I understand their constraints, but my aggrevation is that the financial aid office is very inconsiderate. Never getting back to us or having an honest conversation about the financial aid package makes them look very untrustworthly. When they won’t guarantee the grant amounts every year (given your income stays the same), you are at their mercy and could really get into a large debt situation if they so choose. They have all the control. In this day and age, I hope people would want more control of their finances and what they can expect to be paying. It is disappointing because it was my student’s first choice, but given the lack of trust we had with the financial aid office and package, they are going elsewhere. It’s very disappointing.
@helpdesk101 : Then tell them that…but again, as disappointing as it is, no one should be surprised if they did their research. I never would have expected decent aid from Oxford, yet some folks still get it. When applying to a place like Oxford, better to attempt a merit scholarship.
I went to main campus which was relatively wealthy (even during the reception, even though ECAS was apparently wounded really badly) and they kept the grant at the same level and even increased it some years. If I had gone to Oxford, I never would have had such an expectation (and likely would not have gone if not admitted to main because of it. Instead I would have gone to places that offered me scholarships or where I was covered by HOPE).
Hey Bernie:
My son graduated from Oxford in 2013 and Goizueta last year. During his tenure at Oxford, he aided admissions as a tour guide etc. From my perspective as Dad, I have followed commentary on this website concerning Emory and consistently have seen your commentary. Strictly as a matter of curiosity, not a challenge to your knowledge, I ask if you are an Emory admissions employee and if schools Emory competes with generally also have staff monitor and contribute to this website and similar such sites.
Also, I recall that Emory terminated some majors a few years ago. Was it generally the case that recession induced endowment losses forced reductions in academic offerings and financial aide at private colleges and universities, and hasn’t the market rebound since 2008 alleviated this for Emory, and its competition, to some degree.
Finally, you mentioned that the budgets or endowments for Emory College and Oxford are separate such that the aide they can offer students is different. Can you advise why and how the budgets and endowments for the two schools are different? Is the budget and/or endowment for Goizueta also separate and differently impacted? Why would Emory allow less aide, per student, to be available at Oxford than Emory College? My wife and I give somewhat modestly to Emory, and aside from finding these issues interesting, we might be inclined to direct our contributions within Emory U according to a better understanding of how school endowments.
Thanks for your contributions to this board and any response you can offer to my inquiries.
Oh Bernie:
One other thing, I heard that Oxford admissions statistics are not used for purposes of USNWR rankings, only Emory College statistics. If that is the case, is Oxford merit money less tied strictly to test scores and grades, i.e. statistics driving USNWR ratings, and more responsive to more intangible student characteristics, e.g. indicia of leadership potential, academic curiosity and/or other personal characteristics felt to contribute to the kind of student body Oxford wants?
@CalifBchDad : Hecks no, I praise and criticize programs outside of Emory as much as I do Emory, so definitely don’t work for Emory (they wouldn’t criticize it or highlight what people interpret as weaknesses in a forum like CC). I wish I could be one of those alum interviewers though.
Majors and fin. aid:
Emory’s College was never doing well vs. peers (arts and letters/sciences unit) in the first place in terms of merit and need based aid (and had always stretched its budget), so its academic performance is actually kind of surprising in retrospect. I have no idea how its curriculum and course offerings were as strong as they were in the 90s and early 2000s, but apparently you can do a lot with less money as many less endowed schools doing great things show, especially when you have lower enrollment and a student body with a better attitude. I suspect curriculum offerings shifted as demand shifted from student attitude changing over time at Emory, as in recruit was “meh” after a certain time. Emory’s stats, for example, began slipping behind most peers (except maybe Berkeley, USC, Georgetown) in maybe 2007 when others had more competitive need-based and merit aid. Some of these places did so because their arts and sciences entity had a larger share of the endowment allocated toward that than Emory and still do. For the time, Emory Advantage was pretty good. Now, I am currently concerned about schools who continued that aid scheme during and after the recession.
