Hi all.
It was to my understanding that when two students are simultaneously enrolled in college that their financial aid award increased significantly.
Basically, my tuition is the same as my sister’s from last year. To clarify, LAST YEAR, my sister was attending college alone.
2016-2017 she and I will both be attending, and my financial aid for 2016-17 did not change from her award last year.
BC hasn’t received my FAFSA yet, only my 2014 tax return forms and CSS Profile. Will the FAFSA alter my financial aid award? (I’m assuming not).
I was just wondering… Is this normal? Does your award normally not change significantly, even when two students are enrolled (both undergrad) at the same time?
In general, yes, the EFC gets cut by 40-50% for the second student. In other words, the expected family contribution is half of each. Run the NPC for BC and change from 1 to 2 in college and see what it calculates.
Does your sister attend a private school, or lower cost public? Does she receive merit aid at that school? Also, note that each school figures its own version of NPC. For example, Harvard has one calculation, Cornell, another, and BC a third formula…
That sounds like a good idea. I’m planning on calling in later just to ask a couple of questions.
My sister currently attends BC, and next year (2016-2017) she’ll be attending an Ivy.
Thanks so much for your reply. I’d definitely appreciate any other information you might have to offer.
^^correct; a grad student is independent for the purposes of undergrad fin aid. (And if attending an Ivy for a PhD program, it will be fully funded, so older sis needs no fin aid.)
And in that case, the FinAid award for the OP is consistent with exactly what his sis got.
She got a guaranteed transfer.
So, she’s currently in her first year of undergrad. She was waitlisted from an Ivy and got in and will be attending her second year of undergrad there.
Neverless, we will both be undergraduate.
Is your sister now paying quite a bit less at the new school than she did at BC? If your parents’ 2014 earnings are similar to their 2015 earnings, then the numbers won’t change much, but you are correct that having two students enrolled in undergrad schools (both meet full need) should result in some tution reduction unless your parents have a very high income and/or very high assets. There is a thread about how much BC uses home value in their financial aid calculations. Also, rental property or a business can impact financial aid a lot.
Got it. Transferring to Cornell as a Soph. Assuming your parents earnings/assets are similar to last year, your family’s contribution should have been cut by close to half.
Double check your application forms for both FAFSA and whatever you sent to BC to make sure that is it clear that you’ll have two in college in September. If those are correct, call the BC FinAid office.
Actually, I don’t believe she’s gotten her financial aid package back yet, but we did our FAFSA to together, meaning that we should have similar packages, I think. But Boston hasn’t processed my FAFSA yet, so maybe that contributes to something.
No businesses and no real estate other than the home we are in. I’ll try to look into that thread later if I remember, it sounds useful.
Thanks so much for the information.
Yeah, on BC’s portal (where I checked my award), it says “sister currently enrolled in BC” right under my awards, which concerns me.
Right. I keep planning on calling, but they close pretty early for phone service (I’m three hours ahead of Boston).
Anyways, I’ll do that. Thanks so much.
you can always send an e-mail your financial aid counselor with your question(s) or ask to setup a time for you to call, early am (from the west coast), for example…
Oh okay. Yeah, I’d planned on just calling when in school because they’d close before I got home, but I just shot my financial aid counselor an email explaining the situation and basically asking her the same things I was asking here.
If I don’t get a reply, I’ll try phone.
Thanks so much again!
the counselors are really busy right now, but my experience from a few years ago, was that they always responded to an e-mail within a couple of days. So don’t be concerned if you don’t hear back until Tuesday.