Does attendance at admitted students days influence the final scholarship packages from schools? In other words, do schools consider “demonstrated interest” as they review students for financial aid packages?
No…students would have already gotten their financial aid packages by then. The point of admitted students day is not to try to sell the school to the students.
Attending an “open house” may show interest…but look at the college’s “Common Data Set” to see if interest is even considered at all. It isn’t for large public schools and less competitive schools.
Also, demonstrated interest would be used for admissions, not for financial aid.
The only time this would matter is if it’s a scholarship weekend…and the school specifically says that scholarship consideration is part of that event.
@readytolaunch I have a counterexample to previous posters. My DS was accepted to a competitive college with 20k a year merit. He wanted to go to an accepted students weekend, but had a conflict in that he was going to be out of the country during the available times. Wanting to visit the school before rendering a decision, he scheduled an individual visit during his HS spring break, including meetings with professors from the departments of interest. The day after this visit, his scholarship offer was increased to 25k a year. Was it a coincidence? You decide.
My son was offered 25000 merit scholarship… after admitted day they offered additional 2500 departmental scholarship… totally unexpected.
Most of the time it doesn’t because most schools final financial packages are already sent out by then.
I’ve read that if you go in in April and say that your financial package isn’t quite enough, often some of the kids who have said no to admission have freed up some money and the colleges can sweeten the deal. If they haven’t filled their freshman class towards the end of April they get nervous. Of course, if they have filled their freshman class they will laugh at you and say it’s their final offer, so you are running a risk.
But it’s possible that the money is there if you ask for it.
Once your kid has been accepted to more than one college the power shifts. You now have something the college really wants, Sometimes the colleges are able to pay for it.
D has applied and been accepted to a couple of out of state schools that have not sent out financial aid packages and their accepted student days are coming up in March. My husband doesn’t want to make the journey if we can’t afford to send her to school there without accruing massive debt.
Did you run the net price calculators for the colleges. There is one on each college website. They will give you a decent idea of your net cost…and possible affordability.
I’m wondering if our schools are waiting for us to hit the “I will enroll” button on her portal to see how we serious we are, before they give us our final financial aid number (rolling decision and non-binding EA schools). Currently undergoing several panel and faculty-led interviews for merit aid at some of these schools.
If you have high interest already, why would they offer you more incentive. In contrary, there are actually specific admitted student events for scholarship winners at many schools.
I know a few people who used those visits to negotiate financial aid offers. Some were successful, especially at schools with large endowments.
My son didn’t commit to UChicago until after admitted students day. He committed the next day! Since he wasn’t being offered finaid, he didn’t expect anything more. He did receive a National Merit Scholarship award of $750 per year, after he had accepted. This was pretty obviously UChicago’s way of adding to its tally of NMS awardees in the first year class, but hardly much of an award or incentive. He was offered $4000 NMS from Carleton. (Keep in mind that that was in the previous century when the total COA was less than half of what it is today. We figured our total COA at about $30,000 per year at Chicago then.)