The College Board number is useless for your purposes. It’s a ballpark. No college relies on it; you shouldn’t either.
That said, have you actually filled out/finalized the FAFSA? And the EFC is $35k? Seems like a huge disparity, so I’m wondering what numbers you used/omitted to get such a gap.
Have you run NPCs on any of the schools on your list? NPCs at the school’s website, not College Board.
That should clarify pretty quickly how unrealistic your list is.
There’s confusion in terms here.
What matters is what the college predicts it will cost you and that comes from using their NPC/Net Price Calculator, found on their web site FA page. Some will auto add in any merit you qualify for. Some will pretend loans are “aid,” so you need to carefully read what the NPC shows.
EFC is an old term related to Fafsa. It was a minimum estimate of your cost. Most of us found the college “family contribution,” after they saw our complete documentation, was higher.
All we know, OP, is that your parents earn more than 110k. How they choose to spend their money is their decision, but it’s not the college’s responsibility to make up for that with more fin aid. Many just don’t have enough to give, in the first place.
Agree, schools like NYU and BU are notoriously stingy with aid. Some kids get good grants, but it’s those kids the colleges want most. In both of those cases, you have no trump cards.
I’m not sure why people are angry about the college board EFC estimator. The college board EFC estimator is the only calculator that uses a CSS-like formula (since the college board owns the profile but keeps the exact formula secret).
@anniehhh Between the FAFSA and the College board estimator, you’ve calculated your EFC using both formulas and know that your net price could really vary wildly between 10K and 35K and up, depending on the school’s exact formula.
The next step is to run calculators at each of your schools.
NYU Net price calculator: https://www.nyu.edu/financial.aid/misc/npc/ (Unfortunately, the icon makes it looks like the standard federal one from 2012, so it may not be accurate. Again, NYU is notorious for horrible aid.)
BU Net price calculator: http://www.bu.edu/finaid/aid-basics/cost-of-education/net-price-calculator/
Every school is required to have a net price calculator. Google:
site:schoolname.edu net price calculator
for each school.
You can also find a link to the NPC by looking up the school on college navigator and clicking on the Net Price tab.
Efc is a ballpark of the minimum you can expext to pay. However to know how much a college will cost your family, you need to use each college’s npc. Colleges use their own NPC.
If you want to know how much a college will expect you to pay, enter numbers into each college"s NPC. Each college has different criteria (equity considered in full or capped, capped at 2%, 2.5%, 3%, cars value or age or nothing about cars, etc.)
What your parents feel they can pay doesn’t enter the colleges’ calculations at all.
So, run the NPC on each and every college on your list.
Look at NET COST.
(Cost without loans or work study).
After running their NPC, which colleges are roughly 15k net cost?
You must apply EA or RD because you need to compare packages.
(ED deadlines were Nov 1st/15th anyway.)
Molloy, Quinnipiac, Hofstra will not “give you a lot of scholarships”. Their endowment/finances aren’t in good shape and they may give you 10k in scholarship but expect you to pay 45k. They will not be affordable.
Stony Brook is better and cheaper than them and better than Brooklyn college. Because it is cheaper, you would likely be able to dorm there. Send a good application because it is a match/high match.
Considering your academic interests Albany (you’d even have a shot at honors) and Geneseo (AACSB accredited) would make sense in addition to Stony Brook and Binghamton.
I doubt your parents have heard of Northeastern (which, until recently, was a regional, commuter school for Boston’s working class kids) yet they let you apply there. And certainly they’ve heard of SUNYs.
So, apply more widely and include where you actually have a shot at in terms of affordability. Use your SUNYapply application you’ve already used for Bing, and after you’ve run the npc use the Commonapp for other colleges.
This is your basic strategy if your goal is to dorm and not attend Brooklyn college.
Run the NPC on all colleges presented on this thread. Some may turn out to be affordable and will be another possibility.
I know it’s hard, and disappointing, but you will not attend BU or Northeastern. Better turn around right now and find other solutions. There are many good colleges on the US. Of you follow advice on this thread you’ll have good choices in the spring.
Get a Princeton Review’s best colleges and give it to your parents to find colleges they find acceptable where your stats place you at or near the top 75% (this increases your odds of scholarships). Then run the NPC on these colleges and add then to your list.
Do review, line per line, your FAFSA application. There may be a mistake - an extra zero or something.
I agree- go back to the FAFSA and make sure there are no mistakes. That being said… your top choices will be unaffordable regardless. I know it’s upsetting but lots of kids are in the same situation.
