<p>I am very confused about whether we should submit the CSS or FAFSA if we are not expecting any need based aid (really, we have a high income and they will laugh). However, due to some difficulties in 2007-2010 we weren't able to save much. So we can pay for this first one, but with another child starting college in 2 years, merit scholarships would be VERY welcome, and we would also like to have our child take out some small unsubsidized loans. I know we have to do FAFSA for the loans. But some FA offices are saying we should submit all the forms even for merit.</p>
<p>I am afraid if they see our income they will not consider our child for merit either, so am nervous about sending in anything at all. Many schools say all applicants are considered for merit, but then I called and they said I should submit everything even though I insisted we would not qualify for need based aid. </p>
<p>Is there anyone with a higher income out there who has encountered this decision? Did you need to submit all the forms to be considered for merit aid? Or do you think you may have lost out on merit because you DID file the forms and they punished you for it?</p>
<p>Some of the schools are LACs with good merit aid so I don't want to jinx it.</p>
<p>Those forms are for need based aid. If the merit awards are merit only, the folks awarding them won’t even look at your financial aid applications.</p>
<p>I would say…complete the forms. Some schools will not allow you to APPLY FOR institutional need based aid in subsequent years if you don’t apply as an incoming freshman. </p>
<p>Also, by submitting the FAFSA, your child would be able to take out a Direct Loan in her name…if you wanted her to do so.</p>
<p>I suggest completing the forms. University of Rochester had an interesting summary on their website about people who apply for aid, and the financial outcome, even for people who qualify for merit only. We knew we would not qualify for any need based aid, but we filled out the FAFSA anyway. But once we decided on his school, we were told we did not need to complete additional forms, even though we got reminder e-mails to do so. Just for your reference, I appealed for more merit money, and part of my appeal was that I wanted to ensure he could continue there once we have 3 in school at once. I don’t know if that was the deciding factor, but the school did give him more.</p>
<p>You are probably talking about tens of thousand of dollars in merit aid. Just fill out the forms. At my daughters college we were told that if we didn’t apply the first year then she wouldn’t get aid in any subsequent years. Of our three kids we got a work study offer for one child one year, but all (B students) have gotten substantial merit aid. Absolutely worth it!</p>
<p>We filled in both for D1. She received merit scholarships from 4 colleges and I think 2 required FAFSA to be submitted. We are way above thresholds for any financial aid. Trust me, it is worth the hassle!</p>
<p>Sorry you have the nerves about this- we’ve all been through that. Bottom line, if a school asks for both forms, better to submit both than lose out for not following instructions. Awards, like admissions, can be competitive and you want to avoid mis-steps or anything that might cause the school to consider your merit “paperwork” incomplete.</p>
<p>This is such an ongoing discussion on cc. We did not fill out forms since I knew we would not qualify and my son was offered about the same amount of merit aid at every private school he applied. </p>
<p>Some schools push to fill out the forms regardless. Many parents have stories about how they got better money because they filled it out even though they did not qualify for need aid but I don’t know how true that really is. The whole process is so non standard. </p>
<p>One school told us that without CSS he would not be considered for other merit aid offers. I called CSS. They said any school that requires CSS for merit aid means the merit aid is connected to need regardless of what they say.</p>
<p>They can call it anything they like as far as I’m concerned, just so we don’t pay sticker price. At my oldest son’s school they offered him a few thousand off upon acceptance. After filling out the FAFSA we got the final financial award and it was several thousand more. Presidential Scholarship, Merit Achievement, Old Dead Alumni award - whatever they call it means a discounted price. If they are asking for those forms to be completed for merit aid, why not fill them out?</p>
<p>I think we discussed this in another thread. I know people who have filled in the forms and got ZERO money additionally. It depends on the school.</p>
<p>One school my daughter applied to required CSS to be considered for merit scholarships, so we had to complete it. In the end, that particular school ceased awarding almost all of their non-need-based scholarships so we really didn’t have to fill it out at all. Wish they’d told us that! We found the changes on the website after she applied. She wasn’t eligible for the few they were still awarding.</p>
<p>We did not fill out FAFSA at all, and she was awarded merit scholarships at two of the three schools that offered scholarships for which she was eligible.</p>
<p>The “if you don’t fill out FAFSA freshman year you can’t ask for need-based aid in subsequent years if your situation changes” thing is something I have heard here before, and I think it is true at some schools, but I decided not to worry about it. I didn’t want to give my financial information to anyone who didn’t need to have it.</p>
<p>I understand your confusion and this is something that I am still trying to figure out. I think it also depends where your child is applying and whether that school is a reach/match for them or a school that your child is above the average applicant and someone they might want to recruit with merit aid.</p>
<p>I think the bigger decision comes in whether to check the box, “will apply for financial aid” on the common app. If your child is applying to a reachy school, and especially if that school is “need aware” as opposed to “need blind” in admissions, it may help with admission if you don’t check the box. </p>
