<p>I’d like to whine about “preferential packaging”. Our EFC is just fine. The only problem is the colleges don’t have to honor it. Child one was a strong high school student and got a package that matched our EFC two years ago when she began college. Child 2, our B student, has been offered admit, deny deals. His packages are coming in at more than his sister’s did two years ago as a single child in college. It is though the schools are not going to even consider the sibling in college for him. Our daughter’s school, on the other hand is willing to meet the greatly reduced EFC for her next year. She is also a student they want to keep (great grades and school involvement). As I explained to my son, colleges are a business and they want to purchase what looks like a good prospect on paper. They are willing to take a risk on admitting him but not investing more than say 55-60% of the cost of attendance on him. I’m not angry and perhaps it is good for him to see what his lack of effort brought him. He can simply go to one of the state schools he was accepted to and, if he does well there, transfer.</p>
<p>Comment on “spenders” criticism. We don’t know for a fact why one family has less of an EFC than others and I hesitate to judge another based on superficial observations such as home size, possessions, etc. In the case of my family, we have no debt, an almost paid for house and, what savings we have is in various retirement accounts. The lack of other FAFSA measurable assets probably did contribute a manageable EFC. The fact that we chose safe retirement accounts rather than investments created less overall wealth than we could have had. We just got lucky from the EFC perspective when we made the choice in the 90’s to do this (but not so lucky in terms of savings accumulation). We had no idea these assets would be protected in the FAFSA calculation. We also did not “plan” to have two kids in college at the same time (that’s another “not fair” -lower EFC-I am hearing too much of).</p>
<p>The public institutions are fine and are affordable for most middle class families. I am the product of one and, although I would like to have experienced what my older child has in her private college experience, I in no way feel deprived.</p>
<p>I agree with some of the others who have said that they do not consider cost of living. Sure, I can afford $50,000 a year (28% of our income)…if I move into a shack in the rural parts of my state rather than the affluent neighborhood I currently call home. Where I live, a some houses (and not that big of houses) cost almost as much as small castles in eastern Europe. 
I just have to accept the reality that I may not be able to afford my dream school. Fortunately, in the long run prestige of school doesn’t matter so much as how well you do at that school and your first job. I’m not saying community college is as good as Yale, but going to a reputable state school is not the end of the world.</p>
<p>Got a call from my sister, who has a high school senior. She could not believe that her EFC was through the roof. If her son does not earn any scholarship money or grants, she said, he will not be able to attend a four-year school this fall. What I told her was that she needed to wait until all the offers came in. Then, the schools that my nephew really likes need to be given a call. Not by my nephew, but by my sister. I told her to point out that she has been unemployed since last June, that she has had surgery twice in the past six months and the medical bills are unreal. Documents do not tell the entire story. Sometimes, you need to speak with the financial aid people and offer an explanation. Most schools, at least, give you time to explain and will try to work with you, if they can.</p>
<p>"Documents do not tell the entire story. Sometimes, you need to speak with the financial aid people and offer an explanation. "
momreads, she will likely have even MORE luck IF she sends an appeal letter to the FA people documenting her own situation, and she includes copies of unemployment checks, medical expenses, etc, etc. BEFORE she calls them, instead of just calling them cold . FA people have to have facts in hand before they can go to their boss and ask for changes in FA awards.</p>
<p>My EFC is through the roof. My family makes less than 200k and the EC is over 75k. My parents said they can only pay 30k.</p>
<p>I was accepted Early Decision to Northwestern University, and I had to withdraw because the EFC was too high even after we appealed. Instead… I’ll be going to Ole Miss. Haha.</p>
<p>I guess there’s always grad school.</p>
<p>If people are quoting their FAFSA EFC’s they are horribly misconstruing the given information. The “EFC” in the Fafsa is not what dollar amount you are expected to contribute, but an index which schools will use to calculate your aid… X_X</p>
<p>My parents said they can only pay 30k.</p>
<p>That is very generous. You will be able to find alot of schools you can attend for $30,000 plus the money you can contribute yourself.</p>
<p>We also have a high EFC, I think it is just $100 more than Stanford’s cost of attendance. So my daughter did not get any financial aid in Stanford. We grew up in a poor country, where education is highly valued. My parents could barely afford sending 5 kids to college, but all of us were able to graduate. My daughter is a Freshman in Stanford and she loves it there. As long as we are able (although we have to make a lot of sacrifices), we want to give our kids the best opportunity as long as they work hard in school. I just wish that we get more tax credit for what we are paying in college. They even reduced our credit to about $400 because we made more than the cut-off, which is not much considering we are paying about 27% of our pre-tax income for college.</p>
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<p>The publics are indeed fine, but affordable? Out here in California, the UCs are getting into the $30K range, a price tag which is simply out of the question for many middle class families. Things have changed since the day you and I were in school, when State U really was a financially viable option for almost everyone.</p>
<p>One year at our local public flagship now costs about what my parents paid for my first TWO years at an ivy.</p>
<p>lol @ the kids from privileged families whining about having to pay high tuitions.</p>
<p>My family’s EFC was 7,331. Missed the Pell Grant cutoff by <2,000 dollars.
