<p>How generous is it? My family makes about $200k/yr.</p>
<p>It’s generous, but I don’t know if you’ll receive much from any school – even Harvard and Yale – with a family income of $200K, unless there are some extenuating circumstances.</p>
<p>^^^DmouthGrad2014 is correct. Your best bet is to suddenly get a gaggle of siblings who are in college at the same time as you. ;)</p>
<p>Dartmouth finaid is awesome, but not for those in the $200k income range. Without extenuating circumstances (and/or a ‘gaggle’ as noted above) at that income level, you are essentially full pay at any need-based college.</p>
<p>Do they consider cost of living? 200K in NYC is very different from 200K elsewhere.</p>
<p>No…</p>
<p>At that income level, without several siblings in college/privvate school at the same time or some huge medical expenses or something you aren’t going to get need-based aid from anyone.</p>
<p>The assumption is that your family has saved something or will choose to borrow instead, not that every dime coes out of current operating income.</p>
<p>If your family has not saved enough to mitigate the cost sufficiently and cannot/will not borrow enough to cover the COA at D or similar schools–with an appropriate contribution from you from term-time or vacation earnings-- you should be looking at schools that will give you merit money.</p>