<p>I’m an admitted student who loves the school, and I’m pretty sure I will attend come fall. My questions are first, why all the trash on the ground? It’s not just on campus, but in the streets and everywhere I went on my visit. Is it a Boston thing to not pick up your trash? Notre Dame is far cleaner and in a much worse city. San Francisco is a similar city in size and character, and it is much cleaner. So why? Also, since financial aid is so mediocre for middle toupper income families who still need the aid, how did others work it out. Any advice or stories will be greatly appreciated.</p>
<p>I’ve never seen or heard someone make this observation before. I haven’t really noticed much trash on the BC campus. As for Boston, who knows - perhaps it gives it that good ol’ New England charm?</p>
<p>I also would like any advice on aid. My s didn’t get any and I don’t see how we can do it without him carrying some very heavy debt.</p>
<p>With the exception of a dozen Presidential scholarships, BC does not offer merit aid, mathlady. BC is need-based only.</p>
<p>My son applied to 13 colleges this year, including BC, all of which claimed to give 100% of need. BC’s offer was laughable. The net cost of attendance was DOUBLE that of his best offer.</p>
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<p>Rather harsh, IMO. No other colleges have the resources of HYPS, and therefore cannot come close to their need-based-only packages.</p>
<p>Rather harsh. </p>
<p>Not really. Aside from the ivies, my son’s net cost of attendance at BC was almost double that of Vanderbilt, Pomona, Williams, and Middlebury. It was also 5k greater than Georgetown.</p>
<p>so you are “laughing” at BC for being poor? For not being as rich as HYP and the top LACs? For not being rich enough to ‘buy’ top students with no-loans such as Vandy? </p>
<p>Yes, you can “laugh” at everyone who attends BC bcos they did not have to stats to get accepted into HYP et al?</p>
<p>Stop it. BC is not “poor.” They have an endowment of $1.48 billion, as they proudly boast on their website, 38th-highest in the nation.</p>
<p>You repeatedly remind everyone that BC does not offer merit aid aside from presidential scholarships – I think we are aware. That is not the issue. The truth is, I think BC often really only calculates the highest “need” for the lower end disadvantaged families, which is great because they really need the aid and it’s great that they can get it, but their methodology very often leaves out middle/upper-middle class families who maybe have a steady living but still need aid to pay for BC. Just from reading this board, you can see it is quite a common occurrence, and I don’t think all of us are being selfish or bitter, either. I don’t buy the argument that BC doesn’t have the resources to expand their financial aid; rather, I simply think that they have prioritized far too many other things ahead of doing so. Plus, their extreme focus on the CSS Profile over the FAFSA hurts a lot of people in these situations.</p>
<p>And yes, I am one of these people. I am the biggest BC fan and homer on the planet, but even I cannot defend them here. I received essentially $26,000 in grants alone from Carnegie Mellon, a school with a mere $903 million endowment. How much did BC give me in grants? $0.00.</p>
<p>So am I disappointed? Yes. Did I expect more? Yes, and I was quite aware that BC does not give merit aid. I know they are facing financial challenges – but so is everyone. And BC has more resources than most to deal with them. I am going to appeal this week, and I am crossing my fingers so hard that it helps, but it is still painful because I love BC so much and yet they make it so hard to go there.</p>
<p>How do you appeal? I agree with everything you said and that was my main reason for posting. I think I will need this appeal for financial aid and I would be really appreciative if you tell me how it works.</p>
<p>Actually, I’m not even sure. I was planning on having my dad send an email or letter since he can explain our “financial situation” better than I can. I might actually just drop by the admissions office and ask since I live about 5 seconds away. I’ll get back to you.</p>
<p>P.S. I have never noticed an inordinate amount of trash on the ground. But I do live here so I might just be used to whatever trash levels we have…? That is definitely the first time I have heard anyone mention the trash though. I couldn’t tell you a cause or anything; it seems fine to me.</p>
<p>I come from Northern California which is known for being clean. Maybe it was just a comparison thing. I know it’s a college area with lots of activities and traffic. It’s not a big deal. I just noticed this gravel pit in between the T stop and some stores where there was a ton of garbage and it seemed that I passed a lot of empty bottles and plastic bags going east on Commonwealth to the hotel. Perhaps this can be a way to make a positive impact on BC. Haha.</p>
<p>We had the same experience as gibby. Child got substantially more from other colleges, and they are not HYP etc. I think the difference is home equity. Sure looks to us like BC expects families to borrow extensively from their homes, without regard to your ability to pay that loan back (by capping home equity based on income, as some colleges do). I think their endowment may be lower than the other colleges, but they appear to take good care of their athletes. My child was admitted as an Honors student, and I know merit aid is not available, but we were hoping BC would care just a little about letting one of the top 5% of their applicant pool walk away.</p>
