<p>We really do need those HS counselors to give families some background information on FA. When you hear that a school has need-blind admissions, most of us end up thinking that means that if you’re admitted that the school will make it affordable to attend. But as this thread shows, that’s not the case at all. </p>
<p>I don’t know if the NPCs will ever work to within a few thousand $$$ of the estimate. Once you get to situations that require more analysis by the FA folks–a small business owner, divorced parents with separate households, etc.–then all bets are off.</p>
<p>Y’know, Brandeis changed their admissions policy a few years back to need-aware (they call it "need-sensitive). The admissions people filled the first big wedge of the class with the people they most wanted, regardless of need. Then the FA folks said “OK, you’ve used up this much of the FA we have budgeted for this class”. At a certain point, all of the FA was used up, after which the only students admitted were those who weren’t getting any need-based aid. </p>
<p>In other words, if you were admitted, your need was met. If it couldn’t be, then you were rejected. </p>
<p>There was a verrrrrry lengthy discussion (which I can’t find) about this in the Parents Forum. Opinion was split. Some people thought this was far kinder than admitted students who wouldn’t be able to attend. Others thought that it unfairly took the decision out of the hands of the families: what if they chose to take out loans to close the gap, or had other resources they could call upon? </p>
<p>Now, here’s the most interesting thing: I couldn’t (easily) find anything about this on the Brandeis website. I might be looking in the wrong places…but another possibility is that Brandeis recognizes that people applying for admission don’t want to hear about this. If you have financial need and your stats are a bit low for Brandeis, you’re not going to bother with it as a reach because you know things are even more stacked against you.</p>
<p>*How would you fix a NPC to make the merit estimate more accurate? *</p>
<p>For one thing, merit estimates should NEVER be given if the school chooses only a few students to receive merit out of a large pool of qualified applicants. That just gives false hope. And, it’s also misleading to include any merit in the NPC if stats weren’t even given.</p>
<p>but, if the schools awards merit to most/all students with certain stats, then an easy fix to the NPC would be to provide the based need-based aid info…and then BELOW THAT include a mention that the child’s given stats MAY make them eligible for a merit award of between $XXXX and $YYYY, but that the merit awards are competitive and can’t be guaranteed.</p>
<p>I don’t know if the NPCs will ever work to within a few thousand $$$ of the estimate. Once you get to situations that require more analysis by the FA folks–a small business owner, divorced parents with separate households, etc.–then all bets are off.</p>
<p>Yes, for odd situations, NPCs can’t be that accurate. I think many NPCs do make that disclaimer. But, if the family is intact, has little assets, and just has earned income from salaries, the NPCs should be fairly accurate within a couple thous.</p>
<p>It’s like pulling teeth getting real info from admissions about financial aid and anything where the answer could adversely affect admissions in general. The admissions folks know that any answer they give is likely to be related through the grape vine (or on internet message boards) and someone’s head could roll. Some years ago, an adcom was fired for telling someone s/he had little or no chance of being admitted. It was a totally true statement; in fact with those admissions rates, it could be argued that no has a good chance statistically of being admitted, but the wrong publicity got the person in trouble. Admissions’ job is to get as many applications as possible so there is as much choice as possible for the college to put together the strongest and best class possible.</p>
<p>I read this thread with great curiosity. There are many thoughtful replies. I do find some of the replies to be a little condescending as the OP is only seeking the best price for the schools that they desire. However, sometimes that what you desire and the price for that product are service are misaligned. The frustrating part, I think, is not knowing the price of the product or service. </p>
<p>Would you walk into car dealership, and pick out a car that you want (or worse your kid picks out that car ), without knowing what the price will be? I feel that is what many colleges are doing to us. The more ambiguous the process, the more applications, that they get from us that are hoping for merit or financial aid. It forces us to cast a wide net of $75 applications, hoping catch something of value. For those with $250K per kid in the bank, I guess the process isnt quite as bad–just get the Mercedes or BMW or whatever for your kid. For the rest of us, the chase for the best value is on!!! Enough of the car analogy. </p>
