<p>Most colleges claim to be "need blind," but are they, really? Or, to put it another way, what, exactly, does need blind mean? Every director of admissions and financial aid has a budget, and to meet it, they need to bring in a certain amount in tuition, so they can't afford to ignore the applicants' ability to pay. I can't help but feel that this was true when endowments were soaring, and if so it must be more true today. You may object that HYPS have generous new aid packages for acceptees from lower income families, and this indicates a desire to attract more highly talented applicants who might otherwise think they could never afford a place lke Harvard, and I woul dagree that that is true; but it doesn't follow that more scholarship kids will be accepted.</p>
<p>"Need Blind:" A Polite Fiction?</p>
<p>yes, imho</p>
<p>The desired results are strategized in many ways:</p>
<p>The</a> Atlantic Online | November 2005 | The Best Class Money Can Buy | Matthew Quirk</p>
<p>Not all colleges that are "need blind" in admissions promise to meet full need. The admissions decision could be completely need blind, but then financial aid makes offers with large gaps to keep within the financial aid budget.</p>
<p>It always seemed to me that if it were truly "blind" they would not have a check off box as to whether or not financial aid was applied for, and that there would be a "chinese wall" between the admissions and financial aid people. Alas, there is no such thing. In the end, even those schools that are generous and give out alot of money still have to face a budget reality.</p>
<p>To me it means, if we admit you, we will give you aid. In many cases that then is not all grant money, but loans and work study too. Only a few of the top schools have eliminated loans.</p>
<p>There was a whole article recently on those that are need blind, vs. need sensitive, and if I can find it, I will post the link.</p>
<p>DATA</a>; How Sensitive Are They? - The New York Times</p>
<p>This was the article, but this link does not give you the chart. If you can get access to it, as I recall, it was informative.</p>
<p>The use of admit-deny allows colleges to be honestly need blind.</p>
<p>The real question should be how do colleges that are need blind and promise to meet 100% of need do this while remaining within budget and coming up with roughly the same percent on aid year over year?</p>
<p>We noticed that among my son's cohort the kids with older siblings already in college seemed to fare rather badly. It occurred to some of us that as second or third siblings they were perhaps tagged as being likely to qualify for extra financial aid. Have absolutely no idea if this is really true but it felt this way. And it does make you wonder why they ask on the applications about siblings and if and where they are in college.</p>
<p>Could have just been the first born over achiever effect though.</p>
<p>"Not all colleges that are "need blind" in admissions promise to meet full need. The admissions decision could be completely need blind, but then financial aid makes offers with large gaps to keep within the financial aid budget."
Dadx3 has hit the nail on the head. At many colleges,there IS a huge difference between "need blind" admissions decisions, and how "need" will be actually met by the FA office. The FA office has a given budget, and those students who the admissions office has indicated they REALLY want, based on demographics, may get better offers-more grants and fewer loans- than the less "desirable" admits or those that are deemed "more likely" to enroll. It all falls under the heading of "enrollment management".
Imho, the phrase "need blind" is a fallacy at most colleges, and should be replaced with other, more honest financial terminology.</p>
<p>It is not my understanding that most colleges call themselves "need-blind". Actually, very few do. Additionally, there are very, very few that claim to "meet full need", and this is an entirely different statement from claiming to be "need-blind." Many, many families conflate the two claims, when in actuality one does not predicate the other.</p>
<p>From my observation, the few colleges who are need blind and pledge to meet full need actually are and do, but thost that claim and meet both criteria are a tiny subset of colleges .</p>
<p>True, Garland, most don't. But among the top,say, 30 or so (without getting into which they are) many do. The question is whether the ones that claim they are "need blind" really are.</p>
<p>galand is spot on. </p>
<p>Many don't understand how hard the very top schools have to work to attract low income applicants. It takes a heavy hand on the scales to recruit and enroll low-income students; without that heavy hand, the student body tilts richer and richer. In fact, if you enrolled strictly based on SAT scores and varsity lacrosse, you would have nearly all full-pay students.</p>
<p>The truly need-blind schools know how hard to press on the scale to get the socio-economic diversity they want and can afford.</p>
<p>When you go through the book of over 2000 colleges in the United States, most of those schools are need blind. They do not bother to check whether a student can afford the school or not. They just have to have certain requirements to get into the college, and there has to be places left to accept. Most of these schools do not do a whole heck of a lot in meeting any need. The financial aid office can give you PELL, Staffords and other federal and if available, state funds if you qualify. But there is no guarantee of meeting need.</p>
