<p>I am a prospective freshman for 2012, deferred to RD from EA. I was wondering, those who have received an aid package and current/previous students, how good they were? Is the "No Loan" (NOLA) program generous? Do they cover your travel costs? How much debt are you going to have when you graduate/ed from Tulane? </p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>I hope current students and/or parents will mention how they feel about their packages, but I can tell you that the No Loan program covers tuition, fees, and transportation expenses. I think the student/parent are still responsible for room/board, although certainly Tulane might cover some or all of this as well, if the situation warrants it. But that would be technically separate from the No Loan program.</p>
<p>The average debt for Tulane students after 4 years is about $27,000.</p>
<p>Thank you! That helps :)</p>
<p>FC is correct, the no loan program covers only tuition. Students/families are still responsible for room and board. Students may be offered loans for the room and board (if they qualify).</p>
<p>I think I read somewhere that Tulane averages covering about 92% of need based on the FAFSA (not necessarily what you think you need). Some students get a bigger percentage and some a lower one. I know my daughter did not get all of her need covered, but it is most of it.</p>
<p>Just an FYI, my d was awarded a $3000 work study award and was not able to find a job on campus. I guess the food service does not hire students (a big work study job place on other campuses). I do think it was possible for her to get a work study job, she could have looked sooner and harder, though without a big employer on campus hiring students, that does limit things. My D did find a job off campus and so that worked out, it is not that she didn’t want a job, and there are ways to work around things, a student just needs to figure out what they need and jump on it sooner rather than later.</p>
<p>Bajamm thanks for the input. If u don’t mind me asking, how much debt/loans did ur D have?</p>
<p>I can’t remember for sure how big her loans are. She was offered three and turned one down. I am thinking her two loans total around $6,000 for the year. </p>
<p>I am one that doesn’t mind modest loans, it is a way to build a credit rating. But, modest is the key word, they have to be a manageable total, an amount that a student’s potential job would be able to pay off without undue difficulty. Different majors lead to different jobs, so each student (and family) needs to decide for themselves what is manageable based on potential future earnings.</p>
<p>Thanks bajamm</p>
<p>My son was accepted EA and was offered a $22k scholarship. However, we are hoping for more. He has also applied for the Dean’s Honor Scholarship which aren’t awarded until late February. He hasn’t applied for work study or loans yet.</p>
<p>Do u have to apply for loans or will they be offered with the financial aid package?</p>
<p>Christena - when you apply for need based FA you fill out two forms, FAFSA and CSS (I think I have the acronyms right). From these schools figure out what you should be able to pay (called Expected Financial Contribution or EFC) and what needs to be offered in grants (which are different than merit scholarships but have the same feature in that they don’t need to be repaid), work-study and loans. Different schools will offer you a different mix of these instruments, it isn’t based on some set formula. The EFC should be about the same from school to school, but how the remaining amount gets bridged can vary a lot from school to school. In fact, some schools promise to meet 100% of need based FA, while others like Tulane don’t promise it but often do.</p>
<p>Hope that helps. It can get kind of complicated.</p>
<p>Fallenchemist thanks and that does help</p>
<p>One of our sons is a freshman at Tulane, and in our experience the financial aid package was outstanding. We learned that the Admissions Office controls merit-based aid, while need-based aid comes out of the Financial Aid Office. After first semester senior grades were in and after our S visited Tulane, S asked for and received some additional merit aid. There were some complications with the Financial Aid Office (apparently the new total would have exceeded the EFC-based total), but in the end Financial Aid showed some flexibility and he received an overall increase in aid (more merit, but a small decrease in need-based). There is no way we could have afforded Tulane without the aid, so the whole family is very happy and grateful for the package.</p>
<p>Caddis that’s reassuring! Thanks for the input :)</p>
<p>My D was accepted last month and was offered $27k/year in merit aid (Presidential Scholars, i think?). She has very good grades and scores (4.5 weighted GPA at a big competitive school, 35 ACT, 2150 SAT with 780 in math).</p>
<p>greenmum - Yes, that is the Presidential. Congrats to her! I hope with those excellent stats, she applied for the DHS scholarship (full tuition).</p>
<p>I wish…we STILL haven’t gotten the actual letter. So the deadline for that scholarship passed…I guess I should protest, right? The hardcopy never showed up AND she never got an email. We went into the database and saw she had been admitted. Then I contacted Admissions and they let me know today what her award was.
I guess we DO have a right to complain?</p>
<p>You can sure try. Technically applying for the DHS is not dependent on being admitted yet, since the deadline for the DHS submission and the last day for EA or SCEA notification are the same, December 15. But it is still worth asking, if in fact she applied EA or SCEA. That is a requirement for all DHS applicants this year. So if she did, then I would ask immediately if there is the possibility for an extension to January 15. Don’t be surprised if they say no, there is a “fairness to other applicants” factor they have to balance against your never getting the hard copy (I don’t think there is an e-mail, just the Gibson database status and the physical letter).</p>
<p>The other option is to apply for the Community Service Scholarship. That can run as much as $15,000 per year and would be added onto her Presidential up to the amount of full tuition. I think the deadline for that submission is January 15.</p>
<p>On the other hand, many people don’t know about the DHS until they see the hard copy acceptance. BUt most schools don’t advertise their competitive scholarships, they expect people to research the web sites and find out themselves. When my D was applying to WUSTL, Duke, Vandy, etc. etc. she never was told anything about these kinds of scholarships either. Reading CC and looking at the web sites was the only way we knew what was available at which schools.</p>
<p>Thanks. Basically it was something of a happy surprise to get the $27k. We were hoping for something, but that amount happily exceeded our expectations. We are awaiting word from a couple other schools/merit possibilities, but Tulane is a great option and the $$ is very, very nice to have! So I don’t see us begging for an extension to do the DHS option. We just never got a letter or anything. Still haven’t…</p>
<p>I would ask them to resend the letter anyway. Just curious though, how did you know about the scholarship? They don’t post that on Gibson.</p>
<p>Phone call, once the glitch was recognized.</p>