My family income is below the poverty line what fin. aid package would NYU offer?

Paying for College
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<p>My family income is around 16,000 because my dad recently lost his job, 5 people live in my house excluding my sister who attends Cornell University. I have a 3.6 gpa and a 30 for ACT score, also I'm Student Body Vice President and President of the Ambassadors Club and apart of a lot of other extracurricular & ive performed hours of community service. I've also taken honors classes my whole highschool life and will be taking 3 APs while my school only offers 5. </p>

<p>How do you feel I stack up, I want to apply to NYU CAS Early Decision but my family can't afford NYUs tuition at all if i get in what do you think my financial aid package will be?</p>

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<p>Hi queenisme</p>

<p>Well getting into NYU CAS shouldn’t be too difficult for you, I am worried that they will not be able to cover all your aid required because NYU wants kids that can pay. However, with a strong enough application, I don’t foresee you having a problem getting atleast a 75%-full of you tuition covered.</p>

<p>Why don’t you try some big need-blind schools?</p>

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<p>THANKS ALOT AudreyH!!</p>

<p>I was born and raised in the Bronx, Ny and NYU has been a dream school for me, but my guidance counselor knows my situation and suggest the same thing. I’m afraid to go to a school less prestigous then NYU that will give way more aid and arent sure how I stack up with the big need-blind schools</p>

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<p>NYU does not promise to meet students’ financial need, and probably has the worst financial aid of any top 25 private school. I personally know several students with far less need than you have who were unable to go to NYU because of the large gap (more than $20,000) between their financial need and what NYU offered.</p>

<p>I also have seen students posting on CC about not being able to go to NYU due to a lack of financial aid.</p>

<p>I strongly recommend that you not set yourself up for disappointment by applying to NYU. In addition, I strongly suggest that you not apply anywhere ED unless you choose to apply to one of the rare colleges that is known for offering excellent financial aid with no large loans to students with very low income. I know that Harvard is one such school, but it doesn’t have ED or EA.</p>

<p>In general, it would be wisest for you to make sure that you apply to some colleges that guarantee to meet full financial need and to also apply to some colleges offering generous merit-aid offering colleges where your stats would put you at the top of their pool. Such colleges may include public universities in your state as well as some tier 2 and below colleges .</p>

<p>The colleges that meet full financial need with low or no loans for very low income people are the most difficult colleges in the country to gain entrance to – olaces like Harvard, Yale, Bowdoin, so don’t count on admission to those colleges. They are reach schools for everyone, and admission is getting more difficult every year. Certainly apply to some such schools, but make sure you also apply to other colleges that are more likely to accept you and that are likely to be affordable for you.</p>

<p>There is no compelling reason to fear going to a school less prestigious than NYU. What you achieve in undergraduate in terms of your grades, internships, skills, as well as your MCAT, GRE, LSAT scores is a big determinant of the quality of graduate/professional school that you will be able to attend. Your graduate/professional school is more important than your undergraduate school in terms of your career.</p>

<p>In terms of the opportunities that you get from your undergraduate college and professors, it can be more advantages to be one of the top students at a second tier college (and second tier colleges – places like Fordham, Syracuse, many of the SUNYs are very well regarded. They still are good colleges) than to be in the middle of the heap or lower at a very top college.</p>

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<p>Audrey in post number 2 is dead wrong as to amount of aid to expect. NYU does NOT meet full need, and it does NOT meet 75% of tuition for students. Audrey is apparently reading stats as to averages as if they applied to every case. </p>

<p>NYU LEVERAGES its aid, heavily. It will give generous financial aid, perhaps full rides, to the very top 5% of the students it admits. It will give grants of about $10-$15K to a significant percentage of its students, regardless of how much more than that they may need. They do not look at need in determining the AMOUNT of aid overall for most students-- among students who qualify for need-based aid, they rank them and then offer a grant in a set amount based on the admissions ranking. </p>

<p>PLEASE - do NOT rely on that post – do NOT apply ED. If you want to apply RD and see what you get - I don’t think you will get that much with a 3.6 GPA. </p>

<p>You can get a free ride at via the Macauley CUNY honors program, if you get in – please look at that as a potential financial safety.</p>

<p>You are also kidding yourself about perceived “prestige” of NYU. You can get better financial aid at many colleges that have equal or higher prestige. With your 30 ACT you may get good financial aid from Fordham, for example. You can probably get into many LAC’s, such as Smith, that would offer 100% need based aid.</p>

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<p>Apply to NYU if that is your dream, but DO NOT apply ED!!!
There are lots of great schools out there, apply to a variety of the ones likely to give you great aid and pick the best fit when the offers come in. Taking on a lot of debt (over $25K) for undergrad us a very bad idea.</p>

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<p>NYU might meet your need…some of it…and it might not. It does not have the same generous need based aid meeting full need as Cornell. NYU does not guarantee to meet full need. BUT for highly sought after students, reportedly the financial aid can be good.</p>

<p>I would suggest you also find some schools with similar traits to NYU where the finances won’t be a huge issue if you are accepted. Apply to NYU but do not apply ED. In the end, NYU might come through for you. BUT you need to have some options.</p>

<p>Keep in mind that even IF your tuition costs are covered, the cost of living in NYC is expensive…unless you plan to live at home with your family you need to factor this into your equation as well.</p>

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<p>I would NOT count on NYU to give you the funds you need. **NYU is awful with aid. If you read past threads you’ll see kids similar to you with aid packages with SUPER HUGE gaps with no means to pay. ** Your stats are nice, but not high enough for NYU to single you out for their rare generous offers.</p>