It certainly boosted stats and modestly increased or stabilized rankings at such schools, but the model is not financially sustainable and damned sure did not improve the academics. Luckily one of the schools I speak of was already better academically than some near ranking institutions (and still likely is), but it just doesn’t have the lay prestige (hint: like Emory, it is D-3). I still think they should have reconsidered some of those departments as things like journalism in a city like Atlanta could have had lots of potential if MORE money had been thrown at it. The areas where money has been reallocated, in terms of undergraduate education and opportunities, seem like they are already kind of at their peak in terms of course offerings and co-curricular opps. Some new areas of investment, according to the faculty committee reports I read appear not that feasible even to the faculty told to study them. Like the Chinese Culture and Language investment. Even in like of the allocated monies, throughout the report they were saying: “but how? We’d need more money”
Emory and other unit endowments: I did not understand it until I started doing deeper research on Emory and highered in general. During Wagner’s Campaign Emory, they actually began to show the endowments per unit. I suspect it has something to do with enrollment in each entity. Regardless, non-healthcare (and certainly majority undergrad) entities at Emory seem to struggle versus peers. You can actually now get more information through the giving pages: http://www.emory.edu/home/giving/where-to-give/college.html
There is also the scholarship endowment (they have been mentioning it forever, and I only recently saw this website): http://seedthefuture.emory.edu/
If you maybe are interested in Emory boosting stats and being able to play it less safe in admissions decision, this may be one way to go. But IMHO, it is a short term patch. Given that Emory does not attract students for how “balanced” it is like many other schools, if academics do not improve further, any newer, higher stats. students who enroll will actually notice and pay attention to the differences in academics between Emory and other perhaps super elite schools they were at least qualified to be admitted to (whether they were or not is a different story).
Some schools don’t have to worry about that because their campus life is more traditional and is honestly enough to distract many students from thinking about the academics too much because they are having such a good time with other aspects of the university. To me, it always seemed that, at Emory, if you weren’t having a good academic experience (maybe you were in a weaker department with less course offerings and non-permanent faculty or took weaker instructors intentionally), you were more likely to be disenchanted with the place. At some other places, students often get over mediocre instruction (even when it happens often within their major) quickly. In fact, it shows when the top performing students are the ones harder to retain (any school that sees the same phenomenon and says: “Well it is because they were uncomfortable with being challenged to this level” like I heard one admissions dean suggest in a podcast, is well…lying. Usually the reason is the opposite. The courses were not doing what was expected or the intellectual climate was lacking at these relatively excellent, but less elite places. Many such students, try to transfer to LACs or more prestigious and/or intellectual schools at Emory and other places who see the same trend).
Oxford Student body: Honestly it is about the same as main campus stats wise now…because main has stagnated for the past like 10 years. They’ve certainly seen a bigger upward trend than main for quite a while. Both use a similar scheme it appears to me, focusing more on personal characteristics and curiosity. The reason main has likely started doing this under Latting is to perhaps increase academic diversity, align the student body with more campus initiatives aimed at ultimately creating a more intellectually charged experience, and also for the simple fact that competing for many of the higher stats (let us say 1450/1600 and above for Emory) is no easy feat especially those who fit the qualities you mention. Emory main has a much larger pool and can’t do it, so Oxford certainly has a harder time (though luckily, I guess better recruitment efforts have allowed for more dual applicants). Regardless, you are right in that it may be more of the case with Oxford. I read their strategic plan and it said it wanted to shift to marketing Oxford as more distinct so that they could start getting applicants and enrolling students who actually want to be there because it is different from main and lesser so because it is attached to main. One way they are doing this is actually changing the requirements to graduate. They actually plan on eventually implementing a legit core curriculum of their own flavor that will set them apart from main beyond just the pedagogy typically used in the classroom.
My experience was at Emory, not Oxford. I essentially told them as much, but the representative didn’t really seem to care.
The representatives cannot really respond to it or care as much. You’d have to notify a Dean…a person who actually cares about the competitiveness of the school. They may not be able to do anything either for the immediate situation, but if they get a bunch of written or verbal complaints about it, dealing with the issue would likely move up in priority. Either way, they have already figured out that this is becoming a problem that can no longer be overlooked.
There are major changes taking place in the Office of Financial Aid this summer. All the advisors assigned to students by last name (at least for Emory College) have changed; the advisor we had for 3 years overlapped with her replacement, who is also the new Director of F. Aid… Our former advisor wasn’t as horrid as some described here; she would occasionally answer emails but never phone calls.
Our D’s financial aid award was the same as a need-based offer from another college. I expected that we would not receive enough aid from Emory to consider attending but it was among the top 4 offers for consideration. We were fortunate to find an angel in Student Financial Services who saved my sanity with the F. Aid office. Student Financial Services is the dept. who receives express mail and credits payments and scholarships to your bill. It often takes weeks for payments sent to F. Aid to make their way to SFS to be credited. At least 4 scholarship and private loan checks have not made it through Atlanta’s postal system to Emory (Emory has their own post office, they receive so much mail.) I’ve had to FedEx scholarship and loan checks the last 3 years to SFS so you can get a real person to let you know if it’s been received (not the case with F. Aid.) I’m going to send our SFS angel flowers when my D graduates.
It’s unfortunate that other employees in that office aren’t as professional as your counselor. I’m glad you had a better experience. Too late for us! Maybe they are figuring out that people aren’t just going to accept the “we reassess every year” answer to every question addressed to them. Gave the impression that you should just be happy to be accepted. It’s too bad.