Financial Aid: Student Contribution/Self-help

<p>I was just wondering, does the student contribution/ self-help expectation increase after freshman year? If yes, by how much?</p>

<p>Yes, it does increase every year. I’m not sure, but the amounts may vary from student to student. My daughter is currently a junior, and her self-help portions of her financial aid have looked like this for the past 3 years.</p>

<p>FRESHMAN YEAR
Term-time job: $1250 per semester ($2500 Total)
Summer Employment: $1500</p>

<p>SOPHOMORE YEAR
Term-time job: $1700 per semester ($3400 total)
Summer Employment: $2550</p>

<p>JUNIOR YEAR
Term-time job: $1750 per semester ($3500 total)
Summer Employment: $2750</p>

<p>Why was there such a big jump from your daughter’s first year to second year? Did Harvard reduce its financial aid?</p>

<p>^^ If I’m remembering correctly, my daughter had an outside scholarship that was applied towards her term time job her freshman year, which reduced that contribution. I don’t have the records for what the amount was before the outside scholarship reduction. The jump over the summer employment expectation I believe is related to the fact that rising freshman only have a 2 month break to work (July and August), whereas as college students have 3 months to work (half of May, June, July, most of August).</p>