Colleges that use CSS Profile each have their own way of calculating a family’s contribution and will only use FAFSA to make sure they get the monies do them from the Federal Government. Profile generally results in a higher expected contribution than FAFSA EFC.
I agree…so many people, congress persons included, don’t appreciate how much greater college costs have risen as compared to average family incomes.
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@anaray I’m not 100% sure but my friend who works for a smaller college and private one says that they look at CSS and Net Price Calculator and FAFSA and the NPC never matches with what EFC since different colleges use different criteria for their formula. She said in the past when they get calls, they do consider the situation, especially when they want the students.
I work on a non-profit and we raise $ to give to underserved students. We double check with the school financial officer as a final cross check to make sure we didn’t miss any of the students who are in high need and a few times, what is documented on the standard filing is different from what the FA would tell us as high need since she has a better context of the students’ situation beyond the forms. This is for existing students, though.
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oh ok. At least that way we are still protected. In that case I will apply to all the schools that uses CSS and leave other schools alone!
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You should run each school’s Net Price Calculator to see if the estimated cost will be affordable. Is your FAFSA EFC affordable? Note that CSS schools are generally very selective.
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As of now it is slightly more than affordable. We think around $20000 we can manage. But EFC is $34000. But another think that confuses me is this- Georgetown has given us $51000 and the contribution from parents is 34000. When I read in the website it says the tuition is $54000, boarding and room is 16000 and the books and fees are like $3000, total of $73000. The difference between the the aid they gave and this is like $22000. Then how did they come up with 34000?
Also, will the aid go to tuition directly and we pay for the room and board?
So even if the FAFSA changes, we may get better aid for two kids correct?
I’m not sure I follow you. Is the EFC from GTown or fafsa?
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Can you post a pic of the COA less FA detail? Of course with name and other identifying info redacted.
ETA: the cost info on the website is for this year, not 2021/22, so that could be part of the difference. This says tuition will be $59,784 next year. Board Of Directors Approves Record Increase To Financial Aid At Winter Meeting | Georgetown, DC Patch
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We have two offers from css schools, both are below our FAFSA EFC, but one is above the NPC results I had.
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But that’s part of the rationale for making a change. When college was largely cashflowed out of current income, it made sense for the contribution to be set based on what you could (in theory) pay out of income each year. Now college is so expensive that it needs to be funded by saving and/or borrowing in the 18 years before they go to college and the decade after they graduate, it’s harder to justify giving a windfall to parents of twins, compared to kids who are separated in age.
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Then again, given that people may have been planning / saving for literally decades, it’s kind of lousy to tell them a year or two before their kids start school, “Hey, guess what? You actually needed to save way more than you thought, because we’ve just changed the formula.”
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I’m a parent of twins and I don’t know anyone who said “great I have twins, I don’t need to save as much for college”. At most they had a happy surprise in their junior year of high school when they realized what the current formula meant.
Like most people we saved the same amount per kid. And that meant our twins could have considered attending a meets need school whereas our other kid (5 years younger) won’t.
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Sorry for the delayed reply, but that comment really sticks with me. So true!
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Our kids are spaced 4 years apart, so we would’ve never benefited from having 2 in college. However, I feel horrible that FAFSA is going to make it less affordable for many people to send multiple kids to college. I hope this drives down college costs, since parents simply won’t be able/willing to continue paying obscene college prices.
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EFC looks like FAFSA EFC for me.
Do they show the detail of the $82,080 COA anywhere? It seems if tuition is ~$60K, and room and board ~$16K, they are including $6K of other expenses…which may or may not be what you have to spend (e.g., book or travel estimates might be higher than what you would need to pay, or perhaps they are including health insurance that you wouldn’t need).
Your student will also be able to take $2K unsubsidized loan, which would about cover their responsibility of $2.2K. Of course, a summer job could make sense too.
What is the max the parents can contribute? I think you said around $20K above?
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This makes complete sense now. I was looking at 54000 as a fees from last year. I didn’t realize that they changed.
I think we can contribute 20000. And more than that we have to take loans. Is parent plus loan high interest rate loan?