<p>The fact of the matter is that most of us on CC are not referring the the vast majority of colleges when they discuss "colleges in general". They mean that pool of schools with some name recognition and selectivity. They are not talking about South West Central College, or Valley Central Technical Institute. When you start focusing on the group of schools most discussed on this forum, it is a whole different story. Many of these schools are selective and do take yield very much into consideration. For the most part, with the exception of the larger schools, state schools, this group of colleges may well be need aware.</p>
<p>There are some colleges that do insist they are need blind in admissions. Doesn't mean they will continue to be. We can only look back, not forward. With the economy and investments the way they are these days, I wouldn't be a bit surprised if colleges start tightening their enrollment management. Ability to pay may become very important in many schools.</p>
<p>Some here question how a school could be need blind and yet still promise to meet 100% of need, because of the unpredictablility of the budget. I would supect that after many years of practice the schools know roughly what to expect and have flexiblity to accomodate whatever the total FA need is from year to year. Many of these schools do much more than undergraduate education as well, with grant-funded doctoral programs, law schools, med schools, and big time sports programs, which dilute the effect of the year to year variation in undergrad FA budget. Just the difference in payouts from different football bowl games is enough to cover the entire annual variation in FA needs. Who can ever predict how the football season will end when the budget is cast?</p>
<p>A recent study found that 93 percent of public institutions and 81 percent of private institutions say that they are entirely need blind.</p>
<p>aid</a> / 26 / 11 / 2008 / News / Home - Inside Higher Ed</p>
<p>But as garland and cptofhtehouse said, most of these schools "gap"; that is, they don't guarantee to meet full need. </p>
<p>Some of the schools that meet full need but are not entirely need-blind could probably do so if they chose to. It would just mean cutting some of their no-loan programs, giving less aid to international students, using less preferential packaging, or redistributing funds in some other way. I don't think that it's more noble or confers much of a competitive advantage to be need blind than to have some of those other priorities, so I tend to belive the claims of the need blind schools.</p>
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Some here question how a school could be need blind and yet still promise to meet 100% of need, because of the unpredictablility of the budget
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<p>The majority of colleges that promise to meet 100% need for all students -- and are need blind -- are elite colleges that are also extremely hard to get into. Almost all require SAT/ACT. Study after study after study will tell you that, statistically, there is a linear relation between SAT scores and family income. That is, on an individual basis, one's SAT score has nothing to do with income, but on a group statistical basis, its a good bet that the kid with a 2200 comes from a wealthier family than the kid with 1800.</p>
<p>Since financial aid and admissions are a numbers game -- it is fairly safe and predictable to assume that a given set of <i>de facto</i> income-discriminatory admissions policies will continue to produce similar results (although the current economic crisis throws a wrench into the system). SAT scores aren't the only income-discriminatory policies at work -- favorable treatment of students from private academies, emphasis on various EC's, etc. -- might also tend to sort out the haves from the have-nots. </p>
<p>By "income discriminatory" I don't mean that the colleges have adopted those policies with the purpose of excluding poor people - I just mean that the policies have a discriminatory effect which, while not necessarily intentional, will also impact reasonable expectations in terms of the financial aid budget. </p>
<p>Also, most 100% need colleges use their waitlists as a fudge factor -- they tend not to be need-blind when taking kids off the waitlist, so they can control for contingencies by tilting admissions in a given year toward the waitlist.</p>
<p>Calmom presents a good argument. It is reasonable that their selection criteria skew towards ending up with a majority of wealthy kids. Yet Mini has also posted some convincing arguments and points to a journalist writing about a Dir of Admissions at a 100% need met school asking for the "socio-ec" count. </p>
<p>I also wonder if the budget increases have been significant as schools reach out to more low income kids and as schools become need blind to internationals.</p>
<p>And what happens years like this year and next when they have many kids who have need they didn't have when accepted?</p>
<p>As to football covering the bill, few schools that meet need have revenue sports.</p>
<p>USC, Stanford, Notre Dame, Duke, UVA, UMiami and the Ivy League. Those are a "few" schools that are need-blind, 100% need, with revenue sports. The point is that their variations year to year in FA budgets are probably on par with their locker room towel budgets, so the skepticism that they are really need-blind, 100% need, based on budget considerations, is less justified.</p>
<p>The view taken in our house is school's might be need blind, they just aren't "need stupid".</p>
<p>Kat</p>