My brother just got accepted to one of the 6 need blind colleges (MIT/Harvard/Princeton/Amherst College/Yale). He initially applied for no aid because on paper our parents can afford it, low six figure income, and have enough savings in cash to pay for all 4 years. However there is a problem, my parents life’s savings is located in a country where the Central Bank has a “dollar shortage”, i.e. allocation of US dollars for the purposes of paying school fees and tuition has now fallen to the lowest priority. We have friends that have been waiting one year to get an allocation to pay for their children’s UK universities, and subsequently their child had to leave because of an inability to pay. The situation has gotten worse since he first applied to colleges.
My question is how do I get fin aid to factor this into my request for aid? with he understanding that the cash savings my parents have is near worthless because it cannot be reliably used to pay for college. How do you convey that despite looking “good on paper” the reality is that paying full freight would take up 70% of their post tax salary.
You explain it to them in a way that’s logical and that they can understand. Perhaps offer some plan of action that’s legally binding to your family (like they can withhold the diploma pending clearance of funds).
Contact the school – they obviously are unafraid to accept Int’l students with complex financial situations. Good luck.
Peter- nothing a bunch of strangers can tell you on the internet is valid.
Your brother needs to call his college and have the admissions person who hears his story transfer him to the appropriate professional- either in financial aid, or in the international student’s office, or in the bursar’s department.
You didn’t really think that you were going to get an accurate answer by posting here, did you?
I have no idea if financial aid is going to have a response for you or not. But the sooner your brother reaches out to them, the quicker you guys will know if this is a viable educational alternative or not.
We contacted the school, they said he should fill out the CSS profile. However, this is whats also odd. Based on the amount displayed on CSS the school will she that the resources are there to pay school fees more that twice over for 4 years. But if all of those funds are inaccessible, i.e. it is highly unlikely the funds can be transferred out of the country (in the short term at least), what then? We are afraid they will see we see the funds, and say no aid for you, regardless of the issues going on in your country barring the transfer of money overseas.
You have to deal directly the the colleges, one at a time, and hope they will understand your special circumstances. They are under no obligation to do so. You ARE under an obligation to report all the money you have, whether you have access to it or not. The forms work for the majority of situations, but not for every situation.
This is not all that unique. Many students come to CC and state that their grandparents’ house is in the parents’ name for estate planning reasons, or that the money is in investments and not retirement accounts because that’s how it was set up 20 years ago, or that the family owns 5 houses because they live off the income from those houses. They can explain those circumstances, but the college has to decide if it is going to grant more financial aid or not. One college may, the next may not.
Your situation is a complex one…because you HAVE the money…but you don’t have access to the money…do I have that correct?
As noted, you need to deal directly with the college on this. But you need to be prepared for them to not consider this issue.
I’m going to post this…please don’t think I’m being unkind. Your parents knew one of you was going to be heading to college. This money issue…and location should,have been addressed before now. Really…this is not the college’s problem…it’s your family’s problem.