ED Chances, greatly appreciated

Colleges and Universities A-Z Barnard College
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<p>Barnard is absolutely, 100% my first choice college.
I’m taking the ACT this October (in a couple of weeks) and my predicted score is around 30.
I’ve taken two SAT subject tests with 700 on both and two APs with 5’s on both.</p>

<p>My GPA is 3.7 and I graduated with honors.</p>

<p>I’ve done two foreign exchanges, one as a junior and one as a gap year and therefore am trilingual.</p>

<p>I’ve taken professional voice lessons for 10 years, and performed at weddings and various talent shows.
NHS
Spectrum, LBGT student organization, senior year
active Amnesty International member, two years
part of FCCLA my sophomore year
choir, freshman year</p>

<p>Lot’s of work experience</p>

<p>I expect to double major in Political Science (with a concentration in international relations) and sociology (although, Barnard’s human rights program might take over) and a minor in another language (one of my life goals is to know at least 5, and I’m already more than halfway there).</p>

<p>I’m mostly concerned about my transcripts. For various reasons including parental divorce and exchange, I attended a different high school every year. This greatly damaged my extracurriculars (I wasn’t able to be in any one club more than a year, because it wasn’t offered in the next school) and meant that I was unable to take AP classes until senior year, because only that high school offered it. Also, having to take many online classes that were pass/fail damaged my GPA (which could be higher, I believe).</p>

<p>I’ll have excellent essays and excellent rec letters, from counselors and also my past employers. </p>

<p>I am so set on this school, but I’m very afraid that I won’t get in because I consider myself to have weak stats. Especially considering the school’s acceptance rate. I’m just very unsure and while I know that no one can really predict, I would be very grateful for opinions. Do you think that the things that I mentioned will have a negative effect on my application?</p>

<p>One thing I do have is an honest love for the school, which I really hope will count for something.</p>

<p>Thanks for reading!</p>

2

<p>With divorced parents, is there any issue with finances? Barnard is expensive and qualifying for aid with divorced parents is tricky and sticky at best. BOTH parents have to provide financial info and both are considered, whether they are the custodial parent or not, I believe. Hopefully Calmom will comment on this.</p>

<p>Any way, if finances are going to be any sort of issue, I would not apply ED.</p>

<p>That being said, as long as you make all this background info very clear in your essays, I think you stand a reasonable-to-excellent chance of being admitted. Just think over the ED thing very, very carefully!!</p>

<p>Best to you…</p>

3

<p>Thanks for replying!</p>

<p>As far as I understand it, at least, what was written on the “contract” that I’ll have to sign on the common app’s page, is that if I am accepted ED it is binding UNLESS the college does not give me sufficient funds. Where I go to college will greatly depend on finances for me, but I like Barnard enough to where if they gave me an estimate for aide and I found that it was manageable, even if it wasn’t “stellar”, I would take it over the possibility of going with another school that gave me more aide.</p>

<p>If I’m wrong about this, please tell me. </p>

<p>As for how the “non-custodial parent” form is viewed, I would LOVE opinions or information on that. My custodial parent is my mother, who does NOT have good finances at all. My father, on the other hand, makes 6 figures and does well. It would be very much to my advantage if they weighed my mother more…</p>

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<p>They don’t “weigh” your mother more. The way it works is you should run the FAFSA twice, once for each parent, as if each was the custodial parent. (So you get counted as a dependent college student on each separate FAFSA). Then take the EFC’s and add those together. If either of your parents are homeowners, you will have to factor in their home equity as well.</p>

<p>You should NOT apply ED under the circumstances. You have a set of strengths that will make your application stand out from the others, and you have done a good job of highlighting them in your OP – so I’m sure you can do that in your application. It sounds like you are likely to get little or no financial aid because of your father’s income & assets. </p>

<p>Moreover, because of your father’s income/assets, your financial aid awards from colleges are likely to be all over the map. If you are accepted to Barnard in December and they calculate your aid so that your full cost of attendance for a year is, say, $30K (roughly half the cost for full-pay students), you will have no way of knowing whether other colleges will offer you better, worse, or about the same. You could very well be forced into a situation of needing to turn Barnard down in December, only to find that you don’t have better options in the spring. Your father’s willingness to contribute may also be different in the spring than in the fall. I mean, it’s one thing to present him with the estimated COA of a single college that seems very pricey, it’s quite another to present him with your array of choices and to be able to demonstrate that the cost for the college you want is in the same ballpark or even better than the others. </p>

