<p>For those of you who applied to financial aid can you check if something new appeared on your financial aid requirements on the where am i in the process page? I just check and something called "Perkins Loan Promissory Note" showed up on my page. Does this mean I am basically going to get some sort of financial aid, which means I am either accepted or waitlisted? Extremely Curious to know... I applied to SCS so chances are I got waitlisted but would like to know if that means anything :D</p>
<p>I was wondering the same thing a couple days ago. I do not have the Perkins loan thing on my list, but I noticed that all of my documents have been received by early March and then out of nowhere my noncustodial profile showed up as received on the 18th. My noncustodial parent submitted this profile back in November so its been available all along, but why would they randomly choose it two weeks later from all of my other documents? I want to hope its because decisions are mailed next week and I got in so they are preparing a package but its all speculation!</p>
<p>@ohkawledge On twitter, they said they are still downloading financial aid forms and stuff… Well, they don’t prepare financial aid for rejects obviously. For me, it took so much time to process my CSS. But, I am wondering if this promissory note for a loan means an acceptance (I really hope so), because this actually seems legit. Why would they post this new requirement today? And I applied to SCS which has a 6% acceptance rate. All I need to find out from someone is whether waitlist candidates from previous years also have to submit permissory notes or something. I would assume you would need the note only if you are accepting the aid because it is really official (which people who are waitlisted can’t do – or can they?)</p>
<p>The promissory note has no correlation to the decision. Everyone should get it because it’s not need based. However, when you get your FAT package, it will have all the financial aid information and necessary steps. You will then get some form of online “By signing this thing electronically, I accept my financial aid package”.
I was waitlisted for all the schools I applied to here, but I still had to sign the promissory note.
Good luck in a few days!</p>
<p>@Selena731 You might be talking about the attestations…Everyone who filed the CSS had to do that. But on my portal it says “Perkins Loan Promissory Note” though (JUST TODAY). BTW, Perkins Loan is highly need-based… and I don’t know anyone who got it because it is only given to those who demonstrate EXTREME need. I mean why would they add it now? Decisions were already made 1-2 weeks ago and all this time they are probably preparing financial aid packages to accepted and waitlisted students. In fact, I read online that you actually need this official note if you are getting a perkins loan from a college. I also read somewhere that is a very limited type of loan. Here’s CMU’s info on it: “If a student is offered a Federal Perkins Loan, Student Financial Aid will notify the student to sign a Perkins Master Promissory Note.” IDK, why it says master though, but still seems pretty special to me… Now, doesn’t that mean I am being offered financial aid, which means I am at least not rejected from SCS 
<a href=“https://www.cmu.edu/finaid/loans/perkins.html”>https://www.cmu.edu/finaid/loans/perkins.html</a></p>
<p>A Promissory note is actually a legal note that assures some organization that you will pay back this loan or something. Let me know if I am wrong. Just curious, what do you think now? :P</p>
<p>I think you might be confusing what the promissory note means. Sorry, I misunderstood what loan you were talking about, but regardless of it being need based or not, it’s not college based. When you sign the note, you agree that you will pay the <em>government</em> the money back, and it’s the <em>government</em> that determines whether you qualify for that loan, and not CMU.
But for all means, if it makes you less anxious, you’ll find out in about 2 days. 
