I agree no need to limit to the 6 schools that are need blind in admissions for internationals…there are thousands of international students who have need, sometimes significant levels, studying at the 100 or so meet full need colleges in the US.
Or perhaps a lower bar in cases in which the alternative college has a substantially higher overall acceptance rate (as with Vassar in comparison to Amherst).
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Exactly. Or a school like meets full need Grinnell which takes a large proportion of international students (about 20% per class).
This is just bad information. There’s no way a family with a EFC of $15,000 would be required to take out loans at the following institutions, including their EFC thresholds
in parentheses:
Amherst
Bowdoin
Brown
Claremont McKenna College
Colby College
College of the Ozarks
Columbia University
College of the Holy Cross
Connecticut College ($50,000)
Cornell University ($60,000)
Dartmouth College ($100,000)
Davidson
Duke University ($60,000)
Franklin and Marshall College
Emory University ($50,000)
Olin College
Grinnell College
Harvard University
Haverford College
Johns Hopkins University
Kenyon College
Lafayette College ($50,000)
Lehigh University
Massachusetts Institute of Technology ($75,000)
Northwestern University (must be a Pell Grant recipient)
Oberlin College
University of Pennsylvania
Pomona College
Princeton University
Rice University ($80,000)
Stanford University
Swarthmore College
Tufts University
University of Chicago
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
University of Virginia
Vassar College ($60,000)
Washington and Lee University
Washington University in St. Louis ($60,000)
Wellesley College ($60,000)
Wesleyan University ($60,000)
Williams College ($75,000)
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@compmom what loans? International students are NOT eligible for Direct or Parent Plus Loans. AFAIK Dartmouth does not fund loans itself.
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I have no idea what you just said.
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I read the article and, with all due respect, I’m frankly puzzled why you are deliberately misleading the OP into thinking that there are only five U.S. colleges that will meet 100% need in awarding financial aid to an international student? The article you cite is a puff piece in Forbes written by a grad student, so I’m not holding it to a very high standard.
International students are not eligible for federal loans, so if these schools are putting loans in the packages, they must be loans from the school itself or some other private source. The school may say the student is responsible for $x of the COA but I don’t see how a lot of loans are being included in the packages.
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you’re right, the open curricula of the colleges you mentioned do appeal to me.
hamilton isn’t need blind for intl. students, although they do claim to meet 100% of financial need.
Grinnell College practices need-blind admission for applicants who are U.S. citizens or eligible noncitizens, admitting academically qualified students regardless of financial need. We meet 100% of the demonstrated institutional need of admitted students.
i’m not sure what this means. in my preliminary college searches, Grinnell didn’t appear on the list of colleges that are need blind for intl. and meet full need, so i’ll have to do more research.
smith has been something on my radar for a while, but i’ll look more into it. all these colleges are notoriously difficult to get into, so i think they’d only qualify as reaches/hard targets for me. there’s no harm in trying, though.
i would like to continue with my swimming, but i’m not very optimistic in that regard since there’s a lot of disparity between swim times in the US vs. India. i’m not sure whether my current times would get me anywhere in the US, honestly.
thank you for your help.
From Grinell’s website:
Financial Aid Policy for International Students
Need-Aware Review Policy
Like the majority of highly selective, private liberal arts colleges in the United States, Grinnell employs a need-aware admission policy for international students. This means that your demonstrated financial need is considered along with the academic and extra-curricular components of your application during the admission evaluation. In other words, the competition for financial aid is more competitive as the applicant’s demonstrated financial need increases. Students who demonstrate academic excellence and who maintain active co-curricular involvement are especially attractive to our admissions committee, regardless of financial need. The need-aware model allows us to best distribute our resources to enroll a high-achieving, multi-talented, and geographically diverse class.
i’ll avoid retaking the SATs then- i’d hate to spend time and money just to resit it and god forbid, get the same score. plus i’ve heard that colleges take into account whether you’ve taken the SAT multiple times when deciding on admissions?
it seems that all these schools are extremely competitive in terms of admissions, though. i specifically had vassar on my list because i heard it had an extremely strong gender studies program.
scholarships are an option, but i’m wondering what the right time to apply would be?
loans in my country don’t have the same reputation as loans in the US do, but i’m not sure why it would be wiser to not take loans if i’m going into liberal arts.
thank you for your response.
Smith is not need-blind, but meets full need if you are admitted.
Here is a list of need-blind colleges, which may not be up to date. They may or may not meet full need, and may or may not have loans in the package. Many have merit scholarships.
Colleges Meeting Your Financial Need (■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■)
To be clear: I have never said don’t apply to these schools. Need aware schools are very competitive for international students and may have limited resources for financial aid to international student, but if you get in, many will meet full need.
i see, thank you. i’d love if my swimming did enhance my chances of admission and this seems like a good plan - i just hope my timings match up. and of course, i do want to continue swimming in college but i wanted to know if i can participate in competitions in my home country, where i have better chances, while studying in a college abroad?
all these links are extremely useful, thank you again for the help.
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i see.
even for the colleges that do meet “100% of full demonstrated financial need” when admitted, without loans, i’m unsure of what the financial reads would be.
my family would qualify as upper middle class here in India, but the conversion rates don’t quite carry over to the US. i think the yearly income would come to about $35-40K but i’d have to check. however, we have a lot of loans to pay back, etc. frankly, i don’t want to take a loan for my education but even the amount i’ve stated as the maximum would be very tight for us, and i don’t want to be that sort of burden either.
i’ve tried taking the “average cost after financial aid” listed as a sort of bar for colleges i’m looking at, but even that’s far too high.
i just realised that it’s probably stupid to reply individually to each post.
@Mwfan1921 yes, the budget isn’t just for tuition: which is why i stated that it was highly unrealistic.
i’ve heard that UK is ridiculously expensive, is that true?
admissions in India are through highly competitive entrance exams and not portfolio analyses because of the sheer amount of people that apply. i’m planning on sitting for the national law one and the DLU one and also the entrance for the IITM humanities course. they’re not as competitive as the ones for the engineering courses, but the applicants still number in hundred thousands.
if i do get admitted it’d be very affordable. but they’re not a safety by any means.
i think these recruiting standards aren’t in metres, though, if they’re American standards. it’s a little hard to compare since i’ve never swum yards. i assume that there’s some sort of comparative method which i’d have to look into.
@DadOfJerseyGirl
honestly, i think the greater exposure would be neat. i also prefer the flexibility of courses abroad, i prefer admission methods which look at portfolios rather than those which look at entrance exam results. but i think the largest reason would be: i envy the progressive atmosphere which i’d find abroad. my country has good education (for UG and postgrad, not really for HS and middle school) but it, and more specifically my state is very socially constrained: especially in regards to my sexuality, and tangentially the majors i’d like to take. i’m not going to deny that associated prestige does appeal to me a little.
i am aiming for a few schools in country but i don’t know if they’d qualify as safeties, as i said.
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there’s a lot of discussion about which colleges are need-blind and which offer loans. i think i’d probably have to look particularly into the policies of the schools i apply to and also some external scholarships. what would be a good number of scholarships to apply to?
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You can use IPEDS for a better estimate based on your family’s income bracket, e.g., College Navigator - Grinnell College.
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Why not start by converting meters into yards, and then performing a linear extrapolation?
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Eligible non-citizens are usually green card holders.