So, I wasn’t expecting much. I’m in-state and my EFC is pretty high. But I was given (if I’m correct) $2,000 (for a grand total of $8,000). While my EFC is high, my parents aren’t actually giving me anything. What a joke. To top it all off, my friend who has lower stats than I do (significantly lower) got around $25,000 in grants. I don’t know if that’s per year but it sounds like it is. U of Tennessee gave me $20,500 a year.
I know none of this really matters but I just wanted to rant. Why does OSU’s financial aid suck? Has anyone else experienced this? I definitely won’t be attending.
One word — Diversity. Stats are almost meaningless, anymore. Because your EFC is high, they want that money. And anyone with low EFC that can check the diversity box are in.
@Yakamo No, I believe that I received $2,000 a year in scholarships. (Total = $8,000) They also offered me some money in loans but I typically don’t consider that to be “financial aid”, considering you have to pay it back. Maybe I’m misunderstanding their financial aid page but it just doesn’t seem like a good offer when their instate cost of attendance is around $30,000 a year.
Ohhhh, I got you. I don’t really count loans either. Sorry you didn’t receive a whole lot. I hope you figure something out. Good luck! And I think tuition would be more like $24,000? But that would still be $22,000 left, and I’m not sure if that is in your price range or not.
@Yakamo Yeah, I mean, it isn’t the worst thing in the world. I just felt underappreciated, if that makes sense? Like all my hard work only amounted to $8,000.
Just experienced this with my son (out of state). Wanted significantly more than EFC. They were the ONLY school asking for this. I called Ohio State and told them they were making it impossible to consider their offer seriously. They were polite, but did not have anything else to say. Disappointing.
@Cthulhu789 Did the NPC on the Ohio State website return an estimated cost of attendance that was materially different from the actual financial award? If yes that’s worth a call to the Financial Aid office. As a public institution funded in part by the taxpayers of Ohio its not surprising that their need based aid isn’t generous to students from out of state. The same would be true if an Ohio student applied to Penn State or University of Maryland. The OSU financial aid website is pretty clear that all but one of their grants require Ohio residency. I’m not trying to say I don’t understand the disappointment - I just am not sure it’s fair to hold that against OSU.
For future students reading this thread, OOS students should NOT expect any significant NEED-based aid. This is true for any student applying to any OOS public university. OSU is clear on their website about this fact. OOS students with high-stats certainly may get some MERIT-based aid. But if you are applying to OSU as an OOS student and know you have significant need-based aid please make sure you are also applying to other affordable universities.
Schools offer what they need in aid to get the classes they want. If they don’t offer a lot of aid, they are comfortable they will either get you anyway or get other kids with similar backgrounds that they want in their classes. Some schools looking to improve their rankings offer a lot more aid to out of state kids.
President Drake has stated several times that he wants to decrease merit aid and increase need based aid. Since he took over, merit aid has been ratcheted down (what was $6k/year is now $3/k I believe for instance). Ohio State has become a popular option for a lot of high stats kids from strong suburban school districts in Ohio who often do not need any aid at all. Makes giving a lot of aid (particularly to out of state kids, less important). High cost surrounding states (PA and IL) make it less important as well.
