Well, in this case a parent and then a student asked my opinion and I gave it.
Most parents can’t “choose” to be full pay at NYU.
@VANYU2021Mom CAS does not give out merit academic scholarships without need. So I’d be surprised if your D’s scholarship isn’t need based. Was your EFC above the COA of about $72K? If your EFC was below that at all, your D’s package was based on financial need, plus academic merit. If NYU decides they really want you, they will meet all of your need and can come out with excellent packages that include academic “merit scholarships.” However, if your EFC is above the cost of attendance, you are not considered for the academic scholarship component.
For CAS students, the only exception for pure merit aid is the MLK scholarships that will be given out regardless of need.
For Steinhardt students, pure merit aid (no need) is given for talent in art and music.
https://www.nyu.edu/admissions/undergraduate-admissions/aid-and-costs/scholarships.html
I’m sorry, but you can choose to dispute if you like but her acceptance letter has “academic merit” and nothing about “need base” and that my EFC was was very high. I would love to have been considered need base at all of the schools that she applied to but I wasn’t.
@VANYU2021Mom – you posted last year that NYU awarded your DD “CAS scholarships and work study” – http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/20496932/#Comment_20496932 –
If your daughter received work study, then the award package would have had to have been need-based. Work-study grants can only be awarded to meet unmet need.
But I’d note that’s not really relevant to the discussion here – that NYU only grants generous aid to a very small fraction of admitted students; for the others is very stingy with aid and will not substantially increase awards on appeal – and also that NYU pushes PLUS loans on families to a greater extent than other colleges, with an average annual parent PLUS loan debt of $32,495 (with almost $170 million in federal dollars flowing to NYU each year).
That’s interesting that it says academic merit but nothing about need base. She was offered the Work study but didn’t accept it. We were also offered plus loans but we declined that as well.
@VANYU2021Mom This was explained to me by both financial aid and a department head at NYU. Essentially NYU determines if a domestic student has any need by looking at EFC/ profile and comparing that to the cost of attending. If your EFC is below the COA, then you have need and will be considered for a need based package and work study. You are in pile A.
If you are a domestic student without need (your EFC was above approximately $72k) you are in pile B. You are not considered for any need based scholarships and cannot get work study. Pile B students are considered for MLK scholarships and talent scholarships in art and music through Steinhardt. I am not aware of other current merit scholarships at NYU without a need component.
Getting back to pile A. Everything awarded is based on need and merit. It doesn’t matter what name they have given a scholarship. It is still based on need. NYU will meet more need if they like you and want you to come. Admissions will have a say in that. That’s why appeals usually don’t work. Even if you show more need to them, if they weren’t going to meet your need because you weren’t their highest pick to begin with, it doesn’t change anything. The only appeal that will work is for top students who they are trying to give their best package to. Or an appeal that shows that you have some need and you were not being considered for any need based aid. (You we’re put in pile B in error.)
Years ago my D was put in pile B as a music major. Our EFC was high, but we were hoping for merit aid. Back then music students were awarded (through the department head) merit money for both academics and talent. Since my D had great grades, he put in for her to get an academic music merit award (no need—pile B). Well, we got our acceptance and she had no scholarship. Since D had done a summer program and the department head made clear that he wanted D to attend, I reached out to him. He was distraught to find out that this academic scholarship could no longer be processed without need. So he had to do an appeal on our behalf to the provost so D could be awarded a talent scholarship that could still be awarded without need. (The appeal had to be made since the department had already handed out all their non-need talent money to other students in pile B.)We had to wait 3 weeks, provide proof or other scholarships and eventually D was awarded an $11k talent merit scholarship (no need). That’s how I got my insight into the process.
@VANYU2021Mom – Because NYU does NOT promise to meet full need, they may prefer to label their grants in a way associated with merit aid. As they leverage their aid and provide generous aid only to a small fraction of their most desired applicants, the grant aid is by definition both need-based and merit based.
With the current high COA at most private universities, it is very possible to have an EFC that seems quite high but still is well below the COA – for example – I would consider a $45K EFC to be quite high – but if the COA for the college is $75K – then there is still $30K worth of “need”.
All parents are eligible to take PLUS loans regardless of need, and I have no issue with moderate and judicious use of those loans. I took PLUS loans for my kids to help stretch my dollars – but I was in the situation where I might have $10K available and needing to pay $15K, so using the PLUS loan as a way to compensate for a small shortfall. I would also not have a problem with a more affluent family doing the same thing, in larger amounts – for example, a family that can pay $60K out of pocket using PLUS loans to help get to the full COA of $75K. As long as the amount borrowed is moderate in relation to the family income, it should be manageable. I simply set an upper limit for myself as to monthly payment – I think I figured out that I should be able to meet a monthly payment of $500, and simply planned to keep my borrowing at level that would not result in higher payments.
