<p>Parent of a high school senior here, so not sure what to expect. My son has been accepted to Texas A&M, but since we are out of state, we won't be able to afford it unless he gets substantial financial aid. Meanwhile, Iowa State is relentlessly trying to get him to accept their offer of admission (letters, emails, phone calls). He doesn't want to accept either offer of admission until he knows the bottom line. We filed his FAFSA on 1/1/14 and updated it with the DRT on 2/12/14. When can we reasonably expect to be notified about financial aid and scholarships?</p>
<p>I have exactly the same question. We have four schools to hear from and cannot accept any until we see the bottom line. They want us to accept now and pay for housing and sign up for orientation and we feel odd doing this everywhere when we don’t know what we can afford. Might they come sooner if we did the FAFSA in early January and updated it at the end of January or do we have to wait until April?</p>
<p>Isn’t the timing of everything so backwards? They expect you to say you will come and sign up for housing (with deadlines long before April) and then keep track of all these schools you did this with so you can ask for a refund from all but one. Is that how everyone does this?</p>
<p>Every college wants you to come to their school and every school wants to increase their yield. </p>
<p>Don’t worry about it, don’t answer the phone when they call if you don’t want to. If there is a housing shortage, put down a deposit on housing. (You can ask for the money back sometime, just ask before May 1). No one can make you decide before May 1, it’s a rule. </p>
<p>Be honest, tell them you are still deciding. They are telemarketers, plain and simple. </p>
<p>Sorry, I didn’t answer the question lol! We started hearing from colleges around the middle of March. It seemed that we knew everything by April 1. Financial Aid was the last thing we heard about. </p>
<p>The Florida Colleges I have looked at say the deadline is March 1, and they start sending out aid packages March 15 or so. I am not sure if in other states, they wait until the deadline passes to begin offering aid. It would make sense, so they know how much money they have and not screw over a really needy family who filed later in the timeline. </p>
<p>I figured the definition of a deposit is that you don’t get it back if you back out. If we can get it back, then we better go ahead and get signed up for housing since on-campus space is very limited at TAMU and they told him they want him in a particular dorm with all the other Engineering students.</p>
<p>We have been ignoring the phone. Stressed me out, though, when the City of Ames sent us a letter. When I saw that return address, I thought one of my kids had been caught on a traffic cam and we were receiving a ticket. Turns out it was a marketing letter saying congrats on acceptance to ISU and welcome to Ames. Argh!</p>
<p>You need to check with the school. sometimes enrollment deposits are not refundable. Housing deposits sometimes are.</p>
<p>"My son has been accepted to Texas A&M, but since we are out of state, we won’t be able to afford it unless he gets substantial financial aid. "</p>
<p>If you need to deposit, but fear that the school won’t be affordable…then have you ran the NPC on the school’s website to see if they’ll give you the needed aid? It’s an OOS public, so it may not give you much/any need based aid. If stats are high, you may get enough merit, though. Run the NPC and see what you find out.</p>
<p>Usually you will hear from FA in mid March. If your admission decision is not out yet, your FA may come around the time for admission notice.</p>
<p>I did run the NPC, but it was pretty much worthless. The range was $0 - $25000. His stats are good, but compared to others in Engineering at TAMU, maybe not high enough. If he can get even a small merit scholarship, we are golden. TAMU will waive the out-of-state tuition, which is the biggest expense. Back to my primary question, anybody have experience with TAMU? Any idea when we will find out if he has landed a scholarship or not?</p>
<p>I don’t think you can trust the NPC’s. I’ve had parents tell me they were way off from reality - some showing grants that never materialized and some showing no aid other than loans when they were actually offered grants. We need to see reality and it is driving us crazy having to wait while those with money are busy picking dorm rooms and finding roommates and signing up for orientation, etc.</p>
<p>^^ I tend to agree with concernedmom. Many of the schools don’t ask for GPA or SAT/ACT scores, so there is no merit aid in the NPC algorithm. My D was accepted EA to an LAC last week with $15k merit. The NPC for the school showed that she would be full pay. Several other LACs DO include stats, and merit is part of the equation. We haven’t heard from any of these schools yet, so we’ll see how close their numbers are.</p>
<p>Yes, it is true that some NPCs do not ask for stats. This seems nutty if they do award merit for stats. I guess if the merit is competitive then they can’t really include it.</p>
<p>Yes, sometimes the NPCs include grants that never come. That stinks. I’ve seen NPCs that show a Pell student will get a $4000 SEOG…and then it never comes because those grants are iffy. </p>
<p>Dana…does TAMU still have the policy that someone who gets a small scholarship gets instate tuition? is that “for sure”? I thought that was iffy now. </p>
<p>But if you do get a smallish merit and get instate rates, your costs will be about $19k per year. Is that right? Is that affordable? I think you’ve said that you’re a 0 EFC and you have college savings. So, that may work out fine. </p>
<p>If the scholarship awards are coming from the Dept major, then there may not be a clear answer to your question. </p>
<p>I’m guessing that the range that you’re seeing is based on the fact that some with a 0 EFC may also be NMF, so they’d get a whole bunch of merit. </p>
<p>Schools have so many things to do to get ready to award aid. March is the most likely month to hear about aid, although some schools may take longer. Be forewarned … some schools only release aid information through the student’s online school portal. Warn your child to log into his/her portal as soon as the log-in info is received, and to watch the school email (or forward it to his/her most-used email address) for any messages!</p>
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<p>Actually it is a recommendation not a federal rule or state rule akin to a college “Hallmark Holiday” Many will honor the May 1 date or have it absolutely stated in their acceptance materials. My oldest son had a college where they were pressuring for a particular scholarship and early acceptance acknowledgement, but I e-mailed and got in writing that they would honor the traditional May 1 deadline and continue to hold the scholarship.</p>
<p>Over the history of my three kids, the finaid letters have arrived from mid-March into mid-April. At one of our flagships historically they are still accepting and rejecting kids well into April. Kelsmom might respond, but I think that many colleges are just getting started with packaging incoming freshman. I’ve always been told that they try to do this in order of submit but I’m guessing it’s hit or miss. Check the accepted students portal also, I’ve seen some posted long before a letter came in the mail and last year my youngest had a school that never mailed a formal finaid letter, they expected you to print it off the portal. </p>