<p>There are colleges that I would like to attend that are about 30k and up. Looking through various scholarships, I see many that I would be eligible for (i.e. minority, engineering, female, etc.) However, there always seems to be this caveat: "Must demonstrate financial need".</p>
<p>I must say that I'm not disadvantaged. At all. My parents make anywhere from 150-250k a year. However, this hasn't always been the case. We used to run on 30-60k per year and I have 2 other younger siblings that also are ready to go to college, as well as my parents' graduate school fees are still being paid. I definitely do not want to add to this burden! I'm only a junior, so I'm not applying for financial aid yet, but do I even stand a chance at getting certain scholarships that stipulate financial need for a criterion even if their parents make a sufficiently large sum of money per year?</p>
<p>With that amount of income, you will not qualify for Federal FA and you would only possibly qualify for Institutional FA at HYPS which have very generous policies. So, any merit scholarship that also has a need based factor is highly unlikely.</p>
<p>Be aware that it doesn’t matter that your parents used to make less money, or that they are repaying grad school loans.</p>
<p>There are schools that off merit aid that does NOT have a need based aspect to it. Check the sticky threads on this forum. And if you are willing to list some basic stats & the amount of merit aid you need, there are members who can tell you schools that might be within your range.</p>
<p>Entomom is right. Schools aren’t going to care that your parents havent always made that much money. And, they don’t care about grad fees or other parent education expenses. </p>
<p>And, they won’t care that you have other siblings that have to go to college later. They’ll consider that issue when those kids are actually in college…because maybe they won’t go to college. </p>
<p>Your parents’ income is too high for financial aid.</p>
<p>You need to ask your parents how much they can pay each year for your college costs. Once you know that, you’ll need to plan according to that. If they say that they can only pay $20k per year, then you’ll know that you’ll need to either go to an inexpensive instate public…or go to a school that will give you merit scholarships for your stats and use your parents money to cover the rest of the costs.</p>
<p>High incomes in past years leads to assets which are considered in FA. With low past income your parents should not have many assets to consider.</p>
<p>Work hard in school and go for those merit scholarships. It is true that the “financial need” requirement is confusing, for both school and scholarship purposes. I have yet to figure out exactly what “financial need” is - it’s all over the board. </p>
<p>I work with many students, the majority of whose parents make within the range of 50 - 70000/year and with few true assets, and whose EFCs are usually below 6000, and they still are offered only loans unless they have some other qualifying factor such as minority, etc… These students mainly go to local large public universities here in my state (Ohio), with some schools being a bit more generous than others. This year’s financial aid offers are coming back even worse than in previous years (I’ve not had one work study recipient, which is a first). </p>
<p>Study hard and stay involved to put yourself in line for some scholarship opportunities. :)</p>