<p>Actually, Dartmouth and all of the other schools you mentioned use a combination of both the federal and the institutional methodology. The use the federal methodology to determind your ability for federal aid (pell, federal work study, etc) and the IM to distribute their own funds. Since it is their money, the school decides how to distribute their own institutional aid.</p>
<p>I totally agree with you that different schools will use the same information in different ways.</p>
<p>During My D's admissions cycle D applied to and was accepted to every school she applied to; amherst, dartmouth, williams, barnard, tufts, bryn mawr and Mount Holyoke. No 2 schools offered the same package and there was more than a $10,000 range between the "best" and the "worst" package " </p>
<p>There was a total of $12,256 between the Barnard package and the final offer we got from dartmouth (we used the Williams offer to request a financial review from Dartmouth where she is now a recent grad). However, the Williams package was not the overall "best" package, we were just reviewing 2 comprable schools). </p>
<p>Originally Williams gave more grant money, less in loans (this was before Dartmouth went "no loans", a less student contribution, less parent contribution than Dartmouth. </p>
<p>Dartmouth met Williams' EFC, lowered the loans, and met the grant aid.</p>
<p>Dartmouth's EFC 2221 lower than barnard
student contribution 585 higher than barnard)
Grant money 7720 higher than barnard
loans 2600 less than barnard
work study 300 less than barnar
total 12256</p>
<p>difference between Williams and Amherst</p>
<p>parent contrib 2251 higher at amherst
student contribution 975 higher at amherst
grant money 4906 lower at amherst
loans 3500 higher at amherst
Workstudy 100 higher at amherst
11732 </p>
<p>
[quote]
My conclusion is that financial aid from the no-loan school is not necessarily better than the aid from other schools which still have the “loan” policy. Of course no loan is good for the student but parents may have to sacrifice.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>If you are looking at the EFC which has to be paid on the front end + the loan which has to be repaid on the back end, you have to look at how the situation plays out in your house. </p>
<p>So if Dartmouth"s EFC with no loans is $12,300 and Smith's EFC is 8400 (because your loan was waived) and the loan s waived for all 4 years, then on paper, smith is the more financially feasible option for your family. Keep in mind that each year, because the student is able to borrow more, the loans will increase. If this is the case in * your house* smith could cost more in the end. But as with everything in life YMMV.</p>
<p>What each family is will ing to pay or borrow for their child's education will vary from family to family. Perhaps for your family, it is a more financially feasible option to attend Smith (which does give merit $$ where the other schools do not. D was given merit $ when she was accepted to Brn Mawr). In our case, if Williams had not met the Dartmouth package, I would have still paid the difference for her to attend Dartmouth (again, YMMV).</p>