<p>Bus, now I am extrememly paranoid about FA; what about out of state tuition? Sometimes merit just means paying in state fees even though you are from out of state and you are still saddled with the rest. Is Rose Hulman a private institution?</p>
<p>Austinmom, we did Texas app, the night before it was due; daughter crying dad cursing but we got it in by the deadline for merit scholarships. And to be honest I loved A&M; I cried when they described the ring ceremony and they are ABET accredited with a wide range of engineering degrees. And I actually went there for a couple of weeks for three summers for professional development and I loved the way the cadets would help you if you were lost, which I always was!</p>
<p>labelness, it’s nice that YOU loved A&M but you are not going to college…your daughter is. I hope she has found an instate university in Texas that SHE likes. That is very important. </p>
<p>Rose Hulman is a private college. However it is an engineering type school ONLY. If your daughter changes her mind or even wants to explore other fields of study, that won’t be happening at Rose. It’s a GREAT school, but it’s not for everyone. It’s also located in no where Indiana and some find it very isolated. For the right student it is excellent but it’s not for everyone.</p>
<p>But buyer beware…if your family contribution at Rice is $32,000 it will also be $32,000 at Rose. They do have scholarships but the school is expensive. I don’t know how many larger scholarships they award, but my guess is it’s not a huge number.</p>
<p>Thumper, thanks for the input.</p>
<p>And A&M was second on her list.</p>
<p>I disagree with the posters that suggest that if your EFC is $32K at one college, it will be the same at others. At least that wasn’t the case for my son, whose various aid packages reflected EFCs ranging from about $30K all the way up to $55K. In his case, there was a big difference in how different schools calculated our EFC.</p>
<p>“I swear I am going to encourage every parent I know to come to this resource and get educated.” - I often do the same. </p>
<p>Sadly the school GC did not help much in this area. At our high school they actually perpetuated the myth about colleges meeting “need”, w/o explaining that EFC is waaaay more than most families expect. They didn’t mention EFC caclulators for getting ballpark estimates. Instead they just encouraged students to apply to a variety of schools and then compare the packages.</p>
<p>Sunmachine…I’m the one who spoke about EFC. EFC is a FAFSA term. It is the Expected Family Contribution that is computed using the information on the FAFSA. It is the SAME regardless of the school.</p>
<p>NOW…there is a big difference between EFC per FAFSA, and the family contributions computed by schools using the Profile and/or their own finaid form. These schools use the information on the Profile and/or their own form to determine how they will award their own INSTITUTIONAL money…and YES…the family contributions for these schools can vary by thousands of dollars because the ways the schools use the information varies from school to school. One notable example is the use of home equity. Some schools do not use any home equity in the calculation of assets. Some use a limited %age and some use all of your home equity. Just that can make a huge difference in the award a student might receive from the school (and therefore the difference in what the school expects their parents to pay).</p>
<p>I was only commenting on EFC…which is per FAFSA…it does NOT vary from school to school.</p>
<p>Labelness, I am sorry you are going through this. Your daughter too. This happens all of the time. Many counselors, magazine articles and colleges themselves encourage folks that don’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of getting an iota of financial aid. To apply RD, is not so bad, but to do so in an ED situation is not right. THough, yes, you can pull out of ED if you cannot afford the price, it can be a traumatic process and certainly a painful one.</p>
<p>First of all look and see if the college has some kind of calculator that can tell you what you can expect to get from them. If they are a PROFILE school, run your numbers through the institutional online calculators. FAFSA is not useful in most cases because it really just tells you if your student is PELL eligible which you probably know already. IT also does not take into account many situations that PROFILE and private school fin aid calculators do. So it is entirely possible to get a FAFSA EFC that makes you think that you just might get aid, then you find out that your home equity, you other kids’ accounts, the non custodial spouse’s financials come into play. That happened to a number of folks I know. In any case, make sure that there is not some mistake here in what the school has to offer your child.</p>
<p>Then you need to talk to admissions and frankly tell them the situation. See if they can work out something. Maybe your child is up for some merit award. Maybe there is a true low interest, no interest loan available. Maybe,maybe, maybe. You gotta give it a go. If it turns out that you are not going to be able to afford the school and they cannot help you enough, your child needs to ask for release from ED.</p>
<p>Since all of that cannot be done until the college opens up for business again, right now your and your D need to go over all of the college list and assess each school realistically as to the affordability. Unless the schools have merit money that she has a chance of getting, you will be in the same situation as you are with this school if the sticker price is up there. Your D needs to have schools where she is a top contender in terms of stats and where there is a chance for merit money. Look up what percentage of students get merit money at these schools and compare it to where she is percentage wise in stats. If the school gives 20% of the kids merit awards with average award being $15K, your D realistically needs to be in the top 10% of the class to be in the running for an award of that amount or more. </p>
<p>She also should have some schools that are affordable on her list. That means state school or maybe some low cost privates and local schools where commuting is an option. Those are really the only ones that you can guarantee that you can afford.</p>
<p>One of my sons’ former teachers, whom I like very much, got hit with this reality last year. When they went through the school list, the only schools that they could afford were the in state publics if he wanted to live at the college. He did get some merit awards from some privates, but with costs looming in the $50-60K range, even a nice sized award of $30 leaves a pretty big gap when the parents are going to struggle and borrow even to meat $20K in costs. And these costs usually go up and they, by no means include everything. My son had to come home twice last year due to injury and surgery which really cost us a lot. We had budgeted a nice cushion, we thought but that put us way over. Also, school costs went up despite the economy the way it was. They though 4% was a small increase. Well, maybe for them. </p>