The problem I have is when I see posts from students and parents who clearly don’t have the resources who are taking on unrealistically high debt. So when a student posts that the family EFC is under $10K, the NYU grant is $20K, and parents are willing to borrow the rest – that’s when my blood boils. Sorry, but there is no way that a family with an EFC that low can afford to borrow $50K per year – ($200K overall) – the math just doesn’t work out. Sometimes the parents opt to defer payments while the kid is in college, with the expectation that the child willl take over payments after she graduates - meaning that interest on the loans are running from day 1 – and so 4 years of accumulated interest is tacked on to the loan balance – and neither the parent nor student have any realistic way of paying back those loans.
In theory this concern would apply to any college-since the same system is in place for all – but this seems to be a much bigger issue at NYU than others. To start with, the majority of prestigous, elite colleges are far more generous with need-based aid-- NYU’s aid policies are more in line with universities that are less likely to be perceived as a “dream” colleges. If you remove the “dream” part from the equation, then parents are much more likely to make rational decisions about borrowing. And the reason for this differential is that other prestige colleges seem to have prioritized a commitment to need based aid, with a sincere effort to meet full need of all or most of their students; whereas NYU seems to have priortized expansion of its programs and facilities, including shifting many of its students who don’t make the cut for admission into its domestic programs into it’s international campuses. Fine for those who can afford it – but again we keep seeing posts from students who clearly can’t.
I really think it would be far kinder and more ethical for NYU to go to need-aware admissions and simply deny admission to high need students who are not within the priority admit group that NYU is willing to finance.
And I also think that the federal government would do well to cap the borrowing limit for Parent PLUS loans – at the time that program was extended to allow funding of full COA in 1993, the average total cost of attendance for colleges was under $8000 a year. See https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d07/tables/dt07_320.asp
In 1998, total cost of attendance for NYU was still under $18K (from https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d07/tables/dt07_320.asp)
Before 1993, PLUS loans were capped at $4000 per year – when the cap was removed I don’t think anyone could have anticipated the dramatic increase in costs that have continued through the years.
@uskoolfish thanks for your insight. That explains your feedback a lot. I’m not sure if anything has changed since then but I just looked at the letter again since it’s been a year and it does say academic merit. As I mentioned above we didn’t except the workstudy because she didn’t need it nor the parent plus loans.
@calmom I can see your point about the way they label the scholarships. That could definitely be the case because I’m not sure how they would word it if it was actually financial aid.
I also totally agree with the rest of your post. Thanks
First of all, every single award letter I’ve ever seen (three kids - apps to as many as 20 colleges each) was worded pretty much the same way as NYU’s. Sheesh. Minor variations, but never did any school (INCLUDING NYU) attempt to deceive anybody into thinking that the “loans” were anything but exactly that. How feebleminded do you think families are when reading these award letters? Do you really think anybody accepts an NYU loan without realizing it will need to be paid back? LOL! Blame a family who takes on more loans than it should, don’t blame the school. Bashing NYU for issuing letters that clearly spell out loans is really reaching new levels of NYU-bashing.
But, but, but…NYU is a dream school and it’s not fair that it: doesn’t offer enough money/accepts kids who can’t pay/etc. Look, NYU IS a dream school for many valid reasons that I won’t go into. I don’t need to defend a top-30 university located in a city with abundant and fantastic opportunities right at the doorstep. As far as accepting kids who can’t pay…are YOU the judge of who can’t pay? NYU properly accepts the students who have demonstrated worthiness to matriculate. Whether their financial picture allows them to attend is their business, not yours. Sometimes the EFC does not tell the whole picture. If a college - any college - is unaffordable, the family should decline. Personally, I’d rather get “accepted/denied” as you put it, than denied outright, from any university. Maybe YOU would not prefer this. But that’s just your opinion, and it doesn’t make the NYU admissions process “unethical” in any way.
As far as this statement goes: “NYU appears to have the highest overall number of Parent PLUS loan recipients of any private US college, with 4,258 PLUS loans borrowers in the 2015-2016 school year, averaging $3,495 each” … do you realize that NYU is second only to BYU as the largest private university in the nation…by a LOT. It has nearly 30,000 undergraduate students…the next largest has only about half that many, and the vast, vast majority have only a tiny fraction of that population. OF COURSE NYU will have the highest overall number of PP loan recipients… by a LOT. Again, sheesh, enough with the NYU bashing.
If your student did not attend NYU, then you cannot possibly know or understand the wonderfulness of it. Mine does attend. Mine loves it. Sure there are kids struggling to pay … just like AT EVERY OTHER COLLEGE. Sure there might be better colleges out there - not for my kid, but maybe for yours. Sure there are probably kids there who are unhappy - which is true everywhere. Is this a reason to hate NYU - a school your child does not even attend?
Seriously, if you don’t have a kid attending the college, you really have no basis to judge the experience of others. The anonymous, anecdotal NYU bashing you see on this website is just that…anonymous and anecdotal. There is a reason NYU gets the most applications of any private university in the nation. It’s a fantastic university in a fantastic city, whose students do fantastic things. Stop insulting the many families and students who have chosen NYU as their university (and yes, you ARE insulting us when you bash the university we have chosen).
This quote of mine had a type. Average PLUS loan amount was $32,495. Hence the math leading showing that the PLUS loan system is funneling around $140 milliona annually to NYU.
