How much difference does 1500 dollars make in my EFC?

Oh, these terminology confusions. OP. what your family can pay is not the Estimated Family contribution. The EFC is a term for what the colleges say you can pay, after they look at your fin forms. Or must pay, if they don’t offer sufficient aid. Some of us still use it for what the Fafsa calculates (“Fafsa EFC,” but that’s an old acronym.)

You’re talking about something different. And in that category, what we “could” pay, I always put a very low number.

As far as we know, the question OP refers to is background info only. Not a determinant for aid or admission. It helps with the large picture.

In my case I put in CSS too low amount rather than too much. Can this harm my son’s application? I can’t change CSS now

We explained this several times, several ways.

There are lots of variants on Need Aware and in general, a highly and rightly qualified candidate is not rejected for what you put in that box.

@Alezzz

I’m going to try this again.

The amount you put that YOU can pay has absolutely NOTHING to do with what the school determines you can pay. And it’s what the SCHOOL determines you can pay that matters.

What you put in that field on the Profile does NOT get used when the school calculates your financial need. Your financial need will be based on your income and assets…not some random number you choose to enter that you “can pay”.

@austinmshauri Thank you for the info

The colleges I am applying to award around 53k on average to international students. From my income, assets, etc, they can determine that maybe I can pay around 10k per year. The total cost of attendance is around 68k. Therefore, I need around 58k aid. I have heard people say that colleges don’t give that much aid to students. How true is this?

@ItsComingHome

Don’t look at averages. They mean nothing because some folks get well above the average…and some folks get well BELOW the average.

Are you applying to colleges that guarantee to meet 100% of need for ALL international students? If so, you do have a chance to get that aid if you are VERY low income and actually get accepted to the colleges. But a few things you need to consider.

  1. There are only five colleges that guarantee to meet full need for all international students AND are need blind for admissions. This means your ability to pay WILL be taken into consideration at most colleges when they review your application for admission. And the college determines your ability to pay...not you.
  2. The cost of attendance usually does not include discretionary spending money, books, transportation and health insurance. So...be sure to add those costs to your cost to attend.
  3. At some of the colleges that guarantee to meet full need for all...admissions for international student is highly competitive with some schools having 5% acceptance rates. Some have higher acceptance rates.
  4. Your application for admission as an international student will be reviewed alongside of other applicants from your geographic region. Some areas (Asia, for example) have an abundance of well qualified applicants.
  5. You absolutely should have an affordable college in your country on your application list.
  6. Your ability to work here will be limited while on a student visa.

Colleges give what they can/want to`. If they want to give you $53k but you want $58, that’s a problem. It’s a problem my kids had, and they had to take out some loans, work, economize by living on the $53k

It is very difficult if you aren’t a US citizen to go to school in the US unless you can afford to pay at least $10k to cover your own travel, insurance, and incidentals. There really aren’t that many schools who give 100% of the COA, except to football players.

It’s really no different than if you are a US student. There are many stories about students at ‘meets full needs’ schools who don’t have enough money for food, warm clothing, books. The schools award them almost full cost of attendance, but the schools do expect the students to work, to figure out how to support themselves, or to take out a loan. Many student run out of money because they are sending some money intended for clothing and food home to their families.

No.

They’re asking how much your family can contribute towards the whole “college experience”…which for an int’l would include travel abroad, medical insurance, and personal expenses.

So…how much can your family pay EACH year for your: (fill in each one)

Intl travel to USA in fall, plus travel home in spring (2 one way tickets): $
Personal expenses: $
Health insurance: $
Tuition, room, board, fees, books: $

Grand total from family: $

The reason the grand total is needed is because that’s how families operate. If families look at family budget and think they can squeeze $12,000 to put towards Son’s education …then that has to include all the major expenses associated with this.

Again…the amount you SAY you can pay has absolutely NO impact on the amount the school will calculate they expect you to pay.

In my opinion, just be honest. If your parents can contribute $8000, put that. Really…the colleges do NOT use this number to calculate your need based aid…at all.

And this is true. The fact that a family thinks it can only pay $8k, does not mean that the school will provide the rest.

However, at a “need aware school,” if you say that you can only pay $8k, and the school determines that your family should pay $20k, then they may reject you because you’ve told them that you can’t pay $20k.

The need aware school is going to do their OWN calculations based on your financial aid application data. You could put that you will pay $1,000,000 a year in that spot, and it won’t matter AT ALL if the financial data on your financial aid application forms don’t support that amount.

you know, i see this question so many times on the forum - about what to put for parental contribution.

If the answer doesn’t matter too much for colleges, why do you think it’s asked?

I also remember seeing that question on random scholarship applications when my older daughter was applying - trying to wrap my head around why it’s there and what it really means! thoughts?

Maybe. But it’s such an unsupported question that they can just look at their own calculations. If OP says 8k and the NA college calculates 20k, that’s the figure. They decide if he’s a totally great enough candidate to admit and if budget allows for him, despite his high need.

Our Need Aware offered what they offered despite my listing something like 2k. That $ was far less than they decided wr could pay.

Bgbg4us, it’s a CSS question and then colleges do whatever they do.

There are a lot of questions on the Profile that are information only ones. Some schools ask for the value of your cars. Some ask for the balances in retirement accounts. Neither number is used for financial aid calculation purposes.

Go look at the net price calculators…see if you see a question about what the parent says they will pay. No. See if there is a question about cars. No.

God knows why these questions are there. It is speculated that the schools will only look to,see if they are disproportionate to your income…e.g. if your income is $40,000 a year, but your retirement accounts have $5 million in them, someone is going to wonder why…and how…and might inquire.

That what I’m asked about. I think U calculations will show that I can pay more than told in CSS profile as I estimate it now. Can this harm my son’s application? I asking not about money. I understand very clear that my wishes is nothing for U. But about impact to his chances.
Initially CSS was done for EA application to need-blind U, so I just put low amount without long estimations. But now he applying to some need-aware U also and all they are very competitive. Anything that harm his application can lead to total loose. And I already can’t change CSS profile.
So what you think about it? Have it sense to send emails to those U with update that I ready to pay more than it’s written in CSS profile? Or just left it as it?

@Alezzz, first and foremost, one needs to be the right candidate. You’re letting yourself be confused and may need your own thread, for this. It may help to Google.

As one web site puts it, “At schools with need-aware policies, schools do examine the financial need of students. At many, perhaps most schools, the majority of students, however, are selected regardless of their financial neediness. Using this approach, a school will accept most of its freshmen class without any regard to its financial bottom line. For the last 10%, 20% or 30% of slots, however, a school may start looking a the financial ability of applicants…With this admission approach, the students who are marginal applicants AND financially needy can be rejected.”

You first need to be a quality applicant, what the college wants. Your need is what they calculate, not what you put in that box on the CSS.

All that is clear. But if college have 5000 right applicants for 1000 places 4000 right applicants will be rejected. I trying to understand can fact that amount in CSS profile essentially lower than college estimation be reason to reject right applicant.
I apologize that I don’t creating own thread but OP already got all possible responses. What sense to create one more thread about same thing.

MODERATOR’S NOTE: This thread has gotten off-topic. @Alezzz, you need to start a separate thread to ask questions. It’s considered impolite to hijack another user’s thread.