<p>This weekend is the open house for the students accepted into the Honors program - how many kids typically attend this?</p>
<p>I don’t know what the typical turnout is. We were originally planning on attending but will not go now since the fin aid package made it clear we cannot afford BC. (Supposed to snow too!)</p>
<p>Same here MidClassMom. We had booked a flight but canceled.</p>
<p>We have decided not to go for the same reason - the FA package was awful. Very disappointing that they have this wonderful honors program and give no financial enticement to the top students. I wonder if they’ll get the message if nobody shows up.</p>
<p>BC has poor FA. From who I’ve talked to, it seems like you either get either an absolute ton of money or pretty much nothing. Unfortunately, I got zero FA and am paying the full $55,000/year.</p>
<p>hockeydad:</p>
<p>sorry to hear about your situation, but BC makes it clear that it only offers merit aid to a dozen students a year. Besides the approved D1 scholarships, all other aid is need-based only. Unlike similarly-ranked or lower ranked colleges, BC ois need-blind in admissions and meets full need however. (Yes, like all colleges, “need” is as the college calculates it.)</p>
<p>Yes, several, wealthy private colleges ranked above BC are generally provide merit money and meet 100% of need. Colleges ranked below BC, generally do not meet full need, but do offer some merit aid. Of course, to be eligible for merit money, one has to be in the top ~10% of the applicant pool. </p>
<p>For example, Tufts is need-aware in admissions, but meets full need if accepted. Wake Forest offers merit aid, but does not meet full need. (Yes, they claim to meet full need, but then they ‘meet’ that need with additional outside, private loans.)</p>
<p>If you haven’t already, double check all of your entries to the estimated Profile to make sure that they are correct. (After completing the forms for 4-straight years, and thinking I had experience, I put a $ amount in the wrong line last year, which was a huge decrement to the aid package, which I found later and the college corrected.)</p>
<p>BC does offer other merit scholarships besides the presidential - they are just not significant enough to make a difference (in our case). I wonder how the honors program administrators feel about losing the top kids because of FA policy. If they are trying to attract the top kids they must put their money where their mouth is.</p>
<p>No, BC does not offer merit scholarships beyond the Presidential Scholarships…</p>
<p>And BC is able to attract the top students…if it couldn’t, they would have changed things a long time ago…</p>
<p>hockeydad:</p>
<p>Like nearly all schools, BC has a limited financial aid budget. (The only exceptions would be HYP.) BC has kept its no-merit-aid policy for quite awhile, so they seem to think it works for them. There are plenty of full pay honor students and some who receive a lot of need-based $$ to enable them to attend. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, the upper middle class families have sticker shock when it comes to private college expenses. With a NMSF, I hope your S applied to some of the colleges that offer automatic $$ to such kids. Colleges that play the rankings game just love high stat kids and are willing to pay for them. BC, and many other non-merit schools, however, choose not to play that game.</p>