State School vs Harvard: Any Middle Ground?

College Search & Lists
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<p>Did you take the PSAT as a sophomore? How did you do?</p>

<p>If your family pays about $17k for your brother at Harvard - which has a 10% formula - that suggests that your family has a strong income and/or assets. Does your family have a strong income and/or assets? </p>

<p>If that is true and they can only afford about $20k per year, then you’re going to have to include some schools that will give you big merit, because other schools that give FA will expect a bigger contribution from your parents. Schools like - say JHU - might expect your family to contribute $40k.</p>

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<p>well Princeton was my bros first choice and he wasnt able to go there because it was too expensive apparently even with their contribution. Harvard on the other turned out the be much cheaper (like i said 17k/year).</p>

<p>And this isn’t really pertinent to the question I asked, so if we are done calling me out on everything i say and all my spelling errors then perhaps we can just discuss my question, which was the point of this thread.</p>

<p>And back to John Hopkins, if i were to send the FAFSA form to them (same that got Harvard cost down from 50 grand to 17), would John Hopkins as well give us financial aid to a point that is was less than 25 or 20k a year?</p>

<p>And im not really an expert on how financial aid works at every college, i know about FAFSA cause my parents have to do it every year i think, but they kinda try to keep that stuff and family financial situations private from me.</p>

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<p>well Princeton was my bros first choice and he wasnt able to go there because it was too expensive apparently even with their contribution. Harvard on the other turned out the be much cheaper (like i said 17k/year).</p>

<p>This suggests that your family has a high income.</p>

<p>As for JHU…no, they will more likely expect a contribution like Princeton. JHU does NOT use the Harvard model for aid. </p>

<p>Your parents will likely have to do FAFSA and CSS Profile every year.</p>

<p>Why don’t you ask your parents to see your brother’s FAFSA SAR. That will give an EFC. Find out what the EFC is. If they don’t want to show the details, then they can at least tell you what the EFC is (expected family contribution)</p>

<p>I have a feeling that your brother’s EFC is well above 35000.</p>

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<p>What years? The HYP middle-class initiatives have only come about in the last few years. If your brother got a significantly different package from P than H under the current (more-or-less) finaid programs, that points to some kind of unusual circumstance in your family that significantly affects aid.</p>

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<p>I doubt it. Harvard requires families to contribute only 10% of their income for incomes up to $180k. The fact that your family pays $17k at Harvard indicates you have an income of about $170k, which is above a level that would qualify you for aid at most full-need schools. You have stated that your family is “lower middle class,” however, which seems to contradict that.</p>

<p>With a genuinely middle class or lower middle class income (<80k, say), yes, you could expect your EFC to be less than 25k. But there are a whole lot of confounding factors–assets that the family cannot sell or borrow against, self-employment, divorced parents, and so on–that might affect this. Your EFC might be driven up because of one of these.</p>

<p>–actually, Hopkins has its own aid estimator online ([Hopkins</a> Undergraduate Admissions :: Financial Aid :: Financial Aid Links](<a href=“http://apply.jhu.edu/finaid/links.html]Hopkins”>http://apply.jhu.edu/finaid/links.html)). Grab a parent and/or the parents’ tax forms and fill it out. It’ll probably be more enlightening than a bunch of anonymous strangers.</p>

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<p>BtCorn - Have you considered the U of Alabama? They have an honors program and have recently added an honors fellows program. If you stats are as high as you say then you should be able to attend with almost no $$$ out of your pocket. </p>

<p>Before you blow off the state schools, keep in mind that there are a ton of kids with your stats and higher and your financial situation who have chosen state schools because the top ones were unaffordable to them. </p>

<p>Keep in mind that with your brother in college your financial aid status may improve.</p>

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<p>Thanks guys for all the info, definitely will consider state schools (just probably not UGA) and some of those others in the list.</p>

<p>And thank you for that Aid calculator, i will fill it out as soon as i can.</p>

<p>Talked to parents and turns out i was wrong, we pay 11k a year not 17, so with that being said does that change anything with JHU or anything else? </p>

<p>And as a matter of fact, Princeton wanted 26k a year, while Harvard wanted 11k a year so…</p>

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<p>Ask your parents what the FAFSA EFC is. </p>

<p>If Harvard expects your parents to pay $11k, that suggests an income of about $110k.</p>

<p>That still means that JHU would expect a sizable contribution - probably about $30k per year. Again, JHU does NOT use Harvard’s generous FA formula. Harvard (and maybe Yale) are unique. Don’t go by what THEY do. </p>

<p>Get your bro’s EFC.</p>

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<p>“OP, if you are “lower middle class” which to me means less than a 100K income”</p>