<p>Bottom line, it’s totally nuts for you to apply ED. I’m having a hard time understanding why you would even want to.</p>

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<p>The estimate they give you in December isn’t binding on them and can change radically in April. With two parents in the mix, one of whom has a high motivation to be less than forthcoming with you about his current income and assets, you would be playing with fire. Your dad could submit information during the fall process that materially understates his anticipate 2011 income – then when he submits tax returns in the spring, you could be in for a very unpleasant surprise.</p>

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<p>The reason I want to apply ED is because there truly are no other schools that I want to attend. Of course, I’ll apply to other schools, that’s only logical, but even my second and third choice schools (Tufts and NYU) are very expensive and I want to go to them about one million times less. So if, for example, Barnard cost me 30,000 per year and Tufts only cost me 20,000… it would be worth it, for me, to pay more and attend Barnard. To me, and the career that I want to go into and the life that I want to live, being in New York City and at a women’s liberal arts college, and having access to a major university are almost invaluable factors.</p>

<p>I do have a question about financial aid though… assuming Barnard gives me, let’s say, 20k in financial aid. Wouldn’t the FAFSA be expected to give me around the same figure? If they both gave me 20k, and Barnard tuition cost a bit over 40k… wouldn’t room and board and mealplan etc be my only costs?? Am I completely off on this?</p>

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<p>To be straightforward, my dad does make 6 figures, but he is not “rich”. He makes around 100k and has been divorced twice, has 5 kids (two of which will be in school at the same time) and a major heart condition. Though my mother is the parent I’ve lived with the most in the past year, I’m close to my father, and I’ll tell him to be as honest as possible on the CSS.</p>

<p>He is going to give me all the money he can, which is hopefully, around 10k per year (that’s a high estimate). My mother, by contrast, is giving me nothing and has nothing.</p>

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<p>Then you need to do your homework and figure out what other colleges would be a good fit for your interests or goals. Because ED or not, there’s a good chance that you won’t be able to attend Barnard, either for financial reasons or because you don’t get accepted. (I personally think you would have a very strong and compelling application for Barnard – your gap year puts you in a better position than you would have been applying while still in high school – but that still is no guarantee of acceptance and definitely not a guarantee of affordability).</p>

<p>My d. had a similar background and interests to yours. I think part of her success comes from her flexibility in the way she pursues her goals. A person who creates more options for themselves will also end up with more opportunities. </p>

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<p>You need to look at colleges that are more affordable, either because they are public or likely to offer merit money. If you are interested in pursuing a career in IR, the jobs available with a bachelor’s degree are primarily with government agencies, nonprofits & NGO’s that won’t pay very much, and a master’s or Ph.D. (or a whole lot of years of experience) is essential for getting the higher paid positions. Your multiple language fluency will be a huge asset – but you are going to be hampered if you graduate with a huge amount of debt.</p>

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Given your dad’s 6-figure income, there’s a good likelihood that both will cost $50K plus. </p>

<p>You NEED to focus on increasing your options and weighing them in the spring.</p>

9

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<p>Yes, you are completely off on this. </p>

<p>The FAFSA doesn’t “give” you anything. </p>

<p>It tells you whether you are eligible to receive a Pell grant (maximum roughly $5500); a subsidized loan of $3500-$5500 annually (I $3500 max the first year, but you could also take out an additional $2000 unsubsidized, meaning you would be charged interest from day 1 on that portion); and work-study. If Barnard’s calculation of aid including your dad’s income is that you are not eligible for anything, but your mom’s income is low enough that the FAFSA shows you are Pell-eligible, then you would get the Pell grant + Stafford loan + work study. I think Barnard generally awards about $1800 in work study money to first year students. I don’t know what the current COA for Barnard is, but if I assume it is $58K, then with Pell grant + loan, you would have to pay roughly $48K out of pocket, which would be offset somewhat by the $1800 you could earn at your work-study job. If you are take the unsubsidized $2000 loan on top of that, then your costs out-of-pocket i down to $46K. (Do the math on the interest – its currently 3.4% and if you don’t make interest payments along the way, the interest will compound over the 4 years that you are in school). </p>

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<p>Then run a FAFSA on him and see what the EFC comes out to be. Neither FAFSA nor Barnard cares about his heart condition, though Barnard might consider medical expenses or medically incurred debt, under professional judgment standards. (If you expect Barnard or any other college to be doing you any favors in considering special circumstances, then you definitely should NOT apply ED --to apply ED is to throw away whatever leverage or negotiating power you could possibly have in relation to any discretionary decision as to financial aid).</p>

