College Financial Aid Isn't Going to the Neediest

Paying for College
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<p>Going to a “name” college is not the be all to end all in life. There are families that focus on being able to pay for the top costing schools in this country, and they put a lot of money away to pay for this. The thing is, it’s a balancing act as to what kind of quality and standard of living you want yourself and family to have during those years you have to be saving for college. unless it’s clear that money is not going to be an issue. I know, personally, we made some family decisions as to the size, quality, neighborhood, location of our house so that the 15 years we have been living in it, we have enjoyed the amenities it provides, but at a very steep cost. We could have purchased a house for a lot less and had more money for college. We also spent money on private schools that we felt suited our children’s and our way of thinking and learning, and living, that could have gone towards college costs. We also spent money on other things that enriched our lives.</p>

<p>Basically, if you want financial aid that is going to the needy, you have to down scale to that income level where you qualify for that kind of aid, something I certainly do not want to do . Be aware that doesn’t guarantee to you to get that aid. All it does when you reduce your circumstances is lower the maximum amounts your student CAN possibly get. Yes, there will be those who are in niches and circumstances where they beat the system but that can happen in any situation. I have a neighbor across the street who has DD getting a nice piece of cost met by a very good LAC, that my son took off the table for consideration because full freight was over $60K a year. There are grandparents in the picture that pick up the tab for all kinds of costs, including the house. My guess is the house is not even in their name and GP lends out money each year to be made up when they die. Some arrangement, I know is in place so that the family can live very well and yet qualify for all kinds of aid. I have a friend who did that also. Zero EFCs for each of two kids when NCP made over a half million a year so the kids ended up with about 2/3 of their educations paid for by state, federal and school funds. Yes, there are those who beat the system, but they operate under a risk to do so, that things go wrong with what they do, not legally, but in carrying it out.</p>

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<p>Dad II is pretty old school on college. I have two co-workers, one that worked full-time while going to UNH for engineering. The other worked a lot of hours but not full-time while going to college. I worked about 18 hours a week while going to college and more during the summer. Part-time and summer jobs can be pretty hard to come by right now - though it depends on where you’re located and what your skills are.</p>

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<p>And here’s the rub, cpt. Exactly what you have described, the ‘gaming’ of the system, if you want to call it that, is caused by a combination of an inefficient set of criteria for obtaining need-based aid (or not nearly enough investigation of those cases) & people who are flat-out dishonest. Those people, of course, will be the first to tell you that we are suckers for playing by the rules. I ask them if they can spell K-A-R-M-A…</p>

<p>My dad told me once that it’s not a good attribute to count other peoples’ money. But when a supposed level playing field is skewed, it makes you think. And that’s my idea of ‘old-school’.</p>

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<p>“Spock, I’ve found that evil usually triumphs unless good is very, very careful.” - Leonard McCoy “The Omega Glory”</p>

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<p>It can. But it can also detract from your focus on being as successful as you can be.</p>

<p>This topic bothered me when our son was in his first year of school but he’s out working now and loves his work and we had saved up enough for full-pay for two kids and he chose an inexpensive (relatively) option. So I’m happy now. The realization of paying some big bills was a bit of a shock as I had assumed that there was merit money out there but our timing was bad. We’ve been in frugal mode for so long that not paying college bills feels like we have had a huge raise. In the meantime, I’ve improved my skills, lost 70+ pounds and am thinking about some hobbies that I put off for a few years. We still have our daughter to educate for two or three years but we’re hoping that it won’t be difficult.</p>

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<p>Agreed, BC. What we did for our two kids, paying for their undergraduate education at schools they both loved, is something to be proud of. But the bargainer in me always rues the ‘one that got away’. In this case, however, although like you I had heard about (and seen) examples of gamesmanship and maybe out-and-out fraud, that was not for me. Time to put that battle aside & concentrate on more productive things, I guess.</p>

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<p>Wait. Why are you criticizing Dad II. If his kids are getting Stafford and Perkins then his family has FAFSA need. Which is pretty cut and dry for qualifying.</p>

