<p>Is MIT a school that meets full need? Are loans part of the package? Does the loan part vary based on your income? What expenses are going to absolutely be included (for example, student contribution, work study, etc)? Does anyone get a "full ride"?</p>
<p>Have you tried looking at the website?</p>
<p>[Afford</a> | MIT Admissions](<a href=“http://mitadmissions.org/afford]Afford”>Afford | MIT Admissions)</p>
<p>It always really saddens me when people go to the often-inaccurate CC for so many things that are answered on the website.</p>
<p>MIT calculates how much you can afford to pay, and charges you just that much. If you can’t pay, you won’t have to pay. There are definitely people here who couldn’t afford to pay and therefore do not pay tuition.</p>
<p>Yes, I have been to the website, admittedly though not recently. Sometimes it is easier to ask the questions, so that the answers are all in one place. The MIT website is not always friendly to slow connection speed computers and in order to find the answers to each of my questions requires multiple page changes. </p>
<p>I did find that everyone has to pay “self help” (student contribution and work study) and that yes, loans are certainly part of the package (and seemingly encouraged). I did not click on enough pages for definitive answers to the remainder of my questions. It is ok though, I will find out the information without asking here again.</p>
<p>Apologies for the inconvenience Piper and thank you for the website link. Thank you lidusha.</p>
<p>That isn’t quite accurate. Everyone is expected to pay self-help, equivalent to $4400/year for families earning <$75K, and $6000/year for families earning more than $75K. How that self-help is met is up to the individual student. A campus job, often in a lab, is a quite common way of meeting that self-help requirement. A loan is another way of meeting that requirement (and is not discouraged). Above that, loans are absolutely not part of any financial aid package. Indeed, a significant majority of MIT undergraduates graduate with no debt whatsoever. To be fair, that last statement is also true of Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Dartmouth.</p>
<p>Given that most students graduate debt-free, I think it is a misstatement to say that “Loans are certainly part of the package (and seemingly encouraged).”</p>
<p>I appreciate the reply Mikalye. I obviously misunderstood the information on loans, thank you for clarifying.</p>