<p>FYI, it appears that Cavender’s experience is similar to ours. For our first child going to college, we too were very, very dissappointed by BU’s Fin Aid / Merit offer. It appears that BU is in high demand, and can be extremely selective about to whom and how much aid will be offered. After many tears over the $ that BU offered and numerous email exchanges with BU financial aid officers, we were only further dissappointed. We, thankfully, are taking our $$ and energy to a comparable school that is much more affordable for our family. Our daughter initially was crushed, but that since has passed, and is now thrilled to be going the school she eventually selected!! She will walk away with little or no debt. </p>
<p>Cavender I feel for you, and your frustration with the “system”, I think we all would love for the finanial aid process to be more transparent and predictable. I think that this will only happen as we consumers demand more clarity from these schools, and enroll our children in schools that provide such clarity along with quality and value, so that we can spend our educational $ more wisely. </p>
<p>I truly think the playing field is changing, colleges that do not adjust their pricing strategy to their relative/perceived value, will be left with empty dorms.</p>
<p>I personally would like to have colleges to just charge 20% less, but same price for everyone, there would be no question (very transparent) about how much it costs. No different than same tax rate for everyone, no deductions. Of course, we will then have some special interest group coming in to say, “But what about this, and you should also consider this…”</p>
<p>Oldfort, I would LOVE this to happen (both for college costs and tax system). </p>
<p>Unfortunately, implementing this kind of system will destroy lobbying industry and part of non-profit sector, therefore will damage our economy even further, thus making American families suffer economically and putting college out of reach of even more families. Therefore, it cannot and should not happen. (Yes, I am being sarcastic).</p>
<p>Slitheytove: “In other words, if you were admitted, your need was met. If it couldn’t be, then you were rejected.”</p>
<p>Sounds like a pretty fair system. When filling out the Profile and Fafsa you are being honest and signing statements as to your honesty. The situation with my daughter and BU kind of blindsided me. I didn’t think that any relatively wealthy school could offer ZERO aid when the fafsa said there was a considerable gap. The ZERO part is what I found most troubling. Truly, does BU multiply $60,000 times x numbers of enrolled students and come up with their operating budget? Not likely, but anyone can refute me.
College is soooo expensive, overpriced to say the least.
I don’t think that colleges are so interested in finding that perfect range of students in their applicant search as they are trying to get as many applicants as possible to justify the exorbitant tuitions they charge. The more applicants, the higher the “demand”, the higher the demand the more they can charge. I don’t see the altruism that others in this thread see.
It’s a business after all.</p>
<p>". I didn’t think that any relatively wealthy school could offer ZERO aid when the fafsa said there was a considerable gap. "</p>
<p>FAFSA really needs to change that acronym. It doesn’t really mean that. The results from some federal form doesn’t get to decide what aid you should get from a school. </p>
<p>“The ZERO part is what I found most troubling. Truly, does BU multiply $60,000 times x numbers of enrolled students and come up with their operating budget? Not likely, but anyone can refute me.”</p>
<p>BU’s tuition is not $60k per year; it’s about $40k. That said, schools USUALLY have to budget MORE than that to cover costs, hence the need for an endowment/donors to help offset the per-student shortfall that exists. Even those who pay full freight are often subsidized by the endowment.</p>
<p>4kisinarow, I agree some of us commenting got edgy at times. It’s because we keep seeing this same situation year in and year out. When you are at #4, as I am, you’ll see what I mean. But none of us meant to bash the OP or be cruel.</p>
<p>If it’s not a school that guarantees to meet full need without loans then yeah, they’ll offer zero aid in some cases. </p>
<p>As you said, it’s a business. They’ve got to fill X seats with the highest-quality product they can, but without running over budget (meaning the amount of aid they’ve got available). If the school is one of the handful receiving huge numbers of applications from top-notch students, and also having an enormous FA budget, that’s relatively easy. Admit whoever you want, craft your class with great care. </p>
<p>If, on the other hand, you’re a reasonably well-off school that gets a mix of types of applicants, you can’t afford to give enough aid to everyone. You have to make some hard choices. You could go with the Brandeis system, where you explicitly say that you are going to turn down a big chunk of highly qualified poorer applicants in favor of not-as-well-qualified richer applicants. Or you can go with the BU system, where those better qualified poorer students are admitted and gapped. Disadvantages with both approaches. There will be angry and hurt people no matter which way you go. </p>
<p>Best approach for families is to be familiar with these issues before applying. Which brings us back, once again, to having high schools educating students and parents about the money side of things.</p>