Ah, but my daughter did attend NYU. Which you would know if you had actualy read my posts to this thread rather than freaking out over my critique over their exploitative and predatory financial aid policies.
@calmom - I read every word of your posts, and I stand by mine. Your daughter did not attend NYU undergrad, which is the subject at hand. Graduate programs, the graduate student experience, and grad school financial aid are entirely different matters. What IS relevant is that you did not like the undergraduate package offered to your D, and you judge everyone else’s experience based on that. MY experience was quite different from yours, and I imagine the experience for the nearly 30,000 undergraduates has (largely) been different than yours.
I have not found their financial aid policies exploitative or predatory in the least. NOBODY has been forced to attend NYU by gunpoint as far as I know, nor has anybody been presented with a bill they had no idea was coming. It is a very expensive, highly desirable university. Sour grapes come along with that, I suppose, when you get in but can’t afford it. I always tell people, if you know you can’t afford it and will be heartbroken if you aren’t offered a substantial scholarship, then you really shouldn’t apply.
You are, of course, entitled to your opinion as we all are. But please at least be sensitive to the idea that more families have chosen NYU as their undergraduate experience than any other private university in the nation. The retention rate is 92%, which is quite high when compared to the many thousands of colleges in this country with lower retention rates. NYU also has more Pell students than any ivy (and most other private universities); they try hard to put their limited funds to good use. So, I mean it when I say that this constant NYU bashing from people who have literally ZERO understanding of the wonderfulness of the UNDERGRADAUTE experience at NYU is quite insulting to at least 30,000 people.
So the person in charge of NYU merit aid appeals is Helen Waite.
If you are looking for more merit, go to Helen Waite.
(take it easy folks, I’m just trying to lighten the mood and ease the tension).
I’m not going to debate you because I know what NYU’s practices are and I have been on CC as long as it has existed, and see the same thing happen year after year. A small fraction of NYU students get substantial aid – the rest get awards in varying, mostly small amounts that are tied to NYU’s perception of merit, not actual need. And year after year after year there are students and parent coming to this board with posts like the student in this thread who posted that family EFC was under <$10k and who was offered only $20K in aid and who said that NY is her “dream” school and that if she doesn’t get aid her parents will take out a loan – based on COA that would have to be a loan for around $40K.
There simply is no way a family whose EFC is $10K can afford to take on $40k x 4. (And it will be likely more than that because the fees at NYU will continued to go up but the $20K scholarship probably won’t). In the end that would be $160K of debt, with a montly payment in excess of $1800, and total interest over the life of the loan (assuming 120 month payoff) of almost $63K — so in order to send the child to NYU, that parent would end up paying around $203,000 (and that doesn’t include loan origination fees of more than $1700 each year.
The question in this thread was whether the awards could be appealed. I told both the parent with -0- aid and the student with $20K that they should appeal for the sake of having done so, but that they should not expect significant changes. If they appeal and I am proven wrong – then I’ll revise my opinion. Other than that, there is now more than a dozen years that I have been on CC seeing the same results year after year after year, with not a single exception.
And yes of course NYU is also very happy to accept federal Pell grant money as well as direct loan proceeds, but if they are expecting or encouraging the parents of Pell grant recipients to take PLUS loans – it only reinforces my opinion as to their practices.
If your child is among the small fraction of favored applicant who get strong awards – good for you – but the point is that NYU does not meet need or even factor in degree of need in computing awards for the vast majority of students it admits. Its practices (average 67% of need met) - are on not on par with peer institutions if you go by US News rankings (current NYU rank=30). For example, Boston University (ranked at #37) meets 92% of need on average (and I also know from experience is very transparent about its leveraging practices). Case Western (also #37) meets 100% of need. Tulane (rank #40) meets 97% of need. George Washington (rank #52) meets 90% of need. Fordham (rank #61) meets 80%. Even Pace (rank 187) manages to meet 70% of average need.
And those averages reflect only students who enroll – so we know that - on average – a student with financial need at NYU has 33% of unmet need, and that, on average, parents who take out PLUS loans for their kids are taking out $32.4K of loans.
These figures are not my opinion. They are facts drawn from easily verifiable sources. By the numbers, NYU is underfunding its students to a much greater degree than any other comparable colleges, and also worse than many lower-ranked schools.
That you see statements of facts as “bashing” is your problem, not mine. I live near a large city with very nice homes, very high cost of living, high property values, and a way too many homeless people living in the streets. If I opine that the city is doing a poor job of providing housing for the poor – that is not “bashing” the city – that is pointing out a very real problem. Similarly, if someone was planning to relocate and asked my opinion as to whether to come to this high-cost city, and I knew that person was not wealthy – I might counsel that person to look for more a more affordable city or region to live in.
So same deal – every college has strength and weaknesses, but some have bigger problems than others. When it comes to a pocketbook issue like financial aid & debt, it happens to be a problem that can follow students and parents for decades-- so not a good bet for students like the ones who have posted here who were not offered meaningful financial aid.