Brown University plans to replace student loans with financial grants that do not have to be repaid.
Brown announced Wednesday that the university was launching a fundraising campaign to completely remove student loans from financial aid packages for current and incoming undergraduate students, with plans to start next academic year if the university meets a key fundraising goal.
Heard this too. But what does that mean for the students who are on loans. For the family with low income, the tuitions are waived anyway. But for those families who are too rich to qualify for the waiver and too poor to pay full-tuition, I heard the borrowing amount (i.e. loan) is limited (i.e. force family to pay). Furthermore, don’t know the loan removal is for what type of loan (i.e from federal or private loan etc.). That is a right direction anyway.
@ParentofA_student Yes, families that are not eligible for need based aid will be “forced” to pay.
Loan offered by Brown is mainly for international students who do not qualify federal/state loan.
It may be meaningless to citizen’s family in this country.
When I used the net price calculator for Brown a month ago it estimated that my family and I will have to pay around 26,000 a year. Does this new decision mean that I won’t have to take out any loans?
This is very big news for people “in the middle” – make over $100k so expected to pay a lot of tuition, but don’t make nearly enough to afford Brown without financial aid. Our son’s FA package included $5k in student loans for this, his freshman year, and the amount would have gone up by about $500 in each of the subsequent years. So this will free him of about $18k in student loan debt over the next three years at Brown
My best guess on this: If Brown is able to meet this goal, it will eliminate loans as a “line item” in the official financial aid package. So if a financial aid package includes categories like: scholarship (i.e., “free” money), parent contribution; student contribution; work study, and loans – then the dollar loan amount will be moved into the scholarship amount. It will not reduce the parent or student contribution, and probably not affect work study. Guessing further, I’d bet that it won’t matter if the loans are Federal loans or Brown University Loans. It appears as though this would not apply to those who take out private loans to finance the family or student contribution. How’s that for hedging?!!
@profdad2021 the only line for loans on the npc is student. Since students can only take out $5,000, does that mean that’s the only support the school would offer? If that’s the case this changes practically nothing.
@agentaquastar We are all guessing here, but my best guess is what I said earlier, and IS what you describe above. Brown (and the rest of the Ivy schools) would have to change their entire conception of “ability to pay” for the policy change to have a broader reach and help, for example, those who borrow to cover the parent or student contributions.
Regarding your statement that “this changes practically nothing,” – for the folks who are facing borrowing $15,000 to $20,000 (or more) for their undergraduate degrees - there are some in this group for whom the debt would be difficult to manage, meaning that it WOULD affect their ability to explore their interests and attend graduate school. Also, for those students whose own loans would be eliminated- surely there are lots of these students whose families borrow to meet the parent and student contributions. So it may not entirely eliminate debt for these students either, but it would go a long way and be very helpful. In this sense, then, it is a step in a positive direction.
@profdad2021 thanks for the clarification. I understand that this is a step in the right direction, but (for me) when facing $35,000/yr vs 30,000/yr in debt, the $5000 is negligible bc both values are too much anyways.
I agree with profdad2021 analysis.
Brown will continue to calculate what it feels your family can pay. If it feels you can pay $20,000/year, it will still expect you to pay that – and the $40,000+ difference will be covered with grants/scholarships/work study – not loans.
But if your family can’t afford to pay that $20,000/year, then your family has the option of borrowing that amount. Under the old scenario, you would borrow $20,000 + $5,000. Under this new scenario. you wouldn’t be borrowing the $5000.
Here’s another article about it https://www-cnbc-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.cnbc.com/amp/2017/09/25/brown-university-raising-120-million-to-eliminate-all-student-loans.html
I agree that it needs to be noted that this policy replaces STUDENT loans with grants. If a family feels they cannot meet their EFC from their own resources, they will still need to borrow. It’s the same at Harvard, Princeton, Columbia etc. Many families think that ALL loans are being eliminated when it is only student loans that are affected.
Brown is one of the least generous Ivies, and tends to screw over lower-middle and middle class families. I wish Brown, instead of striving to eliminate loans, would strive towards evaluating demonstrated need more generously. I feel like that would have more of an impact and makes this whole eliminating loans thing look like more of a publicity stunt. I also wish that brown would make more of an effort to provide stipends for things like move-in costs for low income students.
My daughter was admitted to Brown, Haverford, Vassar, and Reed. In descending order the most generous were Haverford, Vassar, Reed and then Brown. Brown refused to grant the non-custodial parent waiver while the other schools accepted it. I appealed and was denied, but they added another $800 to her aid. That’s all. The financial aid package mentioned the possibility of taking out a loan.
We had a different experience. I thought Brown’s aid was very generous. For my kid, their offer was lower than only three other schools: MIT (amazing aid), another Ivy, and a named scholarship from Williams. Brown was above everyone else on the list, including yet another Ivy, a few LACs in the Amherst category, and two big universities. Furthermore, Brown would have adjusted their numbers based on competing need-based offers. I agree with earlier posts in that the change in Brown’s policy affects student loans, which can make up to a $5,000 per year difference in aid, ie, Brown is now covering that $5,000 instead of asking students to get loans. That’s not small potatoes in my book.