$0 fafsa

Paying for College
1

<p>Hi everyone,</p>

<p>I was recently accepted into the Isenberg School of Management at UMass Amherst. Although Babson College and Bentley Univeristy are currently my top choices, I'm guessing that I will end up at UMass Amherst for financial reasons.</p>

<p>I have used online FAFSA calculators and I am predicting that I will have a FAFSA of $0 or really close to $0. How could I predict a good estimate of the amount of aid that I would receive at UMass Amherst? I qualify for In-State tuition and received the Abigal Adams scholarship for free tuition at a state school. </p>

<p>Thanks for your help!</p>

2

<p>As far as federal aid is concerned, with a 0 EFC you would be eligible for the maximum pell grant which is currently $5550 (it may increase a smidge next year). The rest will depend on the school’s aid policies. There is another federal grant called the SEOG. It is what is called campus based aid meaning a school is given $xxxx to distribute to bneedy students in the way they determine to be best. Many schools award it only to students with 0 EFCs. other schools have other criteria. the maximum will vary by school. At my son’s school the max SEOG was $100 a year. At my daughter’s it was $2000 (she received it twice with a 0 EFC but not thos year, still with a 0 EFC). If the school included loans in FA you are eligible for $5500 in Stafford loans of which up to $3500 may be subsidized. You may be eligible for Perkins loans and work study depending on your school’s aid policies (Perkins loans and WS are also campus based programs).</p>

<p>That is about it for federal aid. Any other aid will depend on your state and if they have any need based programs, and on your school and whether they offer institutional aid.</p>

3

<p>Congrats on your acceptances. If I’m not mistaken, Mass has very low tuition for instate students but very high FEES. Does your scholarship cover only tuition or will it cover fees as well? Are you planning to live on campus? Swimcatsmom gave you all of the federal aid options…make sure you research your state aid programs as well and read and understand the student loan info at finaid.org. There are also loan calculators there which are very helpful.</p>

4

<p>Good point. I googled the Abigail Adams scholarship and it looks like it just covers tuition. We have the same in our large state Us. The fees per credit hour are almost as high as the tuition. My daughter has a full tuition waiver scholarship from her university but it does not waive her fees. I think a lot of people are pretty surprised when they discover the huge fees.</p>

5

<p>It’s even worse in MA - I think tuition is around $1500 or so for most of their publics, but the fees are around $9-10K! Idk what their state legislators are doing or why, there seems to be some stigma attached to raising tuition so the schools have to raise fees instead. This is very different than my state, which a slightly higher tuition ($4970) but fees are still under $2K for a full-time student.</p>

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<p>

i dont think it matters anymore. people think theyre the same thing anyways lol</p>

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<p>A couple of years ago (after the big economic implosion) our State wanted the State Us to not increase the tuition that year. A couple of the big schools agreed but were talking about increasing the fees more instead. I was not happy as my daughter’s tuition waiver does not cover fees (I would much prefer they raise the tuition if they are going to raise something). Fortunately they were persuaded it was not a good idea.</p>

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<p>You said: "As far as federal aid is concerned, with a 0 EFC you would be eligible for the maximum pell grant which is currently $5550 (it may increase a smidge next year). "</p>

<p>Please help me understand the Pell Grant criteria terms. Wikipedia has this : “To qualify for a Pell Grant, a student must demonstrate financial need. The amount of the award is based on the Expected Family Contribution, derived from the information on the FAFSA form.”</p>

<p>So, I am confused. You seem like you know this stuff, and I am just getting into this, so your guidance is appreciated.</p>

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<p>Pell is only available to students with very low EFCs. For 2010-2011 the EFC would have had to be between 0 and 5273 for any Pell eligibility.</p>