My friends son got into Northeastern 2 years ago. He had a 35 ACT and was #8 in the class. He has a single mother making about $75,000 a year. This boy received a merit scholarship of $25,000 and no financial aid. The cost came down to about $40,000 a year for her ( maybe a little more). This is why I am am almost positive that NE will be unaffordable for you. Your family makes more money ( although you have 2 in school which cuts your EFC) but you don’t have the grades or scores for merit. You might not get in… to be honest. Kids with your profile from our NY HS have not gotten in. If you do get in you will not get enough aid. My friend got zero aid from NE other than merit… he chose another school.
@anniehhh This is undoubtably stressful but you are doing a good job thinking this through.
To the wise parents: Would it be a good idea to run the Net Price Calculator at test optional wealthy colleges such as Smith and Mount Holyoke?
Annie - these are old prestigious women’s colleges in Massachusetts.
https://npc.collegeboard.org/student/app/smith https://www.smith.edu/admission-aid
https://npc.collegeboard.org/student/app/mtholyoke https://www.mtholyoke.edu/admission
There aren’t business majors by name but these colleges prepare students for the business world through addition programs such as http://bridge.tuck.dartmouth.edu/apply-to-bridge/smith-tuck-fast-track-to-business/ and https://www.smith.edu/gfic/
I think it’s an excellent idea to run the NPCs on all schools. Annie needs to do this immediately and show the number to her parents.
looking at @MYOS1634 's suggestions above…
With automatic merit, you can only get down to about $26K at Mount St. Mary’s. However, there is a scholarship competition where two students get full tuition . I’m not sure when the deadline is for applying and getting invited. You might want to get on that quick.
One very good option I found was St. Vincent College in Latrobe, Pa., near Pittsburgh. It’s scholarship competition has passed. But direct costs are low and merit is excellent. Besides the merit, there is an out-of-state grant, a graduate of Catholic high schools grant, and an alumnus grant that one can get by talking to an alumnus about St. Vincent and writing a paragraph. They will help you find an alumnus. Cost can at least come down to $20K, maybe less. Then there are other departmental scholarships besides.
We visited and I was pleasantly surprised by the seriousness of the students I met there. The coursework seems challenging and there is a lot of support for success. The surrounding natural area is beautiful but it is close to Pittsburgh. Best of both worlds. I know two families whose kids went there. One went on to an ivy for grad school and the other got a very good job at an international company.
My D is particular about theology departments so she wouldn’t consider all Catholic colleges, but I ran a lot of net price calculators. I remember Cabrini and Misericordia coming in at the low $20K range.
University of Toledo has updated their scholarships and the non-flagship Ohio publics have given us great NPC results and my D is a good student but not one of the whiz kids you read about here. Ohio University’s Honors Tutorial College deadline might be December 1. That would be free tuition if you are admitted.
Schools will base their need based aid on your parent income and assets…period. Schools do NOT base their need based aid on what parents say they will pay. You need to move past this idea.
Do NOT apply ED because you think it will net you more need based aid at a school that meets 100% of need. That won’t matter at all.
Did you do an actual FAFSA? If not…do it today…like right now! You will get the EFC per FAFSA once this is submitted.
But a LOT of your colleges also require the CSS Profile which looks at your finances in far more depth than the fafsa. It considers things like primary home equity, for example.
Here are the stats you posted:
Admission to schools that meet full need for all is highly competitive. Many students admitted have heat,y perfect GPAs and standardized test scores. These schools are not a slam dunk for admission for you. Please don’t assume you will get accepted, and receive sufficient aid. You have to get accepted to receive the aid…
And in ALL cases the schools will expect you to pay your family contribution…for the schools on your list provided. There are some more generous colleges where you might get sufficient need based aid…Yale, Harvard, for example. But, in my opinion, these would be an admissions stretch for you.
Oh…one other question…how many of your sisters and brothers will be in college while you are in college?
And again I suggest…talk to the siblings already IN college…and see how they are funding it.
Then it’s your younger sister who will be the only child in college. It doesn’t matter who the student is. Your parents are going to have at least a couple of years where their ~$35k/year EFC will jump to ~$70, and if they only have ~$26k/year to work with that’s a problem. You want to avoid a situation where you and your older sister max out your parents’ spending and borrowing power to attend pricey private colleges and leave your younger sister with only in state or commuter schools as options.
I’ve read everything everyone has said and I appreciate the help. Another question based on a slightly different topic, if I were to get in to one of my top schools, what is your outlook on student loans? Not the Fafsa ones but rather the ones you get from the bank and such. I know it depends on how much you take out, but it is still good to know about it.
You should not borrow more than the amount that you can currently borrow from the federal government
$5500 freshman year
$6500 Sophomore year
$7500 junior and senior year
anything over this is too much money and you will need a creditworthy co-signer.
