<p>So i received an extremely generous package from Villanova. My EFC is 20k and I received: </p>
<p>32k Scholarship/Grant
2k Direct Unsubsidized
3.5k Direct Subsidized
3k Work Study
Total: 40.5k </p>
<p>Total COA is roughly 58k </p>
<p>While they have definitely met my EFC, the issue is that the EFC is not reflective of what my family can afford. A variety of factors (such as one unemployed parent + an above average financial year for the other(real estate)) have resulted in us having an EFC much higher than sustainable. For me to be able to attend i would need to received roughly another 10k in aid (hopefully in grants) for me to be able to attend. If given, I would absolutely attend villanova.</p>
<p>My question is how do I go about asking for some more financial aid? I am planning on visiting in the next week or two for reference. Advice much appreciated </p>
<p>I think you can talk to your financial aid officer about your other offers. They want top students so if you are “in demand” elsewhere, they may come up with some more money for you. </p>
<p>You can contact the financial aid office and ask, but there are no guarantees. When we visited Nova, they made it very clear that they do not guarantee meeting EFC, and for us they certainly didn’t. The yearly cost of attendance for D at Nova would have been $15,000 more than our EFC.</p>
<p>I’m sorry, but this is one of the things that really upsets me about the whole college financial aid system. Parents who do not save up for their children’s college expenses are rewarded with extremely generous grants whereas parents who work day and night, sacrificing their vacations to save up for college, receive zero financial aid. If your parents could not save at least 40k for 4 years of college education over an 18 year period, then someone needs to coach your parents on saving up.</p>
<p>–From a person who will ultimately pay $500,000 for my education</p>
<p>@MrInformed, I could not agree with you more. I was a victim of this myself. My parents went out of their way to fund my 529 and unsurprisingly, no schools offered me aid beyond merit scholarships. It definitely is discouraging to see people who blow through their money receive generous financial aid packages. It’s practically rewarding bad behavior and condoning poor money management techniques since there are no foreseeable consequences for these actions.</p>
<p>I agree also. I will have 2 sons in college this coming Fall and we opened up a 529 accounts for both when they were very young. I have been contributing varying amounts of money (whenever I found extra) throughout the years and we still came up a little short, but we will be able to fund the majority of their 4 years without taking out any loans approximately $50K for both each year. Yes we scrimped and saved, took camping vacations instead of cruises, but in the long run we feel it is worth the sacrifice. Then you have some like OP whom posts they are only receiving $58K but needs more. Very upsetting so say the least. </p>
<p>My family lives a very modest lifestyle. I go to public school, we don’t take vacations, my parents drive 10 year old cars, my parents both work, I have worked since I was 15. I definitely don’t have enough money saved to afford $58,000 x 4 years at Villanova.</p>
<p>THose who save sufficient amounts for college have the luxury of NOT having to join the lottery for financial aid and roulette wheels for merit money in addition to their kids getting accepted at the schools they want. This OP , for instance, has been accepted to Villanove and despite the fin aid package he got, may well not be able to attend, or do so at huge expense in part because his parents did not save enough to pay his way when things went down hill financially with the family </p>
<p>Even if parents qualify for financial aid, most schools don’t meet the need,as defined by FAFSA, much less what families define it to be. Seriously, if you really feel it’s an issue, assign the 520 to a cousin or godchild or donate it to a needy child fund or something, and enter the sweepstakes for those big time awards you think you’d get if you didn’t save. Heck divest yourself of all of your assets and savings and see what big time money you get. It’s not that difficult to get rid of your money. The hard thing is to save it so you have it. Those who did not do that, can’t turn back the clock and get into the situation a saver at the same income is. So if you have such fin aid envy, then get rid of those assets. PM me. I’ll take them.</p>
<p>Based on your math you are about 17.5K short for this year. That’s less than most public state schools. We had a similar decision to make with S-2011 and we opted to stay with the private university and the results were lower costs for two of the first three years and the senior year appears to be even less as our D-2014 will be a freshman this year. While I am not an advocate of loans, the amount you need is not overwhelming. I would also discuss the fluctuation in income with the FA office as there is a liklihood of increased aid next year if the parental income declines. Of coure, it could go the other way if income increases but then you have the additional income source to offset the family portion of the costs. This response may be old news at this time as most students have had to already accept or reject their FA packages. I hope the decision you made or will make works out for you.</p>
<p>It is worth a try to call them and get them to give you a little more aid, but I’m telling you now, 10k more won’t happen. They do have a lot of people on the waitlist ready to pay full tag out of pocket, so unless you have rhodes or fulbright potential, it’s unlikely they will give you more than an additional 1-2k in aid. You got 32k in merit scholarships and grants- you’re already ahead of 99% of villanova students.</p>