<p>I've already applied for admission in the coming fall, and luckily was accepted to several schools I would be happy to attend. One question that came to mind during the process, and that I'm still curious about, is this: Is "need-blind" admission a true policy, particularly at the most selective schools? Because if so, couldn't a school arbitrarily select a class whose majority was eligible for financial aid, a burden that the college probably wouldn't be able/willing to handle? In addition, I saw it mentioned in another thread that not asking for financial aid is a good "tip" for getting accepted Early Decision (as I suspected, although no one other than an admissions officer could confirm that), so wouldn't that contradict the stated admissions policy of "need-blind" colleges?
Thanks in advance for your comments.</p>
<p>In general, the only colleges that claim to be need-blind are extremely selective colleges that also require students to have exceptionally high test scores as well as strong academics (lots of APs) & excellent grades in high school.</p>
<p>Basically that weeds out most kids from lower socio-economic strata right there. There is a pretty direct statistical correlation between income level and SAT scores -- so the higher you set the bar, the less likely it is that you will get many low income applicants. Colleges also use demographic information for marketing -- mailing to certain zip codes, not others.</p>
<p>That's why a college like Harvard can announce it will give full rides to everyone with family incomes under $60K -- it's extremely difficult for kids coming from ordinary middle class families to develop the profiles of academics & EC's that will get them into Harvard.</p>
<p>Need blind also doesn't mean they're going to give away everything. They could have $10 M for example to give away and give it away equitably among the accepted applicants.</p>