<p>Does your Dad own a house or have other property or investments? Remember, that is counted too. </p>

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<p>Then show him that you love him by shopping carefully for a college, rather than put him in the position of having to make a decision in December on a college you love but which may be out of reach financially for him. Why would you put a parent you love in that position? </p>

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<p>There is no way a kid in your position should be applying ED anywhere. It is naive, selfish, short-sighted, and self-defeating. </p>

<p>What state do you live in?</p>

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<p>My father lives in Idaho, my mother lives in Ohio. I could be said to be a resident of both.
My father is still paying for the home he lives in now. I’m sure he has at least a few investements, though I don’t think they are anything big.</p>

<p>I honestly don’t understand how anyone, other than somone making 300k+ could honestly be expected to pay 50k out of pocket, every year. How does anyone achieve this? I cannot be the only person to have ever been in my situation, so I have to believe there is a way other than getting 200k in debt. I know and expect to graduate in debt- but not that much. I’m going to be working as much as possible all four years, other than work study, to off-set costs regardless of where I am. I just honestly don’t understand how they can look at someone who makes 100k and says “yes, they can give half their income every year to a school.” That is obviously ridiculous, at least in my opinion.</p>

<p>As for other schools that I like alright and are cheaper… I’m applying to CUNY Hunter and U Michigan (which has a tuition agreement with Ohio for in-state). However, I’m a very determined person. It would be worth it to me to take another gap year and work full-time, or to go to CUNY while working full-time for a year to gain money enough to attend Barnard the following year (assuming I get accepted) I might even consider doing a Co-op, and taking every other year or semester off to work. Like you said about your daughter, flexibility means more options. College is one of the two largest investments I will ever make in my life, I want it to be worth it and to attend a school I’m really excited about.</p>

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<p>Barnard is going to look at the home equity – the question is how much is the home currently worth. If, for example, the house is worth $150K and he currently owes $50K, then he would have $100K equity. </p>

<p>As to the other investments, the point is that Barnard is going to look at that. I don’t know what your or his idea is of “big”. Maybe he has an investment worth $50K and thinks that is pretty modest – that still is going to be counted as a potential asset for college. </p>

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No one says they have to pay “out of pocket”. Colleges assume that parents will save money for college and/or borrow as needed. </p>

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<p>Students target schools they can afford. If they are certain about their finances and what the colleges will cost, they may apply ED – but the vast majority of students apply RD to multiple colleges, including lower cost public universities or schools where they are guaranteed merit money – and they make their decision in the spring when they have complete information to work from.</p>

<p>Barnard accepts 85% of admitted applicant during the RD round.</p>

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<p>I don’t know what the numbers are going to be. Maybe they will expect less of him. The best thing to do is apply RD and compare offers in the spring. </p>

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<p>That would raise your EFC significantly. If, for example, your EFC base on both parents’ income & assets comes out to $25K a year, and you work at a job that pay you $20K a year and are able to save $10K of that, you could probably expect your EFC to go up to about $37K for the following year. (Rough guess, but my son was out of college for 3 years working full time, and when he went back to school his EFC was around $15K)</p>

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<p>Then why make that investment without fully exploring options? ED implies a very cavalier attitude-- a careful investor does their research first. </p>

<p>You can apply RD and choose a range of colleges that might be good options for you. If your goal is to study more foreign languages, Ohio State would be a great place to do that – see [The</a> Foreign Language Center - Language](<a href=“http://flc.osu.edu/language/default.cfm]The”>http://flc.osu.edu/language/default.cfm) – in addition to regular instruction in an impressive array of languages, various departments at OSU offer self-paced, individualized study options, which might be ideal for a student who wanted to study multiple languages.</p>

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<p>This is really depressing me.</p>

<p>What your saying is that, even if I DO apply RD, because of the money my dad makes I will likely still have to pay 50k or more out of pocket every year I attend, regardless of which school I go to as long as it considers the CSS Profile (most of the schools I like do). </p>

<p>Assuming between me and my dad we could come up with 15-20k dollars a year, still that would mean I would be 30k+ in debt. Yet the student whose parents give them the same amount of money, but on paper make less, get tons of aid and are able to attend… even if we deserve it the same. I don’t really care how much I sound like a complaining teenager that expects life to be fair (which I really don’t)… that hurts.</p>

<p>If this stands to be true I can only apply to community colleges, and Ohio State (neither of which I have even the most remote interest in).</p>