<p>LOL, $100,000 is lower-middle class?? This is my rankings based on annual household income:</p>

<p>Poor/working-class = Under $35,000</p>

<p>Lower middle-class = $35,000 - $75,000</p>

<p>Middle-class = $76,000 - $124,000</p>

<p>Upper middle-class = $125,000 - $249,000</p>

<p>Lower rich = $250,000 - $499,000 </p>

<p>Rich = $500,000 - $999,000</p>

<p>Wealthy = $1.0 million - $99.0 million</p>

<p>Extremely wealthy = $100 million + </p>

<p>Capitalist Class = $1 billion + </p>

<p>Let’s face it: A small minority of people (less than 5%) make over $250,000 per annum. This is reality.</p>

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<p>well thank you so much for giving your opinion on class classification instead of contributing anything useful to this discussion.</p>

<p>Call me lower middle class, middle class, rich, whatever word you want. Im looking for a good college that i can go to for under 20k a year.</p>

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<p>BtCorn, my comment wasn’t directed at you. Another poster claimed $100,000 is lower-middle class. If that is the case, a lot of people in America are poor considering the average income hovers around $50,000.</p>

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<p>actually it’s important to find an accurate range (probably not a good idea to disclose that here) of where your family’s income lies so we can try and make as accurate of a guess as possible as to how much financial aid you can get.</p>

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<p>Did you ask to see your Bro’s SAR or at least have your parents look at it and tell you what his EFC was?</p>

<p>Now, that you say that your parents’ contribution to Harvard is $11k, that suggests an EFC of about $30k or so. </p>

<p>But, I don’t know if his parents are paying the student contribution or not?</p>

<p>BT…does your brother make a contribution from a job or anything or do your parents pay it all?</p>

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<p>As others have indicated, Princeton has one of the best financial aid programs in the country (along with Harvard, Yale, and Stanford). If you want a cost similar to what Harvard is charging for your bother’s education without going to one of those four schools, you will have to turn to merit aid at a lower-selectivity school – assuming your scores are high. </p>

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<p>Not really relevant, but I believe it’s about 2%.</p>

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<p>ten, I agree with you. I gave a broad range of below 100K as many posters think they are lower middle class with much more income. It was meant to decrease controversy so the thread doesn’t degenerate into a argument on who is middle-class, well off etc. Sorry if I did the opposite of what was intended.</p>

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<p>Yes, to some extent. An 11k parental contribution corresponds to an income of 110k, which will get you significant aid at some top schools depending on your assets. Whether it will be enough is something entirely different–I think you’re more likely to have an EFC somewhere in the 25-35k range, if not higher. But that’s my own experiences, and I don’t know a lot about your family finances, obviously.</p>

<p>To circle back to your original question, there are a few ways to tackle your situation. First of all, top LACs seem to be relatively generous with finaid and are not quite as selective as HYP. I wouldn’t expect that much from schools like JHU, Northwestern, etc. but if you might get lucky. Vandy and Rice in particular seem to be very giving with the money, both need-based and merit aid. Which is the other thing: if you can get a significant (say, 10-15k) merit award that stacks with your need-based aid (it doesn’t always), that could push you into the affordable range.</p>

<p>You could also try for one of the big awards (full tuition/full ride) given out at these schools. Duke (Robertson), UNC (Robertson/Morehead-Cain), UVA (Jefferson), Vanderbilt (multiple programs), and Emory (Emory Scholars), among others, give big awards out. But bear in mind that competition for a lot of these scholarships is fiercer than competition to get into Harvard. (Emory is one of the larger programs–it awards about 150 scholarships ranging from 2/3 tuition to a full ride.) Schools where big merit might be a little more attainable are Tulane and USC.</p>

<p>If you are a guy you might want to look in Deep Springs College, which is free, although for some reason no one seems to like it as much as I do…I would have totally applied if I could have. (I don’t think most people would do well there, but if you would it’s a godsend, and if you wouldn’t it’s good for a laugh and a boggle.)</p>

<p>Will you be an NMF? If so there are a number of colleges that give out full tuition and full ride scholarships for that.</p>

<p>Tangent: is there any reason you won’t consider GT? Because you seem to have unequivocally ruled UGA out, but you don’t mention GT at all. They’ve got pretty decent science programs, an excellent BME program, and a very good Chem E program (and you would be surprised how a Chem E degree can be parlayed into bio/biochem work.) Anyway.</p>

<p>PS: OP, this is a public forum. The posters here do not exist for the sole purpose of being helpful to you, and sometimes they say things that you may not want to hear. It’s the price you pay for putting your words out there in the open. And you don’t get to control the flow of conversation–that’s not how CC works. You can have an expectation that people will not go on extended tangents on your request thread–and so far no one has–but that is it.</p>