<p>^^again, BC does not offer merit aid, so it is unfair to compare a need-only school like BC to a merit school like Wake Forest or Villanova. Not only are Wake and 'Nova less competitive than BC for admissions, neither of them meet full need, which BC does. (Of course, non-fafsa schools can determine need anyway that they prefer.) Without a merit scholarship at 'Nova, for example, their need-only $ package can be lower than BC’s. </p>
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<p>I can understand the wishful thinking, but need-only schools make their position perfectly clear. Sure, BC offers D1 scholarships, while meeting “full” need of its students. Wake offers the same D1 scholarships but does NOT meet the full financial need of its students. Ditto 'Nova.</p>
<p>g-man: CMU (Carnegie Mellon?) is another college that does not meet full need of all of its students. It gives more money to kids it wants, and more loans to applicants at the lower end of the pool. It’s termed ‘enrollment management’ and is practiced by many colleges, including the two colleges mentioned earlier, Wake and 'Nova. NYU is another great college well-known for practicing enrollment management.</p>
<p>Good luck on the appeal. I hope it comes thru for you.</p>
<p>Everyone here knows that BC has no merit aid. Let’s not rehash this point. The point is that BC has a huge endowment and great resources and they still give awful NEED BASED AID. And it is easy to say that you meet 100% of need when you get to define what qualifies as need. Apparently, there is no need for middle class on up that BC feels it needs to meet in order to make that claim. </p>
<p>Back to the point. I actually like everything else about BC. How did others in the middle to upper income range make it work?</p>
<p>bluebayou: That was need-based aid I was referring to. Please stop bringing up merit aid. No one is talking about merit aid. And BC may “say” it meets 100% need, but “need” is not the same thing to BC as it is to other colleges (and to us). BC would cost us about $10K more out of pocket than Wake – a college that, as you pointed out, doesn’t guarantee to meet 100% of need. </p>
<p>The tragedy here is that people (like us) encourage their children to apply to BC (and spend $75-100 to do it, what with SAT score reports, CSS/Profile fees, and app fee) thinking that BC will “meet 100% of need” only to find that “need” is defined very differently for BC than for other colleges. Well, my first of four children will be the last to apply to BC, and I’m not the only parent who feels this way.</p>
<p>Perhaps Wake isn’t as selective as BC, but it’s ranked a little higher than BC on USNWR so I would argue that they can be considered “comparable” institutions.</p>
<p>Just had to chime in to let future applicants know that sometimes taking a chance works. BC was a reach for us financially, but D applied anyway based on BC statement of meeting full need. Just received her Financial Aid Package and were shocked. Total was approx $42K. Leaving us with a family contribution of $13K, which was around what our FAFSA EFC predicted. Of course I was thrilled; however, BC is not D’s first choice, so she will be declining. Maybe someone else will get the scholarship $. Good luck to all.</p>
<p>I would just like to chime in with another example from the middle class. My mom has a stable job that brings in much of the family income while my dad is the business owner of a law firm that is, frankly, suffering. Suffering so much in fact that he spent the entire college fund to keep it afloat and pay the bills. So clearly, we needed help despite the number on our FAFSA. We got roughly 18k in grants and 5k in work study/sub loans. The way my family is working it out is to split the remainder in half and to pay for it equally. My parents are tapping their retirement funds and I will be taking out roughly 17k in loans a year. My point is that it IS feasible with their formula, but it’s going to take some sacrifice on your part to make it work.</p>
<p>I totally disagree. My advice to all future applicants to BC and other selective schools is not to believe that BC meets 100% of need as stated and to do your homework and only apply to schools that you can afford with or without financial aid, otherwise on May 1st, you will be very disappointed to find out that you worked very hard in school, just to find out that you cannot go to BC because you and your parents simply cannot afford the bill they believe you can pay. I hope other students do not have to go through in future years, what I and others are going through now. This has been my worse nightmare. Don’t believe the hype.</p>
<p>Ditto, to CollegeMay 2011
I am a aprt time teacher and my husband works for the state. We have 4 children. They gave us $3000. I don’t think it would be wise for us to take from retirement or for my son to go ointo debt. Other schools that do not give merit aid did give us much more financial aid. (Holy Cross ws generous)</p>