<p>Then it sounds like his kids may have recieved “preferential packaging” from the schools for need based aid based on merit. </p>

<p>This does not sound like “gaming” the system.</p>

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<p>^^ thanks. everyone who has ever filed CSS profile and/or FAFSA know that you have to send in your tax documents. There is no way to cheat unless you dare to cheat on your tax. </p>

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<p>I have been talking alone the original topic by OP, by adding my data point to support that the aids are going to the neediest. It was you who asked me the strange question.</p>

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<p>There was a message here that talked about many colleges passing on needy kids 'cause the colleges cd not afford the kids. Of course, this means that the colleges are not need blind since the financial condition is entering into the admission decision.</p>

<p>Are there specific stats reported somewhere on how likely it is for a given college would give out adequate (100 pct) FA to satisfy financial need?</p>

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<p>^ Yes, you can google for a school’s Common Data Set and check section H2i which shows “the percentage of need that was met of students who were awarded any need-based aid.”</p>

<p>It should look something like this: [Aid</a> Awarded to Enrolled Undergraduates](<a href=“http://www.reed.edu/ir/cds/cds1213/cdssech201213.pdf]Aid”>http://www.reed.edu/ir/cds/cds1213/cdssech201213.pdf)</p>

<p>(Not all schools publish the CDS).</p>

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<p>What’s so great about being “needs blind?” Seems like a dumb way to run any organization.</p>

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<p>Yes, sometimes you can game the system. As long as it’s done legally, that’s fine. Sometimes you also miss out due to some dumb technicality too. There is a component of chance and luck in all things in life. </p>

<p>Most games have a component of risk in them and the payoffs are not so certain, and usually not so big that they are worthwhile. Sometimes, you get really lucky, and can make out. You have three kids, spaced 5 years apart, you pay a heck of a lot more than some folks I know with twins and a singleton born a year within the twins, and if you hold one back or push one ahead in school, and, “ooh la la” what that can do do your EFC! I know someone who pushed a kid ahead a year, and held one back in a gap year to have two in college. With an income of $70K a year, which is upper middle class, but living up to the brink of it, means halving the EFC and making it 40% at full need colleges, meant that her kids went to college for a lot less than she would have had to pay. She knew the system and gamed it, and good for her.</p>

<p>My friend’s husband, plotted and planned for the government and schools to come up with as much money as possible for his kids education, and yes, he hit the jack pot Both kids now making big time bucks, and went to college on state, federal and school money even though he made about a half million a year. He did not want to pay more than he absolutely had to for their education , and he did not. Yes, he saved over a $100K with how he worked it out. But my friend, his ex had to trust him for it to work, and yes, she did, and he forked over half the savings to her when the two kids were out of college. He split his saving between the kids who were very happy to get the money when they did, plus they have no loans,other than for law school, and some other grad program, but they are doing very well indeed. They got over on the systme big time and brag about it. All legal.</p>

<p>If you have grandparents or other family members happy to subsidize your standard of living, sometimes very heavily, if they start on asking for loan documents to match up their subsidy, the year before college time, yep, the college kid involved can get some nice fin aid if accepted to a college that will pay it. My neighbors’ DD is going to a $60K+ school, as is her sister–two of them,and they both get some hefty aid, even though they live in a $2milion dollar house with every amenity of life that Grands provide. They drive mighty fine cars, go on the most wonderful vacations, have ECs over the top and their home and yard are showpieces. But I think their family income is under $100K and since the schools the girls go to meet full need, what do you think they are getting in aid with two at college for two years concurrently? Makes your blood boil? Nope, not mine. That’s just the way it works.</p>

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<p>Go to [Harvard</a> College Tuition, Costs and Financial Aid - CollegeData College Profile](<a href=“http://www.collegedata.com/cs/data/college/college_pg03_tmpl.jhtml?schoolId=444]Harvard”>http://www.collegedata.com/cs/data/college/college_pg03_tmpl.jhtml?schoolId=444).</p>

