<p>How is the financial aid package at Penn? How does it compare to other ivys?</p>
<p>2nd question: The financial aid notice on 'PennPlan Online', is that more or less final as long as the tax returns etc. match the info on the original financial aid form???</p>
<p>my financial aid package from penn was excellent. in fact, i received more money from penn than several full scholarship offers. cornell's, however, was significantly lower. </p>
<p>that's more or less final, yes.</p>
<p>Penn has been reasonable with me (well, my parents haven't had to sell their house yet) but sometimes it takes a lot of perseverance to get them to acknowledge a change in circumstances.
For RD '09 admits, however, Penn will definitely negotiate if you have a better offer from a similar calibre institution (Ivy, MIT, Stanford, Duke etc.) If you want to negotiate and are planning to go to Penn preview days, take along a copy of your other awards and there will be fin. aid people there to talk to. If not then make a phonecall, send an e-mail, write a letter.
Penn definitely cares enough about its yield to bargain with you!</p>
<p>my fin. aid was more than i thought i would get ANYWHERE.. it's really awesome for me</p>
<p>I have to agree, financial aid has been good to me. This year they're also making it so outside scholarships don't decrease the aid they give you.. it goes towards the portion you would have paid!</p>
<p>And yeah, definitely try to negotiate, but Penn was by far the best package of any school I was considering (except UMD, but you really can't beat a full ride to there, lol)</p>
<p>the aid they offered me with my admission the other day was fantastic. . .my family was very pleased.</p>
<p>oh you lucky kids. the fin. aid package on the pennplan thing was definitely not enough for me. :( i hope i can somehow negotiate for more.</p>
<p>Penn was pretty good with financial aid,...but princeton tops it all :)</p>
<p>mnasy1122, are you sure that outside scholarships won't decrese your financial aid? I haven't heard anything like that, but if it's true, that would be really cool! Not that I've actually won any outside scholarships, just wishful thinking.</p>
<p>I was also happy with my financial aid package. I'm still waiting on a few more offers for comparision purposes, but Penn's offer totally trumps the need-based aid I've been offered so far. Interesting how our "need" can be different at different schools, isn't it? On the other hand, I'm still weighing Penn against some very generous merit scholarships, so we'll see.</p>
<p>Supposedly they are going to use outside scholarships to reduce the loan part of your aid first, instead of the grant part. Or something.
I guess that's what comes of having a Princetonian for president! Now all we need is a big enough endowment to cut out loans altogether :).</p>
<p>Just wondering, but if I won an outside scholarship, instead of taking out the loan expenses, could I use outside scholarships to pay for my parents' expected contribution?</p>
<p>UPenn really stuck it to me... the financial aid offer (grants) was literally one-fourth of what Dartmouth and Yale offered. I'm going to call them up on Monday....</p>
<p>raven: definitly call up Penn.. they'll almost definitely help you out.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.dailypennsylvanian.com/vnews/display.v/ART/423a8c4ab39b9?in_archive=1%5B/url%5D">http://www.dailypennsylvanian.com/vnews/display.v/ART/423a8c4ab39b9?in_archive=1</a>
That's the article about the outside scholarships..</p>
<p>My PennPlan was also way above my initial projections. It's funny....my EFC was 15k, but I would be basically paying 31k a year for Penn!! It might have to do with the Business/Farm supplement we turned in, but would that really cover the 16k difference??? I dunno, I'm just frustrated that I took all this time and applied, and now I might have to go to a state school cuz of the money. Hopefully Cornell & Norhtwestern can wow me with their offers...</p>
<p>my northwestern was about the same as my NYU stern one... really crappy.</p>
<p>I remember that during my interview, my interviewer (she's an alumni who now teaches at a local college) told me that if I wasn't happy with my finaid package, I should call up Penn and talk to them....she said something to the effect of 'the money's there, they just don't always want to give it to you right away'...does anybody know of a case when this worked? I got in ED, so I don't have any other colleges' aids to compare it to. (BTW, the aid that I did get offered was a workstudy for a couple thousand...no grants)</p>
<p>I know a guy who got an extra $5k from Penn when he asked them to match an offer. He was a transfer but I think it holds true for freshmen too.
I didn't have any other offers to negotiate with but Penn cut my parental contribution in half after my dad lost his job (and I bugged them extensively.)
I definitely remember that when I was at Penn Previews there were several parents clutching folders full of info and remonstrating with F.A. people.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, for ED people, they know they have you over a barrel so they might not be quite so willing to negotiate - definitely worth a try though.</p>
<p>zeezoo, I'm in the same boat... initially all I got was $2500 work study.
My parents filed an appeal immediately (submitted tax forms, etc) and FA tossed a $10K grant my way. Beyond that, I guess you could say they met the EFC (which was around 20K) by shifting the remaining 15K to loans in addition to giving MORE work study. Sort of a pain...
Anyone know whether I can/should push for more aid, given that I'm ED?
Also, I might end up having a few thou in outside scholarships. What exactly does this diminish---work study, loans, grant?</p>
<p>Penn was generous with me. I got 17k in grants somehow, and my family is pretty well off.</p>