Divorced parents- list of college that do not account for my dad's income

Applying to College
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I am going to be a senior this fall. I have started to tour public universities.
My parents are divorced and my guidance counselor mentioned I may want to look at private colleges that will not take into account my dad’s income.
I am not sure how to find these colleges. I emailed my guidance counselor and she is no longer working at the school.

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Most colleges, including nearly every public university, require only FAFSA, which accounts only for the custodial parent’s income.

Many of the private universities on Top50 lists also use the CSS Profile to assess a student’s family’s financial situation. In situations with divorced parents, the CSS Profile requires financial information about the mother, father, and if the biological parents have remarried, the step-mother and step-father.

When I perform a search for “CollegeName CSS” you’ll see a question in the boxes that says, “Does CollegeName require the CSS Profile”. And the answer is listed there.

There’s probably a single resource for this. I think the College Board site has a list of schools that require the CSS Profile.

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Here’s the table where you can sort by schools that require CSS Profile but don’t require non-custodial parent info. If you are interested in a certain school, verify on that school’s website that the CB info is correct. For example, this chart says Bucknell doesn’t require NCP info, but they actually do require it. The most selective schools that don’t require NCP info are UChicago and Vandy. CSS Profile Participating Institutions and Programs

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The laborious way: go to each college’s web site and see what it requires for financial aid applications:

  • Requires FAFSA only – does not require information from non-custodial parent.
  • Requires CSS Profile – check for whether non-custodial parent information is needed.
  • Requires some other form – check for whether non-custodial parent information is needed.

To reduce the laboriousness, you can use the link given by @Mwfan1921 listing CSS Profile using colleges to see which want the non-custodial parent information, but verify on college web sites, since some entries may be in error.

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Because a school doesn’t include the non-custodial income doesn’t mean that it has generous need based aid. If your mother’s income is low, you may get a Pell grant and other need based financial aid. If your mother’s income is $100k or so, it’s harder to get a lot of aid at a public school and you might be better off at a generous private, and that’s when you’ll need to know if the school looks at the income/assets of both parents.

It takes a lot of hunting to find the right financial fit.

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Your family situation is also a factor. Some students have divorced parents who just aren’t cordial, and a non-custodial parent that doesn’t want to contribute financially. But, in situations where a parent is no longer in the picture at all, colleges will grant waivers to not include their financial information on the CSS profile.

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