<p>I think the OP thinks that the endowment’s sole purpose is to provide FA. It’s not. The cost to educate is more than tuition, so the endowment subsidizes every student. </p>
<p>I may not be remembering the numbers right, but I think some/all ivies report that their real cost is over $70k a student (I don’t think this counts room, board, etc.). So even the “full payers” are getting aid.</p>
<p>I disagree. I’ll give you another perspective: I’m a student with a 0 EFC and was still significantly gapped at my public U. However, I also have a 20k outside private scholarship and I earn around 10k a year in work (since I started college so it would not have appeared on my FAFSA). If I had been rejected because they couldn’t meet my “need”, they never would have known that it WAS affordable to me. That’s why schools are need-blind for the most part. They never know, for sure, whether or not it was affordable even with their FA package. Some students can make it work, others can’t, but IMO that shouldn’t be the school’s place to decide.</p>
<p>Right. There are many ways that people close gaps. They cut back, the parents work over-time or take second jobs, the student works 2 jobs over the summer, or the parents take out loans, etc. We don’t want schools rejecting kids just because the school thinks they can’t afford it.</p>
<p>^^ Some schools do just that. They meet full need for accepted kids, but turn down kids who they deem need too much financial aid. </p>
<p>It has even been argued here that ALL meet-full-need schools do this to some degree, although they don’t admit to it. The argument (and you would have to search the cc archives for this) was that the schools must either flat-out consider need OR have a system whereas, by considering zip code/ school of attendance/ early decision, etc-- can estimate need on a rough basis so that their annual financial aid budgets are somewhat consistent.</p>
<p>See, silly me. I’d assumed that a school listed on Princeton Review as meeting, say, 87% of need, meets 87% of need for all students, all the time, insofar as possible given the school’s predictably individualized and/or arbitrary characterization of “need.”</p>
<hr>
<p>That is not logical. The published %'age of how much need is met is just crunching real numbers. Take the total need, as determined by COA-EFC for all aid-eligible students. Add up the total amount of aid awarded to students who have any demonstrated need. Factor into that number by the total number of aid-eligible students. Think about it … this includes every outside scholarship, every institutional scholarship, every grant, every work study award, every loan that is awarded to a student with even $1 of need. Meeting 87% of need does not mean that all student have 87% of their need met. It is a fact that must be reported, not a promise of anything.</p>
<p>It is indeed a frustrating process. But, FA is not an entitlement program. Rather, it is like a business. You and your child may have to think the same way and decline the offer if it does not meet your expectations. DS3 will apply this fall. I have roughly outlined a scheme for our family situation. </p>
<p>1) Prestige Premium: This is the amount you are willing to pay for your child to go to a prestigious college rather than your state school:
a. For better employment opportunity: 40K (this depends upon the major; it would be low for premeds and students aiming for graduate school)
b. For showing off in front of your neighbors or your child’s peers: 5K
c. Child’s happiness premium: 10K
d. Your child can elevate himself/herself to a higher level: 10K
e. Total prestige premium is 65K</p>
<p>2) Risk adjustment: Possibility of your child doing well (staying in top 30%) in a more competitive school:
a. 100% means little risk – 65K*100%
b. 50% means that you have some serious doubt: 32.5K (struggling with 4 AP courses or taking the SAT 3 times to get the average score for the prestigious school)</p>
<p>Example:
This is the premium amount our family would be willing to pay for him to go to a prestigious college on top of what I have to pay if he is to attend our state school. He can choose to take out some loan if he really wants to do it. But, I will set a cap at 20K. So, if he can demonstrate his capability for the tough competition, the total maximum would be:</p>
<p>a. State flagship school: 40K for 4 yrs (free tuition)
b. Prestige premium: 65K<br>
c. DS3’s loan: 20K
d. Total of 125K for 4 yrs</p>
<p>If we have to pay significantly more based upon the financial package from a particular school, a decline letter will be issued. He can save the 20K loan and 65K fund toward a graduate degree. There will be less emotional. It is strictly business.</p>
), without knowing what the price will be? I feel that is what many colleges are doing to us. The more ambiguous the process, the more applications, that they get from us that are hoping for merit or financial aid. It forces us to cast a wide net of $75 applications, hoping catch something of value. For those with $250K per kid in the bank, I guess the process isnt quite as bad–just get the Mercedes or BMW or whatever for your kid. For the rest of us, the chase for the best value is on!!! Enough of the car analogy. </p>