<p>We also wanted to visit him, wanted to get him things, wanted him to participate in some opportuniites that put us way above budget. It takes a lot of discipline to stay within the budget you set out on paper. </p>
<p>When your D talks to the school–and you should talk to them too, make sure her name is not put on the ED accept list if it is decided that she cannot go there. Make sure you remind them of that. Because she can be dropped from consideration from certain school that check that list. Though the word is that only certain schools use the list, I have heard of situations where that is not true.</p>
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<p>Is there really a choice about this?</p>
<p>They are supposed to make sure that does not happen, Thumper. It is supposed to be an automatic process. BUt the fact of the matter is that if you apply ED, it is assumed you are going there and the list could be automatically generated at that time. I know personally of two cases where kids were hit with being on the list when their names should have been removed. One was a particularly tough case because the girl decided she would not go away to college because the father was dxed with Multiple myeloma and needed a bone marrow transplant. The local college that became top on her list, just automatically scrapped her because she showed up on the ED accept list. It was fixed, but it took a lot of trouble, and I have a feeling that if it had been such extenuating circumstances, she probably would not have been accepted. Colleges hate ED renegers. Since it is the student who is going to have to get the consequences, it is his/her responsibility to double check these things. The admissions people are not going to lose any sleep over such things. They are going to be at the apex of their season and they need to fill their class.</p>
<p>I was thinking about the same thing this AM, cptofthehouse. I was under the impression that ED school will automatically contact the HS GC and request to withdraw all student’s other applications. I have also read on CC that some university will keep a “black list” of HS that break the ED contract and not taking any students from the said HS in next couple years.</p>
<p>OP - I checked my 2 year old college financing spreadsheet. COA at A&M was $20,500. DS was offered $5,000 in merit award. (Presidential award, opportunity award and study abroad stipend). This was all based on class rank and test scores. Had he chosen to go there, he could have applied for departmental scholarships (and I have to think they would looooove to have a female engineering student who has been accepted to Rice). </p>
<p>Did you say she was Val? A&M gives full first year tuition to valedictorians. Her hard work is worth a lot. Best of luck to you both!</p>
<p><a href=“https://scholarships.tamu.edu/add_scholarships/Valedictorian_Exemption.aspx[/url]”>https://scholarships.tamu.edu/add_scholarships/Valedictorian_Exemption.aspx</a></p>
<p>Dad II - where did you hear that? I have never heard of a college contacting a GC to tell them to withdraw the student’s other apps. I don’t believe anyone other than the student can withdraw their own apps. It is the STUDENT’S responsibility to live up to their ED obligations. GCs that condone students ignoring the ED rules may go on a college’s “naughty” list, but it’s not the GC’s responsibility - or their right, as far as I know - to submit or withdraw a student’s applications.</p>
<p>Agree with Lafalum - colleges do not contact hs GC and ask them to withdraw other applications after accepting a student ED. It does not work that way. The GC might remind the student to do so - but that’s about it. The GC did not apply to college - the GC cannot withdraw applications - the student must take care of it.</p>
<p>What the GC may also do is not send out any additional information (transcripts, recommendations) until they have confirmation that the student has been released from the ED school. Some may end up calling the school to confirm that this has been done before sending out new information to schools.</p>
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<p>Keep in mind that the GC’s relationship with their regional admissions representative is a business relationship and needs to be cultivated as such. </p>
<p>Counselors with good relationships with their regional admissions offers can pick up a phone and advocate for their student and will be given consideration. Many counselors have had the same relationships with their regional admissions people for years. Like may business relationships, you don’t want to burn any bridges that you may need to cross again.</p>
<p>If you were doing business with someone who you thought had shady business practices or were not people of their word, would you want to continue to do business with them.</p>
<p>Dad II…I think you are mistaken. Please check your sources…</p>
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<p>You know the really sad thing – I’ve been repeating this mantra to countless parents for the last five years, and most still ignore the advice to run financial aid calculators before their kids apply to college. I don’t understand the need to remain ignorant, but there it is.</p>
<p>I have a good friend whose son will be applying to expensive colleges next year; his family earns about $200,000/year and they live in a $1 million house, but he insists that they will get a lot of financial aid. He seems to feel that the colleges will understand that their living expenses are such that someone of their income bracket will get a large grant. I’ve given up trying to give them advice.</p>
<p>“I disagree with the posters that suggest that if your EFC is $32K at one college, it will be the same at others. At least that wasn’t the case for my son, whose various aid packages reflected EFCs ranging from about $30K all the way up to $55K. In his case, there was a big difference in how different schools calculated our EFC.”</p>
<p>We had a similar situation with an EFC calculated at $12K all the way up to $28K.</p>
<p>[Do</a> OTHER colleges know if you’ve applied Early Decision or Early Action elsewhere? - Ask The Dean](<a href=“http://www.collegeconfidential.com/dean/archives/do-other-colleges-know-if-youve-applied-early-decision-or-early-action-elsewhere.htm]Do”>http://www.collegeconfidential.com/dean/archives/do-other-colleges-know-if-youve-applied-early-decision-or-early-action-elsewhere.htm)</p>
<p>That’s a CC dean’s post re: ED and shared names.
Agree with fireand rain. For a year, my best friend has been excitedly telling me all about “meet 100% of need” schools. Thinks evvverything will be covered for her senior daughter. Still hasn’t done the Fafsa or even the Forecaster.<br>
Sybbie brings up an interesting point about the GC- at our hs, the GCs could place an extra call- can yours “pull” for addl FA? </p>
<p>ps. think of EFC as “estimated” family conribution. That’s all it is. When colleges offer a package, in our experience, then it was labelled parental or family contribution.</p>