<p>Relevant parties, </p>
<p>I am a student seriously considering transferring to Bard. My main concern is cost. The problem is that my parents make a relatively large amount, but they are not going to give me any money for college. Would it be inappropriate for me to e-mail Bard’s financial aid department to see how much aid they estimate I would get, just to get a ball park figure? I don’t want to seem like a I am bypassing the time-tested system of applying first and then waiting to see if you are insufficiently poor, but if they charge me too much, it’s just impossible for me to attend; I feel like it would be a massive waste of time on both my part and Bard’s part for me to undergo the whole application process to just be too poor at the end. I see on CollegeBoard that the “average need-based scholarship or grant award” is $33,329, but that’s not all that helpful because my family’s income could be above the average family income of all Bard students. </p>
<p>Thanks for any advice you can offer!</p>