<p>If so, how much did your decision change?</p>
<p>I got this message from Syracuse:</p>
<p>“This year Syracuse University is packaging students to 100% of their demonstrated need using the FAFSA and CSS Profile. Due to this new packaging strategy we are not able to award additional need based aid to students unless there is a financial hardship.”</p>
<p>It surprised me because they did not meet 100% of my need and I assumed that they were not a 100% school.</p>
<p>We received our aid package from Syracuse and it did not even come close to meeting our need as defined by FAFSA. Syracuse is one of the schools who has their own FA formula. This being said, obviously their formula is not as forgiving as the FAFSA, and also, they can fulfill the “need” with loans. In my opinion, loans are not aid. Loans are loans no matter how you package them.</p>
<p>We had success in having schools “reevaluate” (never use the word negotiate with the FA office) our FA package, but only with better offers from peer or higher schools.</p>
<p>Same here. $1000 reduction in parent contribution in one case, $5000 in another.</p>
<p>I got an extra $1500 applied to my grant. The financial aid officer offered to take a look at our tax return (in addition to FAFSA) and apparently found reasons to give us more money!</p>
<p>I have been successful, but I wouldn’t use the word “negotiate”. Rather, its more like bringing the financial aid office’s attention to something they hadn’t considered before.</p>
<p>It’s useful to read up on “professional judgment” to get a sense of the things they might take into account. For example… did you have unusual medical expenses? Are you providing significant financial support to a member of your extended family? </p>
<p>My expected contribution at my daughter’s CSS-Profile school is always way above my FAFSA EFC, so I try to work with financial aid to see where the numbers are coming from. One year I got several hundred added to her grant because of something I hadn’t thought of… it was just an offhand comment I made to the financial aid rep, and it turned out that I had an expense that they would consider, but hadn’t been aware of.</p>
<p>PM me for more info–I had two substantially different need-based offers, and the second school matched the first school’s offer.</p>
<p>Wow - lucky… Tufts just said they won’t give me any more :(</p>
<p>To the OP -</p>
<p>My mother and I recently finished ‘negotiating’ our aid package from Georgetown, with a good amount of success. We had misunderstood that Georgetown relies only on the CSS Profile, rather than FAFSA, so their offices ended up considering the income of my mother AND my father, who is a non-contributing, non-custodial parent. Moreover, because of some moving costs and tax issues involved in my father’s income, his figures were vastly inflated from what he actually earned. He had also lost his job the month after I applied, too, so even if we did convince him to help, he would have had nothing to give. Needless to say, after our original aid package came through, we were completely distraught. They had given us an expected EFC of almost $44,000, with only about $1000 worth of actual GU scholarship. We considered everything - ROTC scholarships, student loans, becoming an RA, joining the military after college, etc. I was determined to reach Georgetown, and we were extremely desperate. This is really silly, and a bit embarrassing, but I even remember doing extra work-outs and runs to prepare for the ROTC physical exam that I would need to take the next year. Hopefully that puts my mindset at the time into a better perspective. Haha.</p>
<p>Our first appeal was turned down, and a non-custodial parent fee waiver that we submitted was also denied. (My father hadn’t been ‘completely missing’ for more than three years, or something like that, which was their central condition for granting it.) Finally, as a last-ditch effort, we wrote letters to the Directors of Financial Aid and Admissions. We included additional recommendation letters from my counselor, teachers, and mock-trial team advisors, and an extensive list of income details, recent expenses, papers documenting our health-insurance costs (which we have been buying out of pocket since my parents divorced), you name it. We finally heard back from their appeals board, and they voted to give me another $21,000 in GU scholarships. It was incredible, and I still almost can’t believe it.</p>
<p>The entire time my mother and I were ‘negotiating’ with them was extremely stressful, because to us, our need was clear, but it took quite a bit of extensive effort to get them to see that too. There were points where we were ready to give up. The $21,000 offer will change for my second, third, and fourth years, after my father gets a job (and who was also recently stipulated to help pay for my tuition in divorce proceedings), and my mother’s income stabilizes, but it was such a huge help. My advice would be to persevere until the very end, because it’s highly likely that your appeal efforts might not be greeted with much enthusiasm/support at first. Express your situation clearly and honestly, and show that you’re not trying to just get a free-ride or subsidized education, but that the amount of aid you are requesting is reasonable and absolutely necessary for your attendance.</p>
<p>I’m posting this because after getting my own awful financial aid package, I was looking at threads JUST like this, to see if there was any hope. It was heartening to see that sometimes, things worked out in the end. Remember, though, any appeal effort will take endurance.</p>
<p>We provided a detailed explanation with supporting documents to Oberlin, Vassar, Davidson and Tufts, showing what we could really afford versus the gap each had left us (approximately the FAFSA EFC). All improved their offers by at least $5,000, with Vassar and Davidson doing better to the point where we felt it would be doable. Each resulted in our son having to borrow the Stafford maximums, and doing work-study, but we don’t have to take any loans as parents and we feel very grateful. He chose Davidson in the end.</p>
<p>There is a lot of misunderstanding on the word “meeting need”.</p>
<p>Colleges can meet need through grants, loans, work study, parental contribution, student contribution through summer job etc. Just because they meet 100% of the need does not mean they meet it only through grants. If the EFC > 0, then they could the parent contribute up to EFC (and again profile schools can use their formula to determine EFC) and that is not considered need. Similarly they can expect students to contribute a part of their assets and that is not considered need either. </p>
<p>Some schools use a lot of loans in their package, so they have met your need but saddled you with a lot of loans. It is up to you to decipher the package and understand the implications.</p>
<p>IN other words, schools may give you a package that meets the gap between the COA and what they expect your parents and yourself to contribute. To them that is the need, not the whole COA.</p>
<p>We had very different offers. Out of 8 schools applied, I considered 3 affordable. I told D if there was one school out of the lesser offers that she really wanted to go to, we would negotiate with that school. She decided she was happy with one of the better offers.</p>
<p>*There is a lot of misunderstanding on the word “meeting need”.</p>
<p>Colleges can meet need through grants, loans, work study, parental contribution, student contribution through summer job etc. Just because they meet 100% of the need does not mean they meet it only through grants. *</p>
<p>Exactly! And, if you notice, many “full need” schools stop their grants (free money) at around the point of personal/misc expenses. Often, the amount that they expect from work/study, summer jobs, student loans, etc, is around the same amount as personal expenses, travel, maybe books, etc. I guess they have no intention of paying for people’s shampoo and deodorant. </p>
<p>And, I’ve noticed that some schools that are saying that they “meet need” are including Plus loans in their packages. Heck, any school can do that. It doesn’t mean that a parent is willing or able to take out such loans.</p>
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<p>That’s like saying you give a lot of money to homeless orphans, but as a side note point out that you make all your money by robbing homeless orphans. It sounds really generous until you think about it even a little bit.</p>
<p>^^^</p>
<p>Or …you say that you’re really generous to low-income people, but in reality you’re just handing them loans and calling them “awards”.</p>
<p>The whole point of using an analogy is to compare something to something else, not to compare something to itself! :D</p>
<p>It’s still a sickening practice, and extremely dishonest too. I’ve even heard of schools try to sell private loans as part of their “aid” packages; that’s something they can’t even hazard a guess as to even being an option for even the first year!</p>
<p>In all honesty, I think that only grants, work-study, and subsidized loans should really count as “financial aid”.</p>
<p>Oooh. Another multi-year thread. 2007->2009->2010. The important thing to consider is how much will need to be picked up each year IN LOANS and paid OUT OF POCKET. If the grants don’t cover it, then it is a cost for the student, now or in the future.</p>