<p>Does the Ivy league offer scholarships for athletes? How is their merit aid on general?</p>
<p>The Ivy league has NO merit based scholarships of any kind. They are need-based.</p>
<p>As for athletes, it is a little bit more iffy. Officially, there are no athletic scholarships, but most people and rumors say that athletes “qualify” for more aid, so in essence they do get scholarships</p>
<p>No athletic scholarships and no merit aid. They do meet 100% of financial need, however.</p>
<p>I’ve heard rumors of “grants” being given to some top level athletes, but you really need to be amazing to get that. Don’t know if it’s true or not.</p>
<p>A truly top academic and athletic candidate who receives attention from coaches at more than one of the ivies, may find that he/she does indeed have a certain amount of financial “wiggle room”. There was a thread to that effect in the Financial Aid Forum earlier this year. However, this is only possible if the student does indeed have Ivy-level academic qualifications, offer a unique strength to the athletic programs (think Olympic class potential here), and if the student/parents/HS coach/etc. are willing to work long and hard at negotiating for a better offer.</p>
<p>Tommy has it right. Yes they do give scholarships, they just don’t call them that. One of our best friends is going through it right now with what is undoubtably a second tier sport. Their child was actively recruited by the coach at an Ivy and one other top 5 school. They have an EFC of 60k but the Ivy ‘found’ 11k per year to entice her to go there. The other top 5 school which also doesn’t give athletic scholarships keeps asking how much the Ivy gave them so that they can come up with a number.</p>
<p>^This is called ‘preferred packaging’ and pertains to ANY applicant a college really wants to attend.</p>
<p>“However, this is only possible if the student does indeed have Ivy-level academic qualifications, offer a unique strength to the athletic programs (think Olympic class potential here)”</p>
<p>Part of that is certainly true in our friend’s case, but not all of it. They are not Olympic class and actually are a bit below par compared to their typical athlete, but they have higher stats than the rest of the team and this Ivy has a rule that the avg of the athletes stats have to be within a certain percentage of the class average. So despite a slightly lower athletic ability they really want her and are going to find some decent money.</p>
<p>^^^ Agreed with TV4caster. Ivies want excellent athletes, but also good students. I know a kid who was the national champion (and had won several international competitions) at a sport near and dear to the hearts of Ivy League schools. He was rejected from all the Ivies because his grades were too low (about a B average.) His sister was also highly ranked in the same sport, but nowhere near no. 1. But - a straight A student with very good SATs. She went (and played for) Princeton. </p>
<p>Speaking of Princeton, a niece of mine was a recruited athlete. Near straight-A student. Princeton interviewed her, watched her play… and told her to retake the SATs, raising her score by a specific number of points. Only then was she admitted, but because they wanted her, family was able to ‘negotiate’ somewhat on the amount of aid she was given.</p>
<p>my friend last year got recruited from harvard, princeton, and yale. they all offered him full ride scholarships. he was a swimmer and water polo player. broke state record for swim and won water polo state championships three times. they even flew him out to the schools to recruit him. his unweighted gpa was about a 3.8 and he was taking hard classes. super involved in school. i guess if your like that then they’ll offer you athletic scholarships.</p>
<p>While I don’t doubt that your friend received grants/scholarships for tuition, R&B, the terminology you are using is not accurate. As I stated earlier, need-only schools will give preferred packaging FA to desired students, but these are not technically athletic scholarships. And the term ‘full ride scholarship’ implies a merit scholarship, which these are not.</p>