<p>I'm so confused with this whole financial aid thing my EFC was 00564 but it said i can only get a 5,000 pell grant which isn't a lot and my parent doesn't make that much money. What does it mean to have full need met?</p>
<p>5500 is the maximum Pell grant for freshman. Your efc has been subtracted from that; your schools will use this information to build a FA package - which may include loans for both you and your parents. Hopfully you have some inexpensive options or schools that meet 100% of demonstrated need.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>It sounds like you completed the FAFSA and you are eligible for $5000 in Pell grant money. You will also be eligible for a Stafford loan of $5500 for freshmen and likely work study. You might be eligible for SEOG or some state grants too…you need to check your colleges.</p>
<p>What does “full need” mean?</p>
<p>There are some very competitive and wealthy schools that guarantee to meet full financial need for all accepted students who enroll at their colleges. There are about 30 schools, I believe, that do this. These schools typically use the Profile or a school generated financial aid form IN ADDITION to the FAFSA. If you were amongst the 10% of accepted students at these schools, your financial need would be met…per their calculations (which sometimes do not match the EFC generated by the FAFSA only).</p>
<p>MOST colleges do NOT meet full need for all accepted students. They simply do not have the resources to do so. </p>
<p>You need to check a couple of things…</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Does your state offer any financial aid grants to students from low income families (NY and CA do, for example…the TAP from NY and the Cal Grant in CA)?</p></li>
<li><p>Have you applied to some of your instate public universities with more modest costs? For example, you would likely be able to cover your college costs at a community college within commuting distance of your home with a Pell grant and Stafford loan.</p></li>
<li><p>Did you apply to any schools with the “meets full need for all students” policies? You can check this on the school websites. </p></li>
<li><p>Do you have an outstanding GPA and SAT/ACT score that might put you in contention for a significant merit award…or are you a NMSF? (are you a senior now…or a junior?).</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Meeting full need is a term that a few colleges use to market their financial aid programs. Need is calculated as COA - EFC. There are probably not more than 50 schools in the country that guarantee to meet need for their students, although most schools do meet 100% of need for at least some of their students. The federal government does not guarantee to meet need for anyone, although they offer several aid programs like Pell, FSEOG, federal work study, and the Stafford and Perkins loan programs. With an EFC of 564, it’s likely you’ll be offered several of those programs, and possibly state and institutional aid too…but it’s the college, not the government, that awards financial aid.</p>
<p>if full need is met does that mean they pay for the total cost. I only applied to 2 school one public instate and the other out of state and private which cost about 39000 a year. These were the statistics for the private out of state school
Full-time freshman enrollment: 1,030
Number who applied for need-based aid: 916
Number who were judged to have need: 692
Number who were offered aid: 692
Number who had full need met: 360
Average percent of need met: 56%
Average financial aid package: $10,875
Average need-based loan: $3,500
Average need-based scholarship or grant award: $2,555
Average non-need based aid: $1,884
Average indebtedness at graduation: $9,437</p>
<p>They do not pay the full costs, it looks like they include loans as part of the financial aid package. They likely include work-study as well, which means you would have to find that job on-campus and earn the money. It’s known as “self-help”. Are you likely to get a merit scholarship from this school?</p>
<p>no they only have one scholarship and my sat scores weren’t high enough to apply for it …so at this rate i probably won’t be able to go because i don’t want to take out a bunch of loans and be in a huge amount of debt</p>
<p>360 of the 692 freshmen who had need…had their need met at that private school. That is 52% of of the students with need who had FULL need met.</p>
<p>The thing you don’t know is what YOUR financial aid package will look like. Sometimes schools do preferential packaging for students with higher GPA and SAT/ACT scores who they really want to attract to their school. </p>
<p>At this point…you just have to wait and see. It may be that you will receive a package that will make attendance at one of both of these schools affordable for your family.</p>
<p>Is there any chance that you are a high achieving high school student? Sometimes that makes a difference!!</p>
<p>Very few school guarantee to meet full need for all of their students. I don’t know any that make this guarantee on FAFSA alone. The more generous schools tend to want more information, and require their own application or PROFILE also to be completed and filed along with FAFSA.</p>
<p>FAFSA qualifies you for government money. You have the maximum PELL and are also entitled to some loans and work study up to your need amount and up to the limits of what your school offers. </p>
<p>The way it looks is that your OOS private school will have to come up with some money out of its own funds to meet your need. Whether it will or not, you have to wait and find out. Then funds automatically available to you, such as PELL and loans usually are only enough to pay for an in state school and only if you commute unless you have so low cost alternatives for living on campus.</p>
<p>nope just an average B student</p>
<p>The way I would interpret those stats is to say that the school likely practices a preferential packaging system, aka enrollment management. As thumper points out, they did meet full need of more than half of their incoming freshmen, but their overall percentage of need met was only 56%…which, btw, is not good at all. Given that their average FA package was under $11K, which includes non-need based aid, I would guess that many of those who had their full need met had a relatively small need to begin with. You won’t know for sure until you actually receive your award letter but, since you’re not eligible for merit aid, I would be prepared for a large gap.</p>
<p>What is the COA at your instate public and does your state offer need-based grants?</p>
<p>instate would probably be about 16000 a year… but the thing is I don’t think i would be happy at an instate school</p>
<p>nd1234…you will just have to wait and see. If you don’t think you’ll want to attend the instate school you’ve applied to, you might want to consider other instate alternatives. You need an affordable option in the end. Please look with an open mind at the choices.</p>
<p>Does nd stand for North Dakota? If not, you probably have a variety of instate schools to choose from…with limited means and a B average, I think finding the perfect fit might have to take a back seat to getting a good education at an affordable price. If you don’t care for the public school that you’ve already applied to, now would be a great time to submit more apps unless you’re okay with starting at a CC near home.</p>