I’m not at all saying that you will be rejected, but for all people who might have similar thoughts, I’m just putting the information out there.</p>
<p>EDIT: I just remembered. When I was applying to either Columbia or Stanford, I can’t remember exactly, near the decision notification date, I got my financial aid package draft (estimation) and they asked me to reply if I accepted it. Of course, I did something electronically and was so hyper because I thought I was in. Couple of days later I got a surprise in the mail…long story short…well, I’m at CMU :)</p>
<p>@Selena731 I guess what is driving my hope (or perhaps false-hope :D) is due to the fact they have a perkins permissory note under my requirements just yesterday. I would assume they wouldn’t make aid packages for those who got rejected, and I would think they will only have the aid package available for waitlisted candidates to see. IMO, they will only make accepted students, who would like to accept the offer, sign a permissory note for those receiving perkins. Again these are all speculations and I might be COMPLETELY wrong. Hopefully, I am right though :P</p>
<p>The Perkins loan, though technically federal, is administered by the college and paid back to the college. </p>
<p>Don’t say it’s false-hope. I’m just confused because I know that’s what I got and I know I was waitlisted and then rejected. Could be that they changed the way things run :-?? </p>
<p>I can try to double check on that tomorrow when I get to campus. Although I’m sure it’s kind of late at this point</p>
<p>Oh did you actually get the perkins promissory though? CMU would actually be the lender in this case. Sure! that would be great if you can find more info on this.</p>
<p>Hmmm just double checked my financial aid history, and yes I had Perkins. However the initial financial aid letter was dated the same day I got accepted (off the waitlist).
It does makes sense but I’ve also asked a bunch of people here who are more knowledgable with the financial aid process, and they mentioned that it’s not an indication based on their experiences with other colleges. Hence I highly doubted that CMU would be any different.</p>
<p>It is definitely possible for them to give this loan to waitlisted students but the main question is why the promissory note now - shouldn’t the have that on the portal if the person is off the waitlist? Will know the truth this week. </p>
<p>Yeah I wonder the same thing. Kind of curious now. If that is the case, then CMU has a pretty ■■■■■■ decision notification system, IMO. At least it’s still better than Harvey Mudd…
Did you apply for any other program besides SCS? </p>
<p>No. I only applied to SCS and they seem to waitlist a lot of people. Previous years, CMU did have a pretty bad notification system actually. They had stuff like “committee read”, “file sent to committee” etc. which made people really anxious. This year, their portal is pretty organized and clean. Everything is as expected… except for the Perkins Loan Promissory Note that showed up on Saturday.</p>
<p>Someone said, “It is unusual; but nothing would prevent the schools to request completed entrance conseling and / or signed MPN from a student who is not admitted yet.” He seems to be experienced in financial aid. </p>
<p>Well, I hope you’re one of the 6%! I feel like they waitlist a lot because sometimes CMU was referred to as “Ivy back up school”. [-( A bunch of people whose reaches are Ivys, MIT/Caltech/Stanford apply to CMU, get in but end up going to their reaches. Hence the big gap between “# accepted” and “# attended”</p>
<p>@Selena731 Would it be possible for you to find out tomorrow why CMU would have the Perkins Loan Promissory Note displayed on one’s portal before even decisions are released? And would waitlisted students still have to get that note in (since chances are I am waitlisted). Thanks! - You could PM me, if necessary.</p>
<p>@agg999
I spoke to a couple of admission people and one of them told me she couldn’t discuss this kind of stuff with anybody aside from the student him/her self. But she did mention that you could always do your financial aid completely separately from college admission, and that’s what she thought the MPN referred to. The second admission officer told me that it is not usually an indication since financial aid and admission reviews are done in parallel. However the actual papers/financial aid letters are only prepared for admitted and waitlisted people.
In the end he pretty much said what I said earlier: don’t try to read into little details/ updates on the web portal and just wait for like one more day. :)</p>
<p>@Selena731 Thanks for asking! You mean they are done in parallel? The process could be different but I don’t understand why they would want waitlisted students to complete the MPN where CMU is the lender (in this case) before even they are accepted. But, I guess it is possible. I don’t want to expect anything, because then I will just feel bad if it doesn’t go as expected.</p>
<p>Yup, no problem. I’ll do anything to avoid getting back to work 
And I have no idea how and why they do it, but there is always a possibility that he didn’t want to disclose private information that could potentially get out. Every school has its own way of doing things and it seemed to be working for CMU for 100+ years :)</p>
<p>@Selena731 do you go to CMU or are you a prospective freshman?</p>