<p>If you get a University Scholarship, can it be applied to your parent contribution? It seems like they just take away you student contribution. Since outside scholarships can only reduce student contribution, the University scholarship seem to take away any usefulness of outside scholarships, which is a bit disappointing.</p>
<p>im not sure what your question is... it seemed like you answered it already. but no, scholarships can NOT be used to reduce parent contribution.</p>
<p>My question was about how the University merit scholarships work with other scholarships someone can receive. If your student contribution is less than 10,000, it completely takes away your ability to benefit from any outside scholarships. So if someone already has a few thousand dollars in outside scholarships, the merit scholarship they give out doesn't seem to do that much. </p>
<p>The financial aid office said that the merit scholarship can only be used on your student contribution. But I also thought I heard from a couple people that it worked differently than outside scholarships and can be used towards parent contribution. I was wondering what other people thought of the situation.</p>
<p>actually something like that sounds familiar... that the college merit scholarships were special in some way.</p>
<p>Why not call the FA office and ask?</p>
<p>From the Alicia Reyes letter my S received with his University Scholars award:
"It is important to note that your University Scholar award will be adjusted only when all the outside awards, in combination with the University Scholar award, exceed the total cost of attendance." </p>
<p>We did not get any other FA from Chicago, however. Our need was less than the $10k award.</p>
<p>See page 9 of the FA booklet for how University Scholar awards coordinate with external scholarships and aid packages. That language would indicate that if you get FA, external awards cannot reduce the parents' contribution.</p>