<p>Reed is currently my top choice- I like the atmosphere, the academics seem great, the location is perfect, and their linguistics program is supposed to be pretty strong. The only thing that has me worried is the financial aid program. I've heard that students are expected to graduate with 16-17k of debt.</p>
<p>Is this true? That much debt seems very difficult to pay off, and I worry that I'd be somewhat trapped by it once I graduate. </p>
<p>To current Reed students/alumni: How generous would you say that Reed is with financial aid? Is it possible to graduate without debt if you come from a middle class family and work/save money as much as you can?</p>
<p>They are very uneven with aid and in my opinion do no provide enough aid to students who come from families that are not nearly destitute. That said they weren’t dishonest in their offers and they were always decent to work with, just apply to a few similar schools. They don’t have deep pockets.</p>
<p>Remember, this is an average, what you care about is how much debt you will have. As I recall, Reed no longer provides 100% of need. You need to run the NPC to get some idea of what you might pay.</p>
<p>Maximum Stafford loans of $20,000-$25,000 is not an unreasonable amount of debt for an undergrad college degree.</p>
<p>Reed College has been need aware, along with several other colleges for some time.
They do still meet 100% of need, however remember that just as with other 100% need colleges, * they determine need* by using the PROFILE and their own forms & need can be met with any combination of loans, grants & work study.</p>
<p>We always filled out FAFSA asap. We were lowish middle and EFC was approx the same cost as instate college. It was a reach school for D & we were surprised that they were so generous, but they apparently took other things into consideration besides GPA & test scores.</p>
<p>If you have less expensive options and you are planning on extensive post BA education- say medical school, you may want to use them, although $4,000 ofdebt for each year of college- even NOT at a private school is an amazing bargain.( that is less than what tuition would be at a community college)</p>
<p>US News is not the be& end all of accuracy, if that is where the idea is coming from that Reed doesnt meet need.</p>
<p>While our PROFILE EFC was apparently the same as our FAFSA EFC, this is NOT usually the case as the PROFILE and the colleges own forms exist to identify extra income & assets that are " available" for student educational expenses.</p>
<p>I feel meeting 100% need is a more important criteria than being need blind.
Very few schools can do both. If you have need (IMO) you want to be assured that your financial aid package will be there for you, even if as in our case income is changed significantly.</p>
<p>When H was laid off just three weeks after D began her freshman year, her grant was increased immediately. If she had been at a school that did NOT attempt to meet 100% of need, they might have told us that she would have to wait until the next year for her aid to be increased, if then. In that case she would have had to transfer, because we could not have come up with the difference.</p>
<p>It’s strange how this one message from a would be student has made me feel as though I want to write a check to Reed so that they can increase financial aid. </p>
<p>One of my complaints, from decades ago when I was a student, was that Reed did not reduce the amount that I had to earn over the summer, even though I brought in considerable outside money through a scholarship. I was cold and hungry a lot of my time at Reed and I truly resented that condition, even though I loved the academic work and discussions in the library. I checked on their website and looked at there current policies regarding outside scholarship money, I think they have improved their policy considerably ([Reed</a> College | Financial Aid | The financial aid package](<a href=“http://www.reed.edu/financialaid/handbook_package.html]Reed”>http://www.reed.edu/financialaid/handbook_package.html)). Based on this I would urge you to not forgo applying to Reed because you are concerned about loans. Look for outside funding. By far most funding comes from schools, but if you can reduce your loan amount by $500/yr by securing outside funds will be very significant to you.</p>
<p>The $16k figure comes from the standard amount of subsidized federal loans available to undergrads over 4 years, which most middle-class families qualify for and most colleges expect you to take out as part of their typical financial aid package (unless you don’t need or want to-- you could try to work and offset the amount covered by loans, but it’s generally not recommended to work more than 20 hours per week while attending Reed). In the grand scheme of things, it’s not really that much debt and much less than the national average. </p>
<p>The great thing with Reed FA is that they cap the loan expectation in your FA package at those Stafford loan limits, so they aren’t including parent PLUS loans etc as part of your “aid” package (which is a totally bs practice if you ask me). They also meet 100% of your need, as discussed above, which is based on your FAFSA and PROFILE forms. </p>
<p>Example: If the Reed financial aid office determines your expected family contribution (EFC) to be $4000 per year, and the total cost of attendance (COA) to be $50,000 per year, your financial aid package should total $46,000 per year. As a freshman, that would probably break down to $2500 in federal sub loans, $1500 in federal work-study, up to $5500 in Pell grants, maybe another state or federal grant, and then the rest would be an institutional grant from Reed. So the institutional aid for needy students can be quite generous… you’d be basically paying low end state college prices ($6500/year) for a private LAC education, and less if you can offset costs by working or outside scholarships.</p>
<p>Also if you do work and save, put the money in a college 529 savings account or in your parents’ savings account, otherwise FAFSA counts it as the student’s personal asset and will include 20% of it in your EFC.</p>
<p>Reed is solely need based aid, so if you are relatively affluent, don’t expect much, as they don’t do merit aid, which statistically favors those who are more affluent.</p>