<p>That link send you specifically to Harvard’s info, but you can look up any school on the site by putting in the name of the school.</p>

<p>It tells you that 70.5% of all Harvard freshmen accepted applied for financial aid. Out of those who applied 85.8% of them were found to qualify for aid. And all of them, 100% got aid, met 100%.</p>

<p>But that’s Harvard. You’ll find at most schools, that not every one who qualified for aid got aid met, and that it’s not met at 100% either. Also remember those are the kids who accepted the school, so there are often kids in those stats that chose to go elsewhere. Not so much for H, but for other schools. The applicants who got terrible financial aid packages are not reflected in this data since only those students who chose to accept the packages are in there. </p>

<p>But, yes, you can look at this data for any college.</p>

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<p>Cpt, glad your blood ain’t boiling…neither is mine…NOT! :)</p>

<p>Those are a couple of interesting methods to ‘legally’ massage the system, and while I can (and do) disapprove of their respective finagling, it’s the system that is full of loopholes that really is to blame. It’s also the private schools doling out this undeserved need-based aid that don’t follow up & investigate possible chicanery.</p>

<p>THIS is really what is taking away from need-based aid going to the right place.</p>

<p>Just a question, whose job is it anyway to police/enforce this? The specific U., or the government? Aren’t there doc’s signed by the aid-getter saying that fraud is punishable by imprisonment?</p>

<p>Just 'cause it’s legal doesn’t necessarily make it right.</p>

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<p>“Need blind” for admissions means that the only thing under consideration is the applicant’s merits, not the size of their pocketbook. </p>

<p>In some cases, this is a fantastic thing. When a school says that it will meet full financial need AND its admissions are need-blind, that school is saying that they want the best students. Only a few handfuls of schools fit this description, and they’re the most selective in the country.</p>

<p>In most cases–need-blind admissions, but no guarantee to meet need–caveat emptor. You might be admitted, but your COA may bear no resemblance to your EFC. Most public schools work this way. </p>

<p>Some schools (generally privates without super-hefty endowments) split the difference. They meet full need, and are need-blind in admissions up until their FA budget is exhausted. Then they switch to need-aware admissions for the final 10-20% or whatever of acceptances.</p>

<p>cpt, what kind of finagling would’ve gotten someone earning $500k/year substantial need-based aid? All I can imagine is FAFSA-only schools (so noncustodial parent income isn’t counted).</p>

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<p>Well, here is a very clear situation that I see all of the time with FAFSA: Kid has hard earned money in his accounts. Saved from piggy banks, scooping dog poo, baby sitting, working summers, etc, etc, and reports a big fat $7K as asset. Well, his EFC is automatically going to be $1400K right there. If he is from a low income family and is PELL eligible, that is nearly dollar for dollar off his PELL award. If he just opened an account and reimbursed his parent for expenses, it could either be within the parent’s asset exclusion allowance or only hit up 5.6%. Fair? Nope. In fact, colleges themselves will tell you outright that assets should be spent and savings be put in the parents’ names. Also, those parents who are foolish enough to file FAFSA the day they got paid or had some earmarked funds in an account are going to be hit harder than those who know the rules of the game and empty those accounts as low as possible before filing. </p>

<p>My friend’s ex made over $500K a year. He did not want to pay for college and state rules in that state ended child support after high school grad. He basically told his wife, who was the custodial parent, that the support and payments for those years the kids were in college would be under $30K but that he would pay off the house before then, and she could borrow the difference from the HELOC and they would split the savings after 6 years. She was really in no position to argue. So she had an auto zero EFC through the simplified means which means no assets counted, and the home is not counted for FAFSA. So both kids got full PELL, full State monies, full subsidized loans and the schools also kicked in some need money. Now that excluded those PROFILE schools, so they had to go to state schools, but they went for practically free, getting work study, subsidzed loans, one got SEOG, the other didn’t. If they were truly at that level of fin aid without a rich father in the background, it still would have been tight, since they did not get full need met. But with Daddy filling in whatever gaps, they were rolling in it. They got over a hundred grand in grants and subsidies, took out only Perkins and subsidzed Staffords, which Dad assumed at the low interest rates when they graduated One went to law school as she graduated summa cum laude from a good state school, the other is also in a great job, and the money saved, Dad gave them when they got married a couple of years ago and made nice down payments on their houses. My friend got the other half of the savings, along with adjustments for anything that wasn’t paid to her those years. </p>