<p>The Pell grant is based on the student’s EFC. Currently (2010-2011) the maximum Pell grant is $5550. To get the maximum $5550 a student must have a 0 EFC. As the EFC goes up the Pell goes down almost inversely. For instance EFC 0 = Pell $5550, EFC 1 to 100 = Pell $5500, EFC 101to 200 = Pell $5400. The highest EFC for any Pell eligibility is 5273 which would be a Pell eligibility of $555. At EFC of 5274 or over there is $0 Pell eligibility.</p>

<p>The above numbers assume full time enrollment. The eligibility amount stays the same whether your school costs $10,000 a year or $40,000 a year.</p>

10

<p>Swimcatsmom:</p>

<p>Thanks for your response. I’m still a little confused, so could you pls help straighten me out?</p>

<p>If your income and assets are high and EFC is 0, then you get the full Pell grant? So, millionaire families get the full Pell grant? I expect this is untrue, but that’s my confusion.</p>

<p>Please help!</p>

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<p>*If your income and assets are high and EFC is 0, then you get the full Pell grant? So, millionaire families get the full Pell grant? I expect this is untrue, but that’s my confusion.</p>

<p>*</p>

<p>???</p>

<p>It’s not possible for someone who has a high income and high assets to have a 0 EFC or an EFC low enough for Pell…unless you’re the Duggar Family and have 6 kids in college at the same time.</p>

<p>People with high incomes and high assets have HIGH EFCs…such as EFC $50k+ or more. Obviously not qualifying for Pell.</p>

<p>Pell is for those with lowish incomes.</p>

<p>Just to give you a very rough idea…someone with an income of $100k (high income) will have an EFC of about $20k…so certainly not an EFC 0…and certainly not low enough to get Pell.</p>

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<p>With an EFC of zero ( poor family), BC would probably be the cheapest of these 3 schools as it meets 100% of need and the others do not. This means that they will give enough grant money along with the Pell and any state grants, student loans and work study to meet the cost of attending.</p>

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<p>

I think you must be misunderstanding what the term EFC means. EFC stands for expected family contribution (though it is a somewhat deceptive term as it is usually the minimum a family must contribute). The EFC is calculated based on income and assets. The higher the income and assets the higher the EFC. A family with high income and high assets is not going to have a 0 EFC. They will have a high EFC, which will make them ineligible for the Pell grant. The Pell grant is usually for people with low income.</p>

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<p>@2college2college, Boston College has not been mentioned as a school in consideration, only UMASS-Amherst, Bentley University & Babson College, all schools that do not meet 100% of need.</p>

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<p>Whoops, sorry!</p>

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<p>Thank you all for your input. Although I am still waiting on my admission decision & estimated aid package from Bentley, I did get into Babson and received an estimated financial aid package. I am estimated to receive the full Pell Grant of $5,550 and received a Babson Grant of $26k / year. It will be curious to see what Bentley offers me for an aid package.</p>

<p>Does anybody on this forum have experience with “negotiating” financial aid packages with colleges? I know that most financial aid offices do not like being shoved with offers from other schools in their faces, but does less aggressive negotiation sometimes work?</p>

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<p>PROFILE OF 2009-10 FINANCIAL AID Freshmen: BABSON COLLEGE </p>

<p>Financial Aid Applicants 265 (56.3%) of freshmen
Found to Have Financial Need 213 (80.4%) of applicants
Received Financial Aid 213 (100.0%) of applicants with financial need
Need Fully Met 51 (23.9%) of aid recipients
Average Percent of Need Met 92%
Average Award $29,408
Need-Based Gift Received by 194 (91.1%) of aid recipients, average amount $24,739
Need-Based Self-Help Received by 213 (100.0%) of aid recipients, average amount $4,669
Merit-Based Gift Received by 22 (10.3%) of aid recipients
Merit-Based Gift Received by 27 (5.7%) of freshmen without need, average amount $21,847 </p>

<p>At Babson they may offer you $5500.00 in Stafford loans & Work Study job.
Still the pell grant and the institutional grant total $31,100, but their price tag is well over 50K. </p>

