Help me guys! I knew that need-based aid would go away if he won these outside scholarships, but it appears that his chosen school is also going to take back their merit aid??!! So angry and feel tricked. Is there any help?
I realize you might not want to give details but this is a tough question in a vacuum. What school? How large was outside scholarship?
He’s headed our one of our state schools as he is in engineering. For his 34 ACT score, he gets the top merit scholarship which is only $8K per year. His schooling will cost us about 60K by the time it’s over. We did not apply for need-based aid as our EFC was too high.
Basically he won a 4 yr 24K scholarship where the state pays 1/2 and the school pays the other 1/2. Now the school is saying their portion will reduce his merit aid only. He also won about $5K in one-time gifts that we aren’t sure how those will be used either. It’s just sad because he worked so hard in these scholarships for months. He should be getting 32K from the university along with the 29K from the outside gifts. Sad.
Some merit aid has a need component. Might that be the case here? Was there any indication when the merit aid was awarded that it could be reduced by outside scholarships? Are the outside scholarships for one year? If so, will merit scholarships we reinstated for future years?
Those are some of our questions too. No indication whatsoever and there is no need component involved. Also let me add that the total cost of this school is well over 120K…the cost to us mentioned above is with those scholarships. This is for instate too.
I wonder if the school isn’t considering that an “outside” scholarship. It is awarded by the state. The school is in the state system. The school is required to use its own funds for the scholarship. They may see it as simply replacing one form of institutional merit with another.
So to make sure I understand, the school offered a merit scholarship initially then he won a second scholarship that was funded half by the state and half by the school? If this is the case, is the school saying he only gets one of the scholarships from the school funded?
Yes…he loses merit aid, not need-based, because he won a scholarship! If this is the norm, okay. I just wish I could understand it because that merit aid is dangled like a carrot.
Yes, but is the school saying he only gets one of the two school funded scholarships? If so, yes, that is not uncommon. Schools have rules on what scholarships can stack and which ones cannot. Generally, speaking, a school’s larger merit scholarships don’t stack.
An example is USC gives two half tuition scholarships, one of which is tied to National Merit Finalist. If a student won the Presidential (?) then became a NMF, they could not combine the two half scholarships for full tuition.
It also depends on how the scholarship is worded. If the school is giving a tuition waiver and the scholarship states that is for tuition, then the scholarship will just replace the the tuition waiver.
For example in TX Valedictorians are given a tuition only scholarship the go to a state school. UT Dallas offer an AES scholarship which most valedictorians would likely be awarded that covers tuition. Since both are for tuition the state scholarship would replace the school scholarship.
Some schools have such limited budgets that their rules require that outside merit will reduce institutional merit if the total exceeds some amount (in some cases, the amount of tuition). Some schools do this so that they can spread merit around to more students.
Find out what your son’s school’s rules are. Sounds like they don’t allow “total merit” to be more than a certain amount.
I’m guessing it has to do with the fact that the school has to fund 1/2 of the “outside” scholarship, which doesn’t make it “outside” as far as they’re concerned. I hate that your son had to spend so much time working on the scholarship only to find out that it doesn’t do him much good.
Okay I think I understand now. It is an issue of funding, so I have told him that we need to be happy for what we have been blessed with and not be sour grapes. Thanks so much for the insight. You all are fab!!
Have always loved your answers! Thanks so much for the time.
If this is a state university, and the “outside” scholarship comes partially from the state and partially from the university, it really is not an “outside” scholarship. Schools may have different rules about which scholarships stack versus replace other scholarships.
What is the cost of attendance at this instate public university?
It’s not too late to submit a FAFSA so that your son can take the $5500 federally funded loan.
If your in ime was too high to qualify for any need based aid…that would imply a solid income. Can you help your son with the college costs.
A lot of times the outside scholarship will replace merit scholarship money. This makes sense for school if that is institutional aid because if you have outside funding, they can use that amount for other students. In my D’s case, she had some one year outside stuff. After that, the other amount bumped back up, then back down again when she got departmental scholarship - but her overall scholarship amount stayed the same. You can’t get more than whatever the COA is for that school.