<p>So a divorced or separated set of parents where one does not earn much can do very well with FAFSA if they cooperate. Also grandparents and other family help can be literally wriiten off by a loan document so that all money given are in loan form and they can be forgiven upon death of the lender or really anytime the lender should so choose. </p>

<p>There are literally dozens of situational niches that one can take advantage as well as pitfalls. The assets moved out of kids to parents, the spacing of kids so you have more than 2 in school at the same time are just two little things.</p>

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<p>Yeah, there’s really no practical way to ferret out this kind of thing. If schools (or FAFSA) were to switch to a system where they insisted on info from both parents then it would really harm students who had no contact (or worse, something highly adversarial or dangerous) with their NCP. </p>

<p>On the other hand, excluding PROFILE schools is kind of its own punishment. Parents get to do what they want with their own money, of course, but I do sympathize with students who post here that they’ve been accepted at really wonderful $$$ schools, but their wealthy parents say they’re not paying. :frowning: </p>

<p>Spacing of kids to maximize FA: shrug. If someone has that much control over their fertility, and is really thinking more about FA than any of the, oh, gazillion other factors that influence the decision of if and when, then my hat’s off to them. ;)</p>

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<p>Spacing kids for FAFSA, LOL, I don’t think so. But if you have kids a year or two apart, you can delay college for one, take a gap year, or if possible accelerate the other to have two in college.</p>

<p>Yes, my friend’s DD would have been one of those kids who wanted to go to a PROFILE school, was accepted to a number of them, but Dad refused to even give financial info. I do believe she did get a waiver from one such school, but I think she was better off at the flagship state school. She graduated with a double major, summa cum laude, got into a great law school, graduated at the top of her class and is now on the partnership track at a major law firm. I don’t think she lost much going to State U. Some grief for a few weeks, and then all was well. Both kids are doing marvelously, and I do envy her for that. </p>

<p>I don’t think you get that much collusions and plotting and planning to get more money out of the college process. Those who do, are generally those who are supported by their parents (the grandparents of the students) and get fin aid when they are taken out of the picture, but again, what can you do? It’s a situation that makes many envious even without the fin aid situation. I’m sitting here basically paying out of pocket for two grandmoms, while my neighbor has grands paying their bills. A privilege of birth. And then there is the kid born into adverse, dysfunctional and poverty level situations, though no fault of his own who has those things to surmount. I think about those kids, and any neck cricks I’m getting from looking up the wealth hierarchy disappears.</p>

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<p>Everyone else here is having fun so I guess it’s time for me to jump into the deep end. </p>

<p>And probably easier to follow if I make separate posts.</p>

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<p>N’westy, that’s just the point. I am not aware of any “slightly lower ranked school” (than Harvard) that offers merit aid.</p>

<p>As already listed very early on in this thread, the NESCAC schools do not have merit aid. Vassar does not. etc.</p>

<p>For goodness sakes, even Franklin & Marshall does not offer merit aid!
How in the world did that come about?</p>

<p>So, you see? That’s a big, big part of this issue. There is no financial scholarship help at any college from the middle on up for anyone.</p>

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<p>Again, this gets to another heart of the issue.</p>

<p>The schools that are need-based only will therefore have a student population skewed at the outer ends of the financial spectrum – only the “rich” and the “poor.”</p>

<p>If that is what they want, fine. Their school, they can do whatever they want.</p>

<p>But we should not cover up what is happening … the top schools are, for the most part, beyond the reach of the vast majority of middle class families.</p>