<p>Yesterday Son got a letter addressed "Dear Student" (his name wasn't even on it), offering him a $13,500 scholarship. All he has to do is apply and put down a $250 deposit. If schools offer "scholarships" like this to everyone, why don't they just lower tuition by $13,500? Is that to keep the "riff raff" from applying? I don't get it.</p>
<p>Why don’t you tell us more about your family and your son, to give us some clues as to why they would send you such a letter? </p>
<p>For example, has your son expressed an interest somehow in Christian or evangelical colleges? Did he score highly on the SAT? Do something else that would bring him fame (or at least attention?)</p>
<p>What do you and he think about the opportunity? (Under GWB, it might have been a good career choice! Under BO, maybe not so much?) </p>
<p>It is difficult to give you a sane answer in such an information vacuum.</p>
<p>I’m pretty sure that he made their “list” due to PSAT or SAT scores (normal very good; not “CC very good.”). No expressed interest in schools like Liberty. They have no idea what his GPA is (and believe me, it’s lower than you’d guess from his SATs.) Buit this wasn’t a “pending receipt of your transcripts” letter. It was a “Dear Student” letter that said he would get this scholarship if he applied. Why not just lower tuition?</p>
<p>Is it possible Liberty buys lists of names? Our daughter (and almost everyone in our area) got a “scholarship” letter from Liberty 2 years ago, though the amounts varied. We assumed the college was just trying to drum up interest in the school.</p>
<p>I assume they buy a list of names, too. But if they’ve got so much money to throw around, why don’t they just lower tuition for everyone?</p>
<p>Marketing.</p>
<p>Nationwide, colleges and universities deliberately seek the maximum price that they can convince the wealthiest parents to pay. Then they discount right and left with various kinds of aid in an effort to squeeze the maximum amount out of each individual student/family. (Kind of the way the airlines sell seats, just without the really good snacks in first class.) If College A can get your family to shell out 25k by offering 15k in “aid”, and can get another family to shell out 30k by offering 10k in “aid”, they are 5k ahead of finding that one uber-rich family that will shell out 50k with no questions asked. They are also 5k ahead of where they’d be if they set their price at 25k per student and didn’t offer any aid. Not to mention of course that there are lots of kids who get to say “College A costs 40k a year, but I have a big scholarship.” and impress everyone who thinks that College A must be a terrific school because it costs so much.</p>
<p>I expect that there is at least one college/university out there where not one single student actually pays the “sticker” price.</p>
<p>This happened with Olin when my son was applying – assumed they go through the SAT lists for particular interests like other schools.</p>
<p>I think it is a little sleazy to offer him the money only if he pays the deposite now. Or am I misunderstanding this? Maybe they are banking, literally, on the hope that kids will pay the deposite then change their minds</p>
<p>We got one of these from a local university. Our son had taken a class there in the past. I think they offer a substantial discount to everyone that lives in-state. We get random and crazy postal spam all the time. It’s like the banner ads that you see at websites. Sometimes you wonder why they send you the ads.</p>
<p>My son received the same letter from Liberty. My son has never expressed an interest in attending Liberty and would not do so for $13500 so he just tossed the letter. It’s not that we wouldnt appreciate a scholarship like that or find it useful it’s just that there has never been any interst in this school. We could only rationalize that they bought SAT scores or perhaps got his name from boys state since it was at Liberty</p>
<p>I guess they have statistics regarding how many students actually take them up on the scholarship…if everyone accepted, I assume it would break the bank. But I can’t help feeling sad for some low income fundamentalist Christian students who really really want to go to Liberty but whose names are not on the purchased list. I hope that type of student gets money, too.</p>
<p>missypie - goggle “tuition discounting strategies” or just “tuition discounting.” there’s some interesting articles out there on the practice.</p>
<p>one article i read mentions that universities used tuition discounting practices while increasing net revenue… and meeting enrollment goals. </p>
<p>you might read up on their enrollment goals…maybe your son falls in that category.</p>
<p>A few comments:</p>
<p>If this was based on SAT scores, it is a bit different than “pure” tuition discounting, because some institutions want to “upgrade” their reported stats by getting more high SAT score kids to attend. </p>
<p>So that is why they don’t just cut tuition for everyone.</p>
<p>Regarding post #7, this situation has nothing in common with Olin, since Olin was endowed upon founding to give free tuition to all attendees (like Cooper Union in NYC, BTW).</p>
<p>Yeah, I guess if their goal is to have more students with SAT scores over X, it wouldnt’ matter if a student had a low GPA.</p>
<p>missypie, </p>
<p>Correct. Far more people pay attention to average SAT score, and SAT score buckets, than to average GPA of an entering class. In fact, the latter is often not even reported. </p>
<p>I believe, but I could be wrong, that SAT score counts more heavily in the rankings of USNWR and others than GPA or class rank. Anyone care to confirm or refute?</p>
<p>Ah, if only Son could find a school he wants to attend that will pay him for his high SAT and ignore his (relatively low) GPA!</p>
<p>Liberty sent my daughter stuff long after she’d made her college decision. And yes, you will get some unsolicited scholarship offers. Usually to colleges your kid wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot pole.</p>
<p>I wonder if Jerry F would approve of this approach if he were still around?</p>
<p>Sure he would. He was all about growing the school in both size and quality. He wanted to create something akin to a Notre Dame and BYU for conservative Christians. Those were his models.</p>
<p>^ They’ve got a ways to go… :)</p>