As an international student, would I have higher chances of getting into the ivies if I don’t apply for aid and am an from ethnic minority?
Not without exceptional grades, test scores and EC’s. Those are called need-aware schools.
Exceptional grades and ECs are a given. Would not asking for financial aid put you above the other internationals who do?
It might. It depends on the school. If it a school that is deluged with applications, like the tip-top schools, then no, it wouldn’t make much of a difference. If it is at a need-aware school, then yes it might make a slight difference.
The key questions here are: Do you need aid and if yes do you qualify for need based aid?
If you need financial aid, then you don’t have much choice but to apply for it. It won’t do you much good to get into a college that costs over $250,000 if you don’t have that kind of money to afford it.
Among the Ivy League, Dartmouth, Harvard, Princeton and Yale are need-blind for internationals. This means – in theory at least – that your financial situation won’t be considered in admissions. The others Brown, Columbia, Cornell and Penn are need aware, meaning that they will know your financial situation when they evaluate your application,
All of the need-blind universities plus Brown guarantee to meet full need for internationals, meaning if you get in they will cover your demonstrated need. For Columbia, Cornell and Penn it’s hard to predict, but again if you’re admitted, there’s a good chance they would make it work for you financially. In all cases, they will not go beyond your demonstrated need, so if you don’t qualify, don’t expect miracles.
Bear in mind, if you don’t apply for financial aid for your first year you may not be eligible for it in later years, even if your financial situation changes. Many colleges have this policy for internationals.
If you already know that you won’t qualify for enough need-based aid, another option would be too look at colleges/universities that offer merit aid to internationals. These are not Ivies, but include some very good schools.
At Brown, Penn, Columbia, and Cornell, it makes a difference in your favor - all other things being equal, of course. If you know you can pay full freight and are competitive for one of these schools, your odds go from 1 in 100 -1 in 40, to about 1 in 20 to 1 in 10 depending on the country you’re from. In other words, it’s still very very hard to get in but the difference is significant. Same thing with Williams, Bowdoin, USC, Stanford…
If you’re AS GOOD as the other applicants - maybe a bit. But don’t forget that there are many, many, many rich people (richer than you, probably) who are also trying to get into those same schools. The sole fact of not applying for aid isn’t going to give you a whole lot of advantage.
Just a quick correction to the above statements: Cornell (like Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Dartmouth) is in fact need blind for international students as well. The difference is that if HYPD accepts an international student, they will commit to meeting 100% of the student’s need. On the other hand, Cornell will not and it has done so in the past. (That’s not to say that they won’t give you 100% of your need, just that they don’t have an obligation to, and they have refused to do so in the past.)
So in short, not applying for aid will only affect your chances at Brown, Dartmouth and Penn (for the Ivies).
^Cornell IS need-aware for internationals as far as I know, go4cornell. In addition, they also don’t necessarily meet need.
@MYOS1634 Cornell is not need-aware ( I don’t know if they were in the past, but I’ve always known them to be need-blind for internationals). You can see its policy on this page: http://www.finaid.cornell.edu/sites/default/files/International%20Financial%20Aid%20FAQs%208-6-12.pdf Scroll down to “Is Cornell need-blind for admission for international students?” In addition to this, an admissions officer told me this himself when he visited my country. (Also, I did say that they don’t necessarily meet need, so we agree on that point.)
@go4cornell, it’s interesting to note that Cornell is need-blind for internationals. So now we have four categories:
Need blind and will meet full need:
Amherst
Dartmouth
MIT
Harvard
Princeton
Yale
Need blind and may not meet full need:
Cornell
Not need blind but will meet full need:
Brown
Colby
Davidson
Hamilton
Macalester
Middlebury
Pomona
Swarthmore
U of Chicago
Vassar
Wellesley
Williams
Not need blind and may not meet demonstrated need:
Carlton
Columbia
Penn
Wesleyan
Comments and corrections are welcome!
^okay, I’ll take them as their word then.
@momrath
There’s a blog site that makes no distinction between these two groups of colleges. Are you basing it on anecdotal evidence? http://blog.■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■/blog/colleges-that-meet-100-of-student-financial-need/
@circuitrider: this site is for first gen domestic students. @momrath listed these colleges according to their policy toward international students.
@myos1634 Then, we’re still missing a site. Or, cite. I haven’t found one that justifies bracketing out Columbia, Penn, Wesleyan or Carlton.
@momrath you can add Georgetown to the list of need-blind for internationals but may not meet full need.
i wouldn’t be eligible for financial aid regardless.
According to The Crimson survey of the Harvard class of 2018, 15% said their family had income of more than $500,000. That’s approximately 15X higher than the incidence of high earners in the US.
In addition, “67 percent of respondents who said their family makes more than $500,000 annually were accepted through early admissions, compared to just 35 percent of those students who said their family income is lower than $40,000.”
“Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid William R. Fitzsimmons ’67 said in an interview last October that part of the reason that an income gap exists in early admissions is that students from less privileged economic backgrounds generally do not have access to the same resources in the college admissions process as their more wealthy peers.”
@circuitrider, @MYOSI634, I’m not citing any site. I tried to find the information on each college’s website by searching for financial aid for international applicants.
Internationals can definitely get financial aid at Columbia, Penn, Wesleyan or Carlton, and many do. As far as I could determine, for internationals these schools are not need-blind in admissions and they don’t guarantee to meet full demonstrated need. If that isn’t correct, let me know and I will amend the list. I’m sure it will end up being a very long list; these are just the schools that recently came up.
What is “demonstrated need” for internationals is a little murky since many NPCs are geared toward U.S. residents, but that’s a different problem.
I’m also trying to compile a list of colleges/universities that offer merit aid to international. So far I’ve mostly concentrated on small LACs. Additions and corrections welcome.
Carlton
Davidson
Dickinson
Kenyon
Mt. Holyoke
Rhodes
Smith
I think this is important because so many international students don’t understand the nuances. They think that if a school is need-blind, they will automatically be able to afford it. To me, the most important factor is whether or not a school guarantees to meet full need, but even then demonstrated need is highly individual. What would work for one applicant may not work for another with a different financial situation.
@momrath and @MYOS1634 - Both Penn and Wesleyan show up on the following website:
http://thecollegematchmaker.com/65-colleges-give-generous-aid-international-students/
In the case of Wesleyan, it clearly states elsewhere on its website that its policy is to meet 100% of demonstrated need “of all admitted students”. Perhaps, it was their error not to append the words, “including international students, transfer students, or any other undergraduate student”, but, I guess they didn’t anticipate how closely the site would be parsed by helpful CC contributors. 