Keep in mind that there are some jobs where you will be a risk if you are carrying too much debt. It will also hurt you when you want to purchase a house/apartment or car.
Outlook is: don’t do it. You aren’t allowed to take them (your limit is 5.5K for freshman year and that is typically already “packaged” unless you apply to a no-loans college). So, your parents have to take them for you. They need to qualify every year for them and since they have consumer/education debt, they may not qualify or, if they qualify, they will not be able to qualify every year. So, when they stop to qualify… you have to drop out. You have enormous debt and no college degree. Your parents have to pay back those loans for you. Even if you die they still have to pay those loans. AND your sister is screwed since your parents can’t help her at all.
The Federal loan limit (5.5K for freshman year, total 27K for 4 years, 31K with interest) is what a college graduate can reasonably pay back over 10 years. Stick to that.
Is there a charter school or less expensive private school your sister could attend starting this Spring? That saved money could go into a 529 to help pay for college. Or could decrease your parents’ debt (which doesn’t count for calculations toward financial aid but would leave you with more disposable income to pay for college)? For you it’s probably too late but if it’s possible…, you could use the savings toward college?
Right now you need to wrap your head around the fact you wont be going to BU or Northeastern. But it doesn’t mean you have to attend Brooklyn College. There are lots of excellent universities (SUNYs, other colleges listed on this thread*) between these.
@anniehhh go back and look at the FAFSA and ensure that you entered that you currently have a sister in college. Something seems off.
This is exactly what I meant by being careful not to limit your sister’s options. You can’t borrow $25k/year. Your parents would have to sign for it. They earn ~$110k/year and have ~$26k/year to spread amongst the 3 of you. If they borrow $25k/year for you they may not have the borrowing power to get any loans at all for your sister, and their available cash may get tied up keeping on top of interest payments for whatever loans they do get. They may not even be able to borrow for you all 4 years. If that happens, you’ll have to drop out and you’ll have enormous debt but no degree.
Run the Net Price calculator for each school you applied to and eliminate any that aren’t affordable for your family. Right now you have a budget of ~$17k/year ($8500 from your parents, the ~$5500/year federal student loan, and ~$3k if you work summers). If your target colleges don’t offer merit for your stats or need based aid for your family income, I don’t see how they’ll be affordable. Make sure you have a couple of CUNY/SUNY schools on your list.
My cousin went to Harvard and she told me her friend funded her entire college tuition in scholarships. Do you think I could do that? Like find a bunch of $5000 scholarships and apply and hope I get them?
Your cousin’s friend likely has an EFC of zero and got generous need based aid from Harvard. That situation does not apply to you- since your EFC is not zero.
For many colleges, any outside scholarship you win does NOT go to paying the family’s share- it will reduce whatever need based aid you get. In some instances you would be allowed to “stack” a merit scholarship you win from an outside source… but these are extremely competitive and very time consuming to apply for.
If you had a nice, realistic college list filled with affordable options, I’d be the first person to encourage you to apply for a couple of outside scholarships. But spending time on those- instead of exploring and researching affordable schools you can get admitted to- is a real time waster.
Hoping isn’t getting you to college. The sooner you come to grips with reality, the longer timeframe you will have to research your options (both academic and financial) and find a list of schools which will work for you and your family.
Realistically, no. Many colleges will subtract the amount of outside scholarships from any grants they give you. Even if they didn’t, it’s extremely difficult to find $25,000 or more, per year, for 4 years.
The best aid comes from schools. If you’re comfortable with Queens College, that’s great. If you want options in the spring, you may want to consider applying to some affordable schools. I don’t think your current list offers you many options.
You said you sister is attending a private college on a scholarship. How do her GPA and test scores compare to yours? If they’re higher, then she’s likely getting merit aid, not need based. So you can’t count on your financial aid package being at all similar to hers. You really need to run each college’s NPC to get an idea where you stand.
My sister’s GPA was higher than mine, but her SAT score was lower. And what makes my list so unrealistic? I have a lot of affordable options. I’m guessing you did not see my full list.
here it is again:
Fordham (commute)
UMiami (dorm)
Binghamton (dorm)
(new) Stony Brook (dorm)
Tulane (dorm)
USC (dorm)
BU (dorm)
St. John’s in Queens (commute & my sister goes here)
NYU (commute)
Syracuse (dorm)
Northeastern (dorm)
Baruch College (commute)
Brooklyn College (commute)
York College (commute)
Queens College (commute)
Adelphi (commute)
Molloy (commute)
Hofstra (commute)
Quinnipiac (dorm)
there’s 6 colleges here that my parents can pay full price for. what makes that so unrealistic?