13

<p>Back to say something less angsty…</p>

<p>Thank you for all the information, it’s very helpful. I see why you are advising me to apply RD and I appreciate it.</p>

<p>On the other hand, I’ve been researching colleges for six months or so now and this is the first college (public or private) that I’ve been genuinely excited about. If it does turn out that I have to turn them down in the fall, that will give me time to rearrange my head and prepare to attend another university, hopefully getting excited about it, by spring. If it turns out that none of my options are better in the spring, then I can’t take them anyways, and I’ll go to a community college or a college like CUNY that I know I can get into and afford, and hopefully transfer to Barnard sophomore or junior year. This seems like the best option to me because the only reason NOT to apply ED is to have options, and in fact, I won’t be erasing my options. But having an estimate earlier will give me mental time to decide what’s best for me and to get over losing (at least for now) my dream school. It will also mean I’ll still have time to apply to MORE public schools than just the two on my list. If in the spring I get a surprise and Tufts or NYU gives me tons more aid than Barnard, well, then I’ll go with them and know that I did the right thing not going to BC.</p>

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<p>Hey karma621</p>

<p>First off, I don’t think you can get accepted to barnard, take a gap year, and then use your gap year to take credit-bearing courses at CUNY. Barnard only accepts credit from non-matriculated students. Therefore you can’t enroll in CUNY during your gap (during which you presumably save up money) and expect those classes to make any difference in your time of graduation. If you plan to pursue this objective, you would simply just NOT apply to Barnard, instead apply to CUNY, and then transfer FROM CUNY to Barnard so that your credits may count towards your Barnard degree.</p>

<p>On the other hand, regarding financial aid. So why don’t you give up all the hypotheticals and possibilites and plug in your formula to Barnard’s net price calculator. <a href=“Net Price Calculator”>Net Price Calculator;

<p>You can also find similar ones for NYU and Tufts if I’m not mistaken. </p>

<p>ALWAYS REMEMBER TO BE HONEST AND OVERESTIMATE. You don’t want a nasty surprise later on. In this situation, it is just an estimate for YOUR viewing. Therefore its best to be as HONEST as possible. They are asking you to self-report estimates here, but when it comes down to actual FinAid time, they will be asking you for DOCUMENTS. So don’t round down in your guess-timites. It will only hurt you in the long run. </p>

<p>@calmom
I think this calculator was put up just this month. So I posted up a thread last August about EDing to Barnard with an EFC of 0 and I remember that you suggested against it. Once this calculator was up, I plugged all my data into it with honesty and overestimation and it spilled out a quite reasonable number. I still hope to be accepted to HEOP scholars to get the HEOP Grants, but even if I don’t, I think it would still be affordable. </p>

<p>Ciao! :)</p>

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<p>Hi! I think you misunderstood me… I meant to say that if I could not afford Barnard I would turn down the acceptance and enroll in CUNY (since I would have turned down Barnard, I wouldn’t be enrolled) and then transfer. </p>

<p>I will use that calculator, thank you! It’s just hard because I am estranged from my mother, and have to get her information from my grandmother (the only person she’ll talk to) and then I have to talk to my father also. I’m in Europe right now so with a combination of time differences etc it’s taking me a long time to get all the information the calculator weeks. I’m planning on having it all in front of me by the end of this week and at MOST at the end of next, but that’s a super helpful link. :slight_smile: </p>

<p>Question… if I lived and worked in NYC for a year, could I apply for state residence and the grants at Barnard for only New Yorkers, or is that not possible?</p>

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<p>@karma
Barnard does not have any specific grants for New Yorkers. New Yorkers file the FAFSA and are eligible for the Pell Grant. HEOP is a program for low-income students in NY. However, you don’t need to be a NY resident for similar grants because you can just apply for BOP (Barnard Opportunity Program), which is the equivilent of HEOP simply for out-of-state residents.</p>

<p>i believe you need 3-4 years of residence at one address to apply for state residence. and for NY state educational financial aid, you need to have filed NYC tax forms and stuff. </p>

<p>nooo problemo.</p>

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<p>Karma, if you are willing to attend CUNY, then you are a fool not to apply for the Macauley Honors College, which has a December 1 application date. (See [Macaulay</a> Honors College - Tuition and Support](<a href=“http://macaulay.cuny.edu/prospective-students/tuition.php]Macaulay”>http://macaulay.cuny.edu/prospective-students/tuition.php) for what they give you). While you are waiting for Barnard’s decision, you will have missed the Macauley deadline – and you could not expect to hear from Macauley until February or March.</p>