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<p>My brother doesnt contribute, my parents pay it all. </p>

<p>and Pierre, about 110k/year.</p>

<p>And pay over 20k a year really doesnt seem like an option, so im trying to think of some good schools that are either inherently cheap or give enough financial aid so that we are only excepted to pay <20k. I know that <20k/year is possible at my state school and at Harvard, but i dont really know about anything beyond that or inbetween those schools, hence the OP.</p>

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<p>OP said: “Call me lower middle class, middle class, rich, whatever word you want. Im looking for a good college that i can go to for under 20k a year.”</p>

<p>All of the following mix and match different sets of aid to end up costing about the same ~ 20k</p>

<p>Lots of different ways to skin the cat</p>

<p>Examples:</p>

<p>OSU with an OOS scholarship</p>

<p>Brown with a family of four with income of 103k and a kid in college
<a href=“https://financialaid.brown.edu/Cmx_Content.aspx?cpId=333[/url]”>https://financialaid.brown.edu/Cmx_Content.aspx?cpId=333&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Princeton with family income of ~ 100k per year
[Princeton</a> University | Who Qualifies for Aid?](<a href=“http://www.princeton.edu/admission/financialaid/how_it_works/who_qualifies/]Princeton”>http://www.princeton.edu/admission/financialaid/how_it_works/who_qualifies/)</p>

<p>Oberlin with a 15k merit scholarship, 2 kids in college and familhy income of ~140k per year</p>

<p>McGill with summer earnings and 3500 federal subsidized loan </p>

<p>Olin College: you get in, they pay for you</p>

<p>Grinnell with 2X the average merit award, summer earnings and 3500 subsidized loan</p>

<p>UMass Amherst Commonwealth College, instate rates</p>

<p>If there’s a school you really like you can gather the info you need from your parents to do the FAFSA estimator, then take it with you to talk to the college</p>

<p>P.S. Take the info you quote about your sib and Harvard and Princeton and toss it out; nobody’s saying it wasn’t real but so far the most reasonable explanations why they were so far apart have nothing to do with current financial aid policies (e.g., different info going to the schools, missed deadlines, etc.); approach this process systematically, not anecdotally (e.g., there is hard data that will tell you which collges give more merit aid than others)</p>

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<p>He doesn’t have a summer job or an on-campus job or anything? Wow. That means the parental contribution is significantly less than 11k. Anyone know what Harvard’s expected student contribution is?</p>

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<p>Basically, your choices are: get into a full-need school that will give you an EFC of <20k–and we’re still working out which schools that might be; get a stacking merit scholarship at a full-need school; get a major merit scholarship that gives you full tuiton or a full ride. To do the last you might have to dip into schools that are significantly weaker than your in-state flagships (UGA and GT).</p>

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<p>An 11k parental contribution corresponds to an income of 110k, which will get you significant aid at some top schools depending on your assets. Whether it will be enough is something entirely different–I think you’re more likely to have an EFC somewhere in the 25-35k range, if not higher. But that’s my own experiences, and I don’t know a lot about your family finances, obviously.</p>

<p>From what I’ve seen, someone with an EFC in the $30-35k range (where it’s likely this student’s EFC will be) does NOT get great aid unless the school is a no loan or very small loan school. </p>

<p>Instead, many full need privates schools, with COAs in the $50k range, will expect …</p>

<p>a full $30 - 35k contribution from the parents</p>

<p>full Federal student loan contribution (ranging $5500 - 7500 per year + maybe some Perkins)</p>

<p>maybe about $2500 in student work study</p>

<p>maybe a summer contribution (could be about $1500 - 2000)</p>

<p>and the rest maybe in a grant. So, about $5k - 10k in a grant. Not exactly what this kid is looking for. </p>

<p>People forget that many of full need schools, still expect the parents to pay their full contribution, and ALSO expect the student to take out max student loans, do work-study, and give a summer contribution (the student’s responsibility, I’ve noticed, is roughly the amount of personal expenses, books, and travel - I guess many schools really don’t want to be paying for those things).</p>

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<p>*My brother doesnt contribute, my parents pay it all. *</p>

<p>There may be a miscommunication. </p>

<p>The parents may be paying for all of his brother’s direct costs to the school and books, but maybe (don’t know) the brother is paying for his day to day “pocket money” stuff from his savings or from a job or the parents give him an allowance and that isn’t being counted in the $11k. I doubt travel expenses are being counted in the $11k.</p>

<p>.</p>