<p>I filled out all the forms, including the very nosy CSS Profile – some CSS schools wanted the entire tax return. I knew we would not qualify. For our situation – son ended up waitlisted and then accepted at reachy school – we are paying in full anyway as I expected we would all along. It was not useful for us to have filled out those forms. He was applying to almost all need-blind schools, so I like to think that the fact that he checked the “will apply for aid” box did not hurt him, but it was a close call. I was totally unaware of the need-blind vs need-aware situation.</p>
<p>Sally Rubenstone, the “Dean of CC” has a column on this and as you can see, I had follow-up questions for her:</p>
<p>FYI - Fordham requires that you fill out a FAFSA if they award you merit aid. They do make it very easy by having a service which you call for free and they fill the form out with you over the phone. This can all be done AFTER they accept you and award you merit. Although we did this for Fordham we did not indicate or send this information to any of the other schools my daughter was accepted to (and she did not choose Fordham). I have heard that it is easier to apply for need aid later on (when more of your kids are in college and the tuition load grows) if you file the FAFSA each year (even those years you know you don’t meet the requirements)</p>
<p>I should add that my daughter did receive merit scholarships at all the schools she was accepted to that award merit (and we had filled in the will not be applying for financial aid box on the common app.)</p>
<p>Please don’t make statements that " true merit scholarships don’t ask for FAFSA or CSS"</p>
<p>Yes, they do! I can recall that Washington and Lee required CSS for their Johnson scholarship. As do other schools. D1 was offered Johnson full COA for 4 years over $200k. We do not qualify for any need based aid.</p>
<p>We had to fill out the FAFSA for merit aid for my oldest. I think the schools want to be sure the student does not qualify for need-based aid before deciding on the overall package. We had to continue to update the FAFSA each year, but that may be due to the fact that he took a small loan. His merit award was a four-year award.</p>
<p>My second kid went to a state school and does not have merit money or loans. We did the FAFSA when he was applying, but not now that he is in college even though we get endless reminders to do so. </p>
<p>I would fill it out. If it is truly merit money, your income will not matter. However, many of the top schools give either no or very limited merit money these days, having moved much of that cash into need-based aid. It is not always clear on either the websites or from the info sessions that merit money is not available. It is always good to ask. We wasted time and money submitting apps to schools that did not offer merit money.</p>
<p>I, too, have noticed that some schools say everyone is considered for merit (presumably, without requiring FAFSA) and other schools say that FAFSA is required to be considered for anything, including merit.</p>
<p>I sometimes wonder if the latter schools require FAFSA because they think there might be some families eligible for need-based aid that don’t realize it, particularly non-institutional dollars, and the school wants to pull in as many of those dollars as possible.</p>
<p>I also wonder (in a more jaded way) if they want to see your financials so that they can feel more confident in being cheap with merit money (if they conclude that you can well afford the school, and the kid wants to go there). Just the same way a car dealer would love to see your FAFSA before quoting a price.</p>
<p>GW, for example, has two types of merit scholarships. They have one type of scholarship (I believe) that can be awarded to students who have no documented need. If I’m not mistaken, it might be called the Presidential and it was recently something on the order of $15K/year. However, they ALSO have a big, big bucket of merit scholarships that can be awarded, on the basis of merit, to students who have documented need. My understanding was that if your EFC<COA by ANY AMOUNT, then your student would be eligible to get scholarships from that bucket. Since GW’s COA is uber-high, you could fall into that bucket with an EFC of 50k, and maybe even luck into a really big ($30K) merit scholarship “for students with need.”</p>
<p>I think the more typical scenario is that people apply for need-based aid and do not qualify but may be awarded the no-need merit scholarship at GW. I had a theory that not applying for need-based aid might have decreased one’s likelihood of being awarded the Presidential, because they were reserving it for [meritorious] students who had anticipated getting some need-based aid and weren’t going to get it. But, I understand there were people who got the Presidential without filling out financial aid forms, so I’m probably wrong.</p>
<p>I agree with you both. If a school thinks a student might qualify for need based merit money it is coming out of a different pot that straight merit. Why wouldn’t they want to know if they could preserve the straight merit money for those who do not qualify for need.</p>
<p>And, yes, they certainly would want to know if they could get away with not giving merit money to a family that financially could afford to pay full price.</p>
<p>Which makes me wonder if international students get merit aid? Schools are accepting more international students because they are full pay but do schools still think they need to entice them just a bit with merit money.</p>
<p>Mizzou requires fafsa each year. We don’t qualify for need bqsed aid and merit scholarships there are only available to tippy top students. Everyone else falss somewhere in between.</p>
<p>If you plan for any student loans, the fafsa is required to.</p>
<p>Fwiw, a quote from Kantrowitz, the guy behind finaid.org, who has a NYT blog:
Colleges generally do not award a student less merit aid because the students parents are wealthy. In fact, many colleges award merit aid specifically to attract wealthy students, since a full-pay student yields more revenue to the college even after subtracting the merit aid than several low-income students.</p>