I know many people who had Florida Prepaid and there was absolutely no difference in admission rates to Florida schools. The plan is managed by an agency not connected with admissions at any school, and I don’t even think it is a question on the applications whether you have Florida prepaid (it would be reported like a 529 plan on FAFSA or CSS).
Those who bought FPP a number of years ago had as a benefit that they’d also receive instate tuition rates even if they left Florida or even if they’d never lived in Florida at all. Anyone could buy the plan. That is no longer the case and those who have that benefit are beginning to age out, but I don’t think admissions would even know if they did have the benefit. They’d be looking at an application marked either ‘instate’ or ‘out-of-state’ and decide based on that.
If you are arguing that a public school like UF or UCF would rather have an international or OOS student to get a higher tuition, that’s different. Most public schools have a certain percentage of spots for instate and OOS, and if an applicant is considered instate because of prepaid rather than OOS, then it just puts them in a different admissions pile. Admissions still doesn’t know if the applicant is full pay, full need, prepaid, 529 plan, or really can’t afford the school. The admissions decision is need blind.
Okay, JMS111, I meant then some kind of prepaid thing, in general, that some states have, that can impact tuition. I’m not up on all the differences because we didn’t do any of that ( either prepaid state stuff, 529,or other programs). Probably should have but just didn’t. I would be shocked if Florida admissions people are able to give preference to full pay INSTATE students over other instate students, at their public universities. That doesn’t even sound right .
No worries, I wasn’t being critical or snarky at all, and apologize if it came off that way. Was just trying to be helpful in separating one from the other for discussion purposes. We do, for example, have a 529 but not prepaid tuition plan. I don’t know if schools somehow factor prepaid tuition plans into admission, and agree it would be problematic if they did. Thanks!
We are not applying to the school I was referring to and we don’t have prepaid (I called it a savings plan mostly because of paranoia that my post would somehow get back to her…) but previous poster did make me wonder how WOULD the school know you had prepaid. I hadn’t questioned it at the time, but it was one of those conversations that always kind of gnawed at the back of my mind. Now I wish I was still in contact with her to find out if she misspoke or what exactly she meant. It had always made me feel rather bad for people with prepaid. I admit, if I was mislead, I’m glad. There are many problems with older prepaid plans that should have been addressed at one point or another. But I never liked the idea that it would be held against a student.