<p>Private schools may state on their web site that they don’t engage in “negotiations”.
The schools have to be on equal ranking with each other, I don’t believe Babson, UMASS & Bentley are comparable to each other. </p>

<p>If you are not happy with your financial aid packages, you can always appeal it, worse thing they can say is “No”. They won’t take back their offer of acceptance! :)</p>

18

<p>Congrats on getting into Isenberg.</p>

<p>UMass Amherst tuition is $1714/year, your Adams scholarship covers that. Tuition is set by our state legislature, which takes pride in not having raised tuition in years, keeping UMass affordable for the common person.</p>

<p>Fees are $10,018/year (almost 6x the tuition for 2010-2011, expect them to go up 10-15% for 2011-2012. So much for keeping things affordable). </p>

<p>Then there are the other fees not included in the fees. If you are covered by health insurance that meets UMass requirements, these fees will be around $560 for the year as a freshman.</p>

<p>If you are not covered by health insurance, add another $2370 for school-provided insurance.</p>

<p>These bonus fees of course are not listed on the main UMass web pages, you have to go digging around the bursar’s pages to find them: <a href=“http://www.umass.edu/bursar/files/full-time%20ugrad.pdf[/url]”>http://www.umass.edu/bursar/files/full-time%20ugrad.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Make sure you include them when adding up the cost for UMass.</p>

<p>As far as FA, I don’t think UMass gives out a lot of institutional need-based aid. You could probably reasonably expect a couple thou in university grants, maybe some small merit scholarships if you are a really strong applicant.</p>

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<p>JohnMass…are your stats very high for these schools (like in the upper quartile of the school)? If so, they may be more open to an appeal (if they allow appeals). However, if your stats are rather average for these schools, then your chances for getting more money may not be as good.</p>

<p>At Babson they may offer you $5500.00 in Stafford loans & Work Study job.
Still the pell grant and the institutional grant total $31,100, but their price tag is well over 50K.</p>

<p>Good point…you will have a substantial gap in aid.</p>

<p>Annual College Costs ( Fall 2010 ) Living on-campus </p>

<p>tuition and fees: $39,040 (minus $26k school grant & $5500 Pell)
Room and board: $12,876<br>
Books and supplies: $1,000
Estimated personal expenses: $900 (this is LOW)
Transportation expense: $1,250 </p>

<p>Current school year COA…about…$56k</p>

<p>The COA of Babson is about $56k for the CURRENT school year…Next FALL will be higher…and every year after will be higher.</p>

<p>Even with the addition of a fed student loan, you’re not even getting all your tuition covered. So, you’ll have a gap with tuition and a complete coverage gap for room, board, books, etc. </p>

<p>I just saw your stats…</p>

<p>*Weighted GPA: 3.79 (on a 4.0 scale) I am currently in the top 15% of my class </p>

<p>ACT Score: 27*</p>

<p>Test Scores Middle 50% of First-Year Students Percent Who Submitted Scores
SAT Critical Reading: 560 - 650
SAT Math: 610 - 700
SAT Writing: 560 - 670
ACT Composite: 25 - 29 </p>

<p>Your test scores are in the middle at Babson. While you can try to appeal your FA package, the school may not be very motivated to give you enough money to make it affordable. Your score is in mid range at Bentley but it’s a bit better. </p>

<p>Where all have you applied? Did you apply to any financial safety schools (schools that you know that you have costs covered?) If not, you need to do so.</p>

<p>Did you apply to any schools that you could commute to?</p>

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<p>

OP is a MA resident, so travel should be substantially less than $1250. Personal expenses can be kept low with discipline, especially if you have no money or are cheap. $100/month is not that unreasonable IMO.</p>

<p>Right now, the gap for Babson looks to be around $23-24K.</p>

<p>For UMass the gap is around $16K, and if he receives any grants it will of course be less.</p>