The difference would have been paying 10,000 a year instead of the 20,000 we pay now. Bah.</p>
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<p>Just out of curiosity, how does that work?</p>
<p>Oh, and at my school I missed the “full ride without loans” income cut off by $100. That $100 was the difference between $0 in loans and ~ $8k in loans. PS: We made $100 above poverty.</p>
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<p>[CNN</a> Fact Check: How do California’s hikes in college costs stack up? - CNN.com](<a href=“http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/03/04/california.fees/]CNN”>http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/03/04/california.fees/)
Must be something they aren’t telling us.</p>
<p>Quote:
" ‘I hate when people assume all the spenders are irresponsible or greedy.’
Louise, I agree, ctmother’s post above is a great example."</p>
<p>LasMa, you completely misunderstood my post (#191). I am in full sympathy with people who spent money for severe medical problems, etc.</p>
<p>The purpose of my post - if you can distinguish purpose from emotional attacks - is simply to say that the EFC does NOT represent what you are supposed to pull out of CURRENT INCOME, which is what apparently EVERYONE assumes.</p>
<p>Instead, it is a formulaic figure, calculated on a strictly identical basis for everyone, of what you should be able, ALL THINGS BEING EQUAL, to handle via savings (past money), loans and summer jobs (future income) and cash flow (current income), etc. </p>
<p>Since all things are NOT equal - you may have massive medical expenses for a disabled sibling, for example - the next step is to go the the college FA office.</p>
<p>My point was that the formula is the fairest way to do things because - not to put too fine a point on it - people can lie and manipulate the data to make it look like they need more than someone else. It is much fairer to have an identically-calculated ballpark figure to start with.</p>
<p>emeraldkitty, it looks like those figures are tuition and fees only. Cost of Attendance, which is what most of us are really concerned with, also includes on-campus room and board. I think that’s what they’re missing.</p>
<p>ctmother, if you think I don’t understand what EFC means, you are sadly mistaken. And just a friendly suggestion: Yelling isn’t really the done thing on this board, nor is lecturing other posters as if they were idiot children. :)</p>
<p>Many people said if you saved a lot in your bank accounts, then you will have high EFC. Basically that means if you are a repsonisble spender, it is not good when consider filing FAFSA, is it true? I saved about $30,000 for my child’s tuition and paid off my mortgage, that means I will pay higher cost for my child’s education. While some families who make much more money than we do and carelessly spend their money without much savings will pay less for their child’s education. That just does not make sense.</p>
<p>Wildwood, That isn’t true. While they count savings against you at about 6% after an allowance based upon your age, the bulk of the EFC is your income. I think that the number is 47% above their base line number. You are way ahead by saving money both for your own mental health and your ability to help pay for school. We started saving for college over a decade ago. It really helps. I ran EFC calculators using $30k difference in savings and the same income. It only changes the EFC by less than 2000 but I would rather have the 30k in the bank to help. This assumes that the savings are in your name and not the child’s</p>
<p>Wildwood,
This calculator can help you see a rough estimate of the relative contribution of income and savings.
[FinAid</a> | Calculators | QuickEFC Chart](<a href=“http://www.finaid.org/calculators/quickefcchart.phtml]FinAid”>http://www.finaid.org/calculators/quickefcchart.phtml)</p>
<p>The people who find themselves in real straits seem to be those parents who have a current high income but, for some reason (such as only recently attaining this income, having student loans of their own, having had other extraordinary expenses) were not able to save the amount that the formula assumes that persons at that income level should have saved.</p>