
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<p>So was I, blu. So was I.</p>
<p>
And merit-based aid is merely singing for your supper. Marite asks above, shouldn’t the student be paying the college? Well, maybe not. The merit-based rider is paid to attend, not the other way around. He becomes part of the talent the full ride parents will pay to have their kids hang around with.</p>
<p>I’ve told this story before, but when my kid was in 8th grade, she had this teacher who was really pretty hardcore. And she was always yelling about something. But she started in on the class one day about something or other, and then got on this rant about colleges. She ultimately gave this sort of motivational speech, I guess, all about how they really needed to work hard, and think, and use their minds, and put themselves out there-- to make such an effort throughout their high school years, that–in the end-- colleges would offer to pay <em>them</em> to attend–not the other way around. A lot of those kids took that to heart and never forgot it. It made good sense to me, too.
And I agree with cur’s comment, “We should reward excellence when we see it.” Yes, I think so, too.</p>
<p>I agree with jack and cur’s comments about rewarding excellence. By the way, we should remember that socialism is just a philosophy which dismally failed when it was applied to economics…</p>
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<p>Works very well with need aid though . As a means to redistribute wealth and level the historically tilted fields of opportunity in this country, it’s the best I’ve seen. Of course I haven’t actually seen much else lately but…;)</p>
<p>(For those who may not have caught my intent, I wasn’t denigrating need aid by saying it was “socialism”. While oft times not having a government as the actor, that’s what need based financing of education is . In essence . )</p>
<p>A little socialism never hurt anyone, but keeping most of the influence firmly in the capitalist/free market camp is the way to go.</p>
<p>The whole argument in this thread against merit based aid going to those who don’t “deserve” it as much is the same going on with affirmative action in college admissions, and advantages given to athletes.</p>
<p>The world needs both the greedy millionaire and the philanthropist, although some might like the latter more than the former.</p>
<p>AdOfficer,</p>
<p>My comment was not meant to single out Harvard. They are often just the largest target because they have the largest endowment. Though like many schools I think they can do more. Their tuition and endowment are growing much faster then inflation.</p>
<p>Further, as a private institution they should have a lot of latitude in how they conduct their business. However, as a non-profit that receives tax breaks and federal aid for students and research I think we can ask for more from them and many of the other schools.</p>
<p>In reading my comments please understand that I will be writing out two tuition checks to private colleges in the fall that have just raised their tuition by an amount greater than inflation. No need to name the schools, it could be virtually any college in the country.</p>
<p>Maybe I’m wrong, but it seems to me that democratic socialism is working well in Scandinavia.</p>
<p>call me a socialist but I still believe being rewarded with an acceptance is the fairest “merit reward” a school can provide to its’ students. There are 2 ways I feel merit systems are unfair … first, as mentioned previously, the vast majority of schools that provide merit awards DO NOT provide 100% of need based aid to students who need financial aid (so Peter is being robbed to pay Paul) … and second, and the true socialist comment, I dislike the creation of classes of students within the university (are you a regular student or a special merit student).</p>
<p>Of course any school can provide aid as they wish but when I’m worth $20B and start a school the only aid provided will be for financial aid and we’ll provide 100% of need … although we don’t need 3tgo U to do this … the IVYies and the NECSAC schools are already in this camp for the most part. (I would also define need more liberally than FAFSA … so more families would get more aid).</p>
<p>Finland, Norway and Sweden are very capitalistic countries. The fact that they have strong social programs due to outrageous taxes ( 70% ) and that for the most part their citizens are not driven by an obscene consumerism is a different story but it is a common mistake to refer to them as “examples of economic socialism”. Not true.</p>
<p>Not to get off on a tangent here about “classes” but one can take that argument to extremes. There are all sort of groups students. After all, there are more dedicated, brighter and smarter students than others…so…isn’t that a certain “class” ? I do not share the view of not rewarding excellence. That does not mean that people in need will miss out on opportunities when a certain balance is created.</p>