<p>If you are estranged from your mom, that is one more reason why ED is not a reasonable option. Barnard is not going to give you money unless your mom fills out required forms and submits her tax returns. So you could get accepted at Barnard in December, be given what looks like a reasonable award, and then find that it all evaporates in the spring because your mom delays or refuses outright to submit needed paperwork.</p>

<p>The net price calculator that noloser linked to is an ESTIMATE only, it is not binding. It could easily end up $5000 or $10000 off the mark, one way or another. Noloser is applying under HEOP, which is different in that it offers specific benefits, but it is also available RD in any case. (It’s a risky admissions approach because the HEOP eligibility requires that that the SAT/ACT reading score be on the very low end of the typical score range of Barnard applicants, so you kind of have to apply to Barnard with one hand tied behind your back to even qualify.) </p>

<p>Also, to Karma – if Barnard accepted you ED but you turned them down because of lack of financial aid, I doubt seriously that they would consider you as a transfer down the road. In that case you would have pretty much burned your bridges with them.</p>

<p>I still don’t get it. Why the insistence on ED? It offers you no benefit whatsoever, hurts you, and puts your dad in an unfair and untenable position.</p>

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<p>@Calmom,</p>

<p>If a student applies early decision, does everything they can to attend, and just cannot because of financial issues why would they not accept them later as a transfer? I have a hard time believing that a student with that much persistence and demonstrated interest- and with the stats- wouldn’t get in because they had hurt feelings. Also, my mother will give me the information. I said it was more difficult, not impossible. </p>

<p>I said that the reason I wanted to apply ED is because I want to know SOONER rather than later what it will cost me to attend so that if I do have to turn it down I’ll have time to get excited about another school and to apply to more schools if it looks like LACs and private colleges are going to give me little financial aid. Thank you for the information regarding CUNY- I will fill out that application, it seems like a great fall back program and the scholarship benefits are amazing. </p>

<p>I honestly don’t understand how ED can hurt me, or how it’s “unfair” to anyone. If anything it just gets the stressful part of not knowing over earlier. Like I said, if I can’t afford it, well, I can’t. That won’t change whether it is in the fall or spring, and if I can’t afford it, I won’t be able to afford it no matter WHAT the other schools give me. On the other hand, if I CAN afford it, I’ll know sooner and will have saved myself tons of application fees and many months of stressing over not knowing. If I wasn’t sure if it was my first choice, then ED would be stupid. I am sure, so while I am keeping my options open, I just want to know if I’ll be accepted and if I can attend, because if I don’t get better options in the spring then I will have to go to a safety school anyway, it’s not like I would go to Tufts in the spring for the same money that I could have gone to Barnard but turned it down. No, if I don’t go to Barnard it will be because the aid is absolutely unaffordable.</p>

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<p>If you apply ED you will not know until April what it will cost for you to attend Barnard. They will give you an <em>estimated</em> award in December – it is not binding on them. They can change it in the spring. You have divorced parents, a home-owning, high earning father with other kids in college. There’s a pretty high likelihood that something will change. </p>

<p>ED is also a binding promise you make to the school that you WILL attend if accepted. Yes, they will release you from that if you say you can’t afford it, but they aren’t going to look favorably on you if you apply later as a transfer student. Why should they admit a student who already broke their word once? In any case, Barnard does not guarantee financial aid to transfer students, so it would really be disingenuous to tell them you can’t attend for financial reasons one year, and then apply as a transfer without any expectation of aid the next. </p>

<p>Barnard’s financial aid policies are not identical to other colleges in any case. I’ve had considerable variation in the level of need based awards from different college - that’s just what happens when parents are divorced and there is home equity thrown into the mix. Each college has their own separate policies and methodology. So you can’t assume that the award from Barnard is representative of the award you might get from Tufts or another college. It could be the same, it could be more, it could be less.</p>

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<p>Is it really impossible to transfer to Barnard then, even a year later? Assuming I apply RD and can’t go because of finances, attended CUNY Honors and then applied for my sophomore or junior year- they would give me even less money than they had originally? This is starting to sound like a catch-22; every angle is impossible.</p>

<p>Can you tell me more about the honors program at CUNY? I’ve heard that CUNY academics are not great, and that is my main priority in choosing a college. I want to actually learn and be challenged, I want to be challenged a lot. I mean, they are basically paying you to attend which is incredible and can save so much money- but is it really worth it? Do people regularly transfer from CUNY to top schools, or are they looked down on?</p>