<p>Hey guys, I was wondering if demonstrating interest could hurt your chances of getting a scholarship. Let me give you guys the situation.</p>
<p>I have a safety. Admission to this school is guaranteed, and it's a safety I really wouldn't mind going to at all. The problem is the cost. The school is $50,000 a year, and I don't think I would get any financial aid, so I'm hoping for a scholarship here.</p>
<p>Now, I know demonstrating interest helps your chances to actually get in to a school, but if you're already above that school's range, could demonstrating interest actually work against you? Schools give scholarships so that good students will choose them over other schools, but if they see that I really like the school and have shown lots of interest in it, would they be less likely to give me a scholarship? Would it decrease the amount of money I would potentially get since they have seen that I already like the school?</p>
<p>I haven't demonstrated much interest yet, except for going on one tour. Should I demonstrate any more, or would that not be a good idea at this point?</p>
<p>The school will know it’s a safety for you (assuming it really is), and would generally assume that you would otherwise accept admission to one of your match schools, other things being equal (which they never are). So then it’s a question of how much ($) they want to try to attract you; the more they offer, the more likely you’ll come (maybe).</p>
<p>An applicant can fake interest, and can also unintentionally mask it, so schools generally won’t place so much importance on it (and some none at all; check schools’ Common Data Set section C7).</p>
<p>thanks, vonlost! but for a school like American University, which considers demonstrated interest to be one of the most important factors, is it better not to show too much interest if you’re basically guaranteed acceptance but you’re hoping for merit aid?</p>
<p>That’s a tough one, showing enough interest to be admitted, but not too much if you think it would diminish merit money. I sure don’t know, but I would guess that merit money has more to do with your record, less with your attitude, i.e., they offer the most to those they want the most.</p>
<p>I would have to agree with Vonlost. I think merit $ are more linked to your stats/record than attitude. The school is trying to draw higher scorers to bring up their own prestige.</p>
<p>saman32 - I’m curious about your comment - " Admission to this school is guaranteed". How do you know? </p>
<p>If it is just based on your grades/test scores, I would say don’t be so arogant. There are a lot of smart applicants out there.</p>
<p>As far as demostrating interest, I would say that is never a bad thing, especially given you say Amercian rates that highly in their criteria. </p>
<p>In the end, assuming you get accepted, and assuming the financial aid package is not what you had hoped, you could appeal saying it is your top choice, but the finances is the obstacle. You will be in a better position for reconsideration if there is a strong history of demonstrated interest. If you are lukewarm re: demostrating interest, your case for it being your top choice will be weak.</p>
<p>This happened with my son, at another school that also rates interst highly, and in the end they revised the aid package - scholarship and grants - that made it affordable for us.</p>
<p>Based purely on personal experience with one school, I don’t think that this is always true. My oldest son applied to a school that was a safety based upon stats. He was invited to an off campus interview (about 45 minutes from our home) and he attended. He felt that his interview went well. He visited the campus once prior to applying with us, revisited alone prior to getting merit aid or FA package when it was a holiday break. He shadowed a student during that visit, ate lunch in their dining hall and attended one class. It was a day program that this school offers to all accepted students on their website, so not too unusual, but again showing interest. Addtionally, my son listed 2 alumni that he knows, as he was asked on the app if he knows anyone who attended this school. He was accepted, but no merit was offered, and no FA grants (only loans) were offered in their package. This is an expensive private university. It was a shame because my son loved this school and he would have attended if the package were in a range that we could afford. </p>
<p>I don’t think that you should make decision based upon one person’s experience, but I do think this is a valid question, and something to think about.</p>
<p>To a certain extent, yes. I remember at a Financial Aid info session, Kelly Walter from BU said something along the lines of “If you show up on campus with the full BU sweats and it’s your third visit in two months, the school will know you you are willing to pay more to attend”</p>
<p>Schools do practice a certain amount of yield protection and may not admit students if they really think there’s not a snowball’s chance in hell that the applicant will enroll. There are kids with top-notch stats who are wait-listed at GWU each year, for example. GWU doesn’t like to be anyone’s safety. </p>