<p>That is part of the problem - defining 100% of need. 100% of need according to who? As long as there is not sufficient money to make sure everyone gets their share, the middle will always end up short. Yes, I am all for the lower end of the economic spectrum being equilized, the upper end probably does not need it - but the people in the middle again get screwed. So merit aid gives the kids in the middle a shot at the brass ring. Work hard during HS, meet merit aid standards, become accomplished and you too can go to a great school without you or your parents being in debt for the next 20 years. </p>
<p>Sounds like a fair scenario to me. But then again I suppose a lot depends on which side of the merit aid equation you end up on.</p>
<p>3togo: So you would be against honors classes as well-- or, for that matter, more advanced class sections of a particular subject? In high school, did your kids take AP courses? Did they receive high marks or college credit for any of those courses? If they did, that already sets them apart from those kids who didn’t/couldn’t enroll in such courses. Did they ever receive a tangible reward, or recognition, for an achievement of some sort? If they did, that already sets them apart from the kids who didn’t have the means, smarts, or talent to achieve such recognition. And what about the kids who applied to your kid’s college and didn’t get accepted? What about them? By your definition, your kid’s acceptance meant he/she received a “merit reward,” while those kids who got rejected from the same school didn’t. Yikes. What about them??</p>
<p>Once again, most merit scholarships with which I am famliar are privately endowed and have no bearing on the university financial aid budget. </p>
<p>I’m still waiting on that huge list of schools, mentioned earlier by a poster, that takes 60%+ of their financial aid budgets and use those monies for merit scholarships instead. I would love to see that list.</p>
<p>You beat me to it Jack. By the way, 3togo, this notion of displacement of need aid is totally bogus. Read post#136.</p>
<p>I think marite and others make a reasonable argument for the need based approach. However like ST2, I think one of the issues is that someone is deciding what somebody else can afford. It is like defining the poverty level. It is kind of dependent on a lot of things. Like many distributions we can probably say who is really poor at one end and who is rich at the other. The broad middle is problematic.<br>
What can happen I think though is we argue we cannot blame children for the sins of their parents e.g. parents who live to above their means, spend all their money, get divorced, live dangerous lifestyles whatever that qualify their kids for financial aid. On the other hand what I hear is from the parents who lived way below their means, maybe paid off their house and maybe scrimped so mom could stay at home with the kids etc. I have been on committees where I have see merit scholarhips denied because that person “has a good family and does not need it”. These kids often feel they are being “punished for having parents who stayed together, were frugal, and perhaps raised children with what many might say are “honorable values”.” This groups may earn middle incomes and appear “well off” on paper but are often feel that a college may say “what is yours is ours” when the finaid forms are evaluated. One could argue that need-based money may do just the opposite of what it is intended to do. But let’s not get into that here. Suffice it to say that the two sides will continue to argue on many CC threads and probably just agree to disagree.</p>
<p>Do any of the anti merit aid people on this thread object to the children of the wealthy taking athletic scholarships?</p>
<p>oldolddad:</p>
<p>You make a very valid argument, and one that I am very aware of.<br>
In awarding need-based aid, colleges do make decisions as to how much aid a student should get; often, it is not the same as what the student’s family feels it can afford.
One, of course, can say the same about merit, insofar as grades are often subjective and criteria for awarding merit can be argued about. As one poster mentioned, an award for community service, intended to recognize altruism, shuts out students who need to work to contribute to their families.</p>
<p>Ideally, need-based aid should be far more generous to individual students and to more students than is currently the case. And since it is not, I continue to endorse the practice of middle class families to seek out the best way to fund their children’s college education. Whether it’s called need-based aid or merit aid is immaterial from their point of view.</p>
<p>Let’s hope that the millionnaire’s father, having saved $200k in college expenses by having his son apply for merit aid, will one day feel like contributing to his son’s college fund or endow a scholarship.</p>