<p>NYU is not like Cornell that gives big grants and such to low income students. </p>

<p>Absolutely do NOT apply to NYU as an ED student. </p>

<p>Apply to NYU as regular admission, but do not get your hopes up about attending there because it’s very unlikely that it will be affordable to you. **It’s not unusual for NYU’s aid packages to have a $25k+ gap in them which low income families cannot pay for. </p>

<p>I don’t understand why NYU does that - especially to low income students since that means such students have to come up with $100k+ over 4 years…crazy!!!**</p>

<p>Instead, do yourself a favor and look for schools that will give you generous aid and/or merit scholarships for your stats. Please get over your insistence at going to a “prestigious” school. I know that your sister is at Cornell, so maybe you feel the pressure to go to a similar school, but you don’t want to get yourself in a situation where you have a pile of acceptances next spring, but no affordable schools. </p>

<p>What is your intended major?</p>

<p>Also, take the ACT and SAT again. You might increase your scores.</p>

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<p>My son was accepted there for graduate school for the fall. He had an income of under $20,000 per year. They offered him $9,000 in grants per year. For that, and other reasons, he decided not to go.</p>

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<p>Your aid is likely to be so bad, I wouldn’t bother with the application fee.</p>

<p>Another poster on these threads had an EFC of 0 and was expected to take out 30k+ in loans per year.</p>

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<p>Just an FYI…graduate school financial aid is not predicated on need. The FAFSA EFC and your income do not typically factor into the awarding of graduate school funding. It is usually based on merit and comes in the form of grants, assistantships, fellowships, scholarships, work study (at some schools), loans,</p>

<p>However, I do agree…$9000 in funding for NYU for grad school is not enough to make it affordable for most students without taking HUGE loans.</p>

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<p>NYU is the school I have seen the most posts about bad aid and people not being able to attend. There are occasional exceptions but they are the exception. If you want to apply then I would suggest you apply regular admission and also apply to other schools that promise to meet need and to some financial safeties. Do not even think of applying ED to NYU.</p>

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<p>There’s this odd and somewhat disturbing perception, at least by students posting on this forum, that NYU is the best or even the only college in or near New York City. If this is representative of one of the reasons why people apply to NYU, then it’s quite possible that the school doesn’t feel the need to offer better aid since many admitted students seem bend over backward (and screw themselves up) trying to afford it regardless of how bad the package actually is.</p>

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<p>I know…NYU has this mystique that may or may not be deserved. However, it doesn’t deserve to be the dream school of any student who has big need. That’s just setting a student up for huge disappointment.</p>

<p>If we knew the OP’s intended major, we could suggest other schools that would likely work for her</p>

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<p>Basically, as a 0 EFC students you’re “entitled” to a $5550 Pell grant, a $5500 Stafford loan, and about $5K in TAP. You would probably receive a bit more through Perkins loans, FSEOG, and other programs but it would likely only be a few thousand. Then you would be at the mercy of NYU’s FA…which has not worked out well in the past for other low income students. Unlike Cornell, NYU tuition is $40K/year, with no chance at a reduction for being instate. You have a chance for better aid if you apply and are accepted as a HEOP student…but I have no idea how many slots they have or what their cutoffs are. You might give the HEOP office at NYU a call/email and find out what their requirements are…your stats may be a bit too high to qualify.</p>

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<p>THANKS for all the feedback!</p>

<p>I wanted to major in international studies at CAS or media, culture & communication at Steinhardt. Although NYU is my dream school i was also considering UConn, Penn State-University Park, Syracuse & Suny Binghamton do you think i would have better luck with there financial aid?</p>

<p>My sister attends Cornell and pays little to nothing, but I’m pretty sure Cornell is out of my reach.</p>

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<p>“Unlike Cornell, NYU tuition is $40K/year, with no chance at a reduction for being instate.”</p>

<p>Not so. If you live in NYS, try applying for admission to NYU under the Higher Education Opportunity Program (HEOP). I know the H/EOP students at Cornell pretty much get a full ride; I don’t see why NYU would be vastly different. Of course, the program is largely-income based, but from your story I don’t see why you wouldn’t qualify.</p>

<p>Also, if you are a minority student, you may want to consider applying for the Gates Millennium Scholarship. This scholarship program is funded by Bill Gates and his wife, and pays the difference between the cost of attendance and how much the college actually gives you.</p>

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<p>You must be a resident of New York State for this program as mrsopresident stated. I’ve met some HEOP students and they do not get a free ride. They are still expected to take out the maximum staffords and perkins. They are not usually given room and board, unless they live outside of the borroughs and that they still have to contribute.</p>

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<p>I don’t mean to pry, but one thing that I think we forgot to mention is that a lot of financial aid is dependent on which state your parents live in. A state university like UCONN, costs about $8k per year in tuition for people who live in Connecticut, but about 3 times that amount for people from other states. Your financial aid will be more or less the same at each of these schools (discounting any state aid programs and any scholarships that colleges themselves might give you for merit), but a school that might be affordable in-state might be completely impossible out-of-state.</p>

<p>Similar issues might crop up Penn State and the New York State University system, depending on whether or not you live in the same state as them.</p>

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<p>I’m a New York state resident and actually live in NYC. Thank you (mrsopresident) for informing me about the HEOP program, I’ve actually heard of it. Also I’m of African American descent and both of my parents aren’t American, making my siblings and I the first set of Americans in my family. Many students in my school have received the Gates Millennium Scholarship and I definitely want to apply.</p>