Merit plus Need Based Aid?

Paying for College
1

I pulled the following information off of another website. My question is:

Do colleges (not the full need met colleges) offer both merit scholarships and need based aid to the same student in some cases?

Based on the information below, it would seem to be that some received both types of aid. Is my reading accurate based on the percentages shown?

This is for the college of Wooster, but I am also checking for the general concept of colleges offering both types of aid to the same student.

PROFILE OF 2013-14 FINANCIAL AID

Freshmen

Financial Aid Applicants
435 (77.7%) of freshmen

Found to Have Financial Need
350 (80.5%) of applicants

Received Financial Aid
350 (100.0%) of applicants with financial need

Need Fully Met
193 (55.1%) of aid recipients

Average Percent of Need Met
95%

Average Award
$36,338

Need-Based Gift
Received by 338 (96.6%) of aid recipients, average amount $27,981

Need-Based Self-Help
Received by 279 (79.7%) of aid recipients, average amount $7,100

Merit-Based Gift
Received by 57 (16.3%) of aid recipients

Merit-Based Gift
198 (35.4%) of freshmen had no financial need and received merit aid, average amount $19,388

2

In some cases, yes.

If a student is Pell qualified, and he gets a merit scholarship, then he will still get his Pell Grant, no matter what.

If the school gives institutional grant aid, and the student still has need after getting merit and fed aid, the school may award a univ grant.

merit is usually awarded first.

3

Thanks mom2collegekids- We are looking at colleges for my son in groupings for financial reasons- NMF colleges, Full Need Met colleges, competitive scholarship colleges, and others, and was wondering if it were possible to get a combo financial aid and merit to match what some of the full need met colleges offer (not HYP-the better LACs). For instance if the NPC on a college like Wooster showed an EFC of $20K, could my son possibly land a merit scholarship to bring it down to $10K or lower or would they then take the other aid away if you win merit? It sounds like you are saying they might not take the grant away, or does that vary a great deal by college?

4

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For instance if the NPC on a college like Wooster showed an EFC of $20K, could my son possibly land a merit scholarship to bring it down to $10K or lower or would they then take the other aid away if you win merit? I
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Merit is awarded FIRST…if the merit is institutional. Are you talking about outside merit?

In your scenario, you’re asking if your son will get the “need based aid” (indicated on the NPC), and then be able to apply the merit to bring down EFC.

If you’re talking about outside merit, then it depends on the school.

Schools typically view getting merit awards as “now the student has LESS need.”

Some will take away grant money (so that they can award grant money to someone else…and they expect you to pay your EFC).

Some will let you replace the loans and work study that is in the pkg with the merit.

If your goal is to reduce your EFC, then really the way to do that is to accept a large merit award that covers all of “need” and also covers some/all of EFC.

5

Yes, getting merit scholarships would not block off need based aids if there is need left. There are also merit scholarships with a need component that can be counted for both. In other words, merit scholarships will mostly replace your need based aids until there is no more need based aid then it would reduce your cost. Note that some need based aids are loan and workstudy, so there is still advantage to replace them with scholarships.