My D is considering MHC but we would need to receive both merit and financial aid for her to attend. Our EFC is much higher than we can afford. (my employment situation has change my husband business earning vary greatly year to year). I am wondering if the amount of financial aid could be reduced if she receives merit aid if they consider our EFC has been met?
Merit aid reduces need. The best you can hope for is that student loan and work study expectation will be offset first, then grant aid.
You might be able to get your EFC reduced due to professional judgement if your circumstances have changed significantly compared to the two-years-prior amounts.
I recommend applying. The offer my daughter received from MHC included both merit aid and need aid, and brought her cost to well below our EFC. It did not tie to the NPC, either. Just a generous offer with no explanation. I think it depends a lot on how MHC feels about the “fit” of a student to their profile.
Also consider Wellesley because they supposedly guarantee that if they accept you, you can attend. I do know of one person who was able to negotiate her already good FA package because of a circumstance that Welleseley was unaware.
Mount Holyoke replaces student loan and work expectation first, then reduces grants when outside scholarships are received by a student getting need-based financial aid: https://www.mtholyoke.edu/sfs/resources/scholarship_policies
For its own merit scholarships, you may have to ask directly if the same policy applies or something different is done.
@pauler80020 could you attribute your generous aid to anything not related to EFC, like being an athlete or the like?
@Mags1127 No, not an athlete, not first generation, not URM, not a legacy. No hooks at all. Just a garden-variety upper middle class suburban white woman. She is from another region of the country, but Colorado is not under-represented at national LACs. She submitted an arts supplement video for dance, but otherwise had a pretty typical application – or so we thought. It’s a pretty interesting school!
My D was offered merit aid from Mt. Holyoke last year – it replaced need aid first and then reduced COA after that. This was true at all 3 of 4 colleges where she had merit offers. The exception (the 4th) was a small NMF scholarship from a college that otherwise didn’t offer merit $$
@pauler80020 that’s good to know. D applied and interviewed with alumna and randomly ran into another alumna at a dog show which supported her rationale as to why she thought it would be a good fit. We’re not able to swing it based off NPC so we encouraged her to explore a few other womens and co-ed. Don’t want her to get her hopes up. Did she tour the campus? Just wonder if that made a difference too?
@Aussiemom yes she did a tour and an interview during the summer before applying. According to the common data set, MHC considers demonstrated interest, but it is not a major factor in admissions.
Mt. Holyoke is a favorite for this family! I hope that you all like it too.
I know that she will. She is seeking a diverse community to grow and learn. Mt. Holyoke does seem to have that and hopefully a supportive, collaborative learning environment as opposed to a competitive one. I’m really impressed with the selection of majors for being a school of that size!
Depends what “much higher” is. We found MoHo financial aid to be as good or better than many of the NE LACs and really liked it, although D choose a different school in the end.