I applied to Richmond, but I’ve heard different things about the financial aid
my aid package was far better than other schools offers, however im from a single income household, probably lower middle class. seems like those in the upper middle class range don’t receive much and need merit aid to make it reasonably affordable. hope this helps
My daughter is a senior and Richmond has been very good to us. First year they matched our Fafsa EFC which we could afford. Second year, she picked up a donor scholarship and a department scholarship so total came under our EFC. Richmond has paid for an internship (which they donfor all,) they gave her extra scholarships to study abroad for 6 months. Getting a campus job has been easy for her. She will graduate with less than 6 k in debt and we picked up no debt. We can’t complain a bit which is why our son is applying there now.
It all really depends on circumstances but Our circumstances are pretty straight-forward and they’ve been wonderful.
My S was admitted in the EA round and was very hopeful of attending there, but I knew Richmond was out of the question as soon as I saw the aid package. We are a dual income family, but neither of us earns six-figures. My spouse and I each have a moderate amount of savings in our 401ks, but other than that, we don’t have a great deal of assets. We also don’t have a great deal of debt, other than what we still owe on our house. S18 has a sibling who will be in college soon too, so it’s not like we only have one child to put through school.
Richmond gave my S a very small grant, but otherwise expects us to pay about 30% of our before-tax income for tuition, room and board, and of course we’ll spend even more when books, travel and incidentals are factored in. The amount they said we could contribute was about 60% more than our FAFSA EFC. (I know Richmond is a CSS school, and we were expecting them to think we could pay more than the FAFSA EFC, but 60% seems like a harsh upward adjustment.) We have heard back from 6 other schools, a couple of which are also pricey private schools, and Richmond’s “aid” package makes it $20K more expensive for us than the next least generous school. For a school that touts its affordability, I was shocked.
Having read a few others’ experiences (there is another thread about this in the Richmond forum called “Need-Based Aid.”), and having re-reviewed Richmond’s website, I get the impression that Richmond has chosen to focus most of its available aid on low-income students, and anyone else is just out of luck if they need much aid to go to Richmond. In hindsight, I should have picked up on those clues on its website, and shouldn’t have allowed my son to apply.
@gclsports Will your children overlap in college? I’m a UR alum, and my financial aid went up a ton when my younger sister started college. Basically cut Richmond’s EFC in half for my junior/senior year, and all the additional aid was in grant money. I also had numerous friends who received scholarships (like turtletime mentions above) after they declared their majors, ranging from a few hundred to $10,000. Of course you can’t count on those merit awards, but because UR meets 100% of need, you should definitely investigate the four-year need-based aid picture if you haven’t.
Having worked in enrollment at several colleges that meet 100% of need, I think there are many misconceptions about how need-based aid works. Merit scholarships are easier to understand because they stay the same; need-based aid is recalculated every year. At colleges that meet 100% of need, if your family financial situation remains identical year to year, this typically means a slight increase in aid each year (as tuition and room/board rise; most colleges offset this somewhat with increased federal loan limits starting in year 2, but there’s usually some grant increase as well.) And if you have another student enter college, it can change the calculus drastically, typically increasing grant funding a lot, as the EFC is essentially divided among the number of students in college. (Note that this can also work negatively. If you have an older child who will graduate at some point, the EFC won’t be divided up anymore and aid will decrease.)
Thanks @highered11. I knew to expect that need-based aid would increase when S20 enters college and that it would change each year depending on income and other circumstances. Still, the amount that Richmond expects us to pay is a great deal more than we can afford for two years while we wait for S20 to enter college. We already live very modestly (average house, old cars, no vacations, pack lunches, etc.), so I don’t know what we would cut out to be able to eke that out for two years while we wait for S20 to enter college. And even if we could manage to do that somehow, the hope that Richmond might increase our aid somewhat when S20 goes to school is just too much of an unknown. Having seen what Richmond thinks is affordable, I just don’t have any confidence that its offer would increase enough in two years to make it workable. Worst fear is spending more than we can afford on S18 and not having anything left for S20, who is not likely to get into a “meets need” school and not likely to get much merit.
@turtletime thank you for posting your experience. D18 has been given a generous need-based grant but Hubby still is unsure we should take on the leftover as he is fearful that it’s a bait and switch (this is our first to go off). UR is currently her 1st choice although she still has 3 applications out for RD. We do not foresee our financial situation changing (ie income increasing) in the next few years so I think this grant would stay same as long as she is in good standing and we apply Oct 1. Because we failed to save well (our fault not hers) we will need to incur some debt (ie loans) to help with EFC costs but only about $10K/year (my reasoning is that’s the same as buying a nice new car - which we would never buy but…) I just thought the application process was nerve wracking watching her write all those essays… but now we have to figure out how to pay for her dream school and still have some left for younger S and D! Convincing Daddy (who put the thrift in thrifty!) that this is reasonable and worth it may the hardest part of this process yet (well besides packing her up in August… but I have time to prepare for that, right?!)
As a parent who has two kids in college and one who was accepted and turned down Richmond, I have some words of advice. My son was accepted at a few top 15 schools. We loved Richmond and would have loved fo him to attend there, but the financial aid was not good. We are middle class with not much savings or assets. Our financial aid package was much lower than other meets needs schools and included a lot of loans which I do not consider financial aid. He choose to attend Vanderbilt which is a school that does not include loans in their package and gives great financial aid. Even with great aid he has had to take on some debt. In hindsight I would tell any parent that only a minimal amount of debt is worth taking on for a dream school. My daughter took a different route of going to a school much lower on her list who gave her a large scholarship. She has been much happier than my son and has not gotten any less of an education. If I were to give advice I would tell you go to a school that is more affordble and embrace the opportunities at that school. When you are ready to start your professional life or attend grad school you will be happier you do not have debt. There are many schools to be happy at, not just one. Don’t fall in love with any school during the application process.
I just completed the net price calculator for University of Richmond. It returned an estimate that our contribution would be $57,000 a year, on an AGI of about $130k. This seems ridiculous. Has anyone had similar experiences?
As a parent of a rising sophomore at Richmond I thought that I’d chime in. We have dds as two different schools at the same time. Richmond’s aid package has been extremely generous to us, in fact increasing this year based upon a job switch for my husband. All aid is in grant/scholarships, beyond daughter taking on fafsa qualified subsidized loan. My other daughter’s school while also offering grant/scholarships, and also a CSS school did not increase this year their aid package like Richmond did. Again, every situation is different but wanted to share our experience. Good luck. We also felt that the NPC was very accurate at both schools.
The need based aid we got at UR was very generous, and when my ex had a pay cut I requested they look into it & we got another $15k in aid the following yr. 100% need blind, which is rare, they meet 100% need. We were quite impresssed.
@VaParents19 I assume you are in state. Did that include the TAG grant? I assume they still do those.