<p>If you are well above the 75th percentile for GPA and standardized test scores, and bring to the table other qualities that would make you an attractive addition to the community, I think there may be a fine line to walk at some schools to demonstrate sufficient interest that they think you might actually attend if accepted, but not so much that they don’t feel compelled to make an effort to woo you. </p>
<p>However, if you are thinking specifically of American U, my understanding from the Admissions Officer who was answering questions on the AU forum last year was that they do merit scholarships by the numbers. (Just the numbers.) There would be little down-side to showing interest.</p>
<p>LasMa, I know that the package was horrible and it was my son’s worst package. This school was a safety school, but my son was a B+ HS student so it was not as though they “knew” that he would never attend and go to HYSP (he was not anywhere in the ballpark to attend an Ivy or similarly ranked school). I can tell you that the FA package had more loans in it than any other school had in its package (we had plenty of other packages to compare this one with), no grants included of ANY kind, and we are a middle class family (truly middle class btw).</p>
<p>As far as merit aid, my son was offered merit aid at much higher ranked schools than this school. In fact, he was offered merit aid at nearly every other private university and the one other school that did not offer merit aid made up for it with FA grants. I really feel that the lousy package was a result of showing too much interest. My son was not even trying “to show interest” once accepted. He was trying to explore whether he’d like to attend!</p>
<p>northeastmom - How do you know the other offers were really “merit aid?” Schools make this very confusing. Lots of parents believe that their kids won merit scholarships, when actually they were need-based with a “merit” component which is actually a method for targeting the FA.</p>
<p>MisterK, in some cases it was purely merit aid because it was offered BEFORE we submitted the profile and/or FAFSA. In other cases, we do not know. Of course, at some schools it was “tuition discounting”, labeled as merit aid. This son did have good but not CC high SAT scores, B+ avereage at a top state public, and very good ECs.</p>
<p>My point is that at the school where my son really showed a lot of interest he got his worst package, and it was at a safety school.</p>
<p>^ A possibility is that the school had already depleted its FA budget, and were offering a “come anyway” spot. nem didn’t say, but I assume the school offers merit aid to some.</p>
<p>vonlost, we filed for FA on Jan. 1, so the school should not have depleted its financial aid budget. We were “first in line” to receive FA if the true criteria were those who file the fafsa first are the first in line to be evaluated for aid.</p>
<p>^ Submission dates are not usually considered for FA, but rather the school’s ranking of applicants. Another possibility is that this is a PROFILE school using an unusual FA option compared to other schools. Another possibility is that the school reduced FA because the applicant showed interest. Cases like this can also show why schools would NOT reduce merit money to those showing interest; applicants would turn them down!</p>
<p>I have wondered if too much interest could be an issue. Thanks NEM for sharing your experience - I have seen many odd things happen in the app process and I think your story adds to the conversation in a concrete way. My D2 is applying this year and merit aid is a big factor so most of her schools are more match/safeties and I would be disappointed if they thought they were just backups and offered her no aid due to that - because they are all truly in contention. I wonder if the school looks at the applicants list to determine if they are considered a “backup”. My D really only has one real reach school so the rest shouldn’t feel they are bottom of the list. Did this one school stand out as seriously lower ranked/less competitive than the rest? I had a very similar experience with prep school admissions BTW.</p>
<p>This was not a Profile school. If our kid was “ranked” against other applicants, I am sure that he was within the top 25% of accepted students at this school.</p>
<p>I do assume that since my son showed a lot of interest, the school just assumed that we would just take out a lot of loans, or somehow find the money to make this school a reality for our son. I guess they get enough folks to pay full freight whether they can afford it or not.</p>
<p>NewEnglandmother, I cross posted with you. No, this school was not a lower ranked school than many others. My son applied mostly to low match and saftey schools because for us money was a huge consideration. Additionally, we were very concerned that our son would keep his merit award for all 4 years, so we did not want him even attending a reach or high match school!</p>