<p>My son was offered a 4500 /year Perkins Loan at one school , a 1700 Perkins and another and no Perkins at a third (the school he was really interested in.) </p>
<p>he was also offered the stafford--sub and un sub. at all three schools.</p>
<p>When I called school that gave no Perkins ,they said he didnt qualify. I really dont even know what this Perkins Loan is , and why he would qualify at one school and not the other.</p>
<p>Any insights?</p>
<p>Perkins loans (and SEOG grants) have very limited funding and schools only have so many dollars in Perkins to award. Once they award it they have no more. As funding is so limited each school sets their own criteria for awarding it and their own maximum amount they will award.</p>
<p>The standard definition is:
A federal Perkins loan is a low interest (5%) loan for undergraduate and graduate students with “exceptional” financial need.</p>
<p>I found (and this is purely my experience) that my children were offered them when they were either the “poorest” at the school, or the school, as swimcatsmom said, had more funding.
We aren’t poor,but not affluent by far, but at Connecticut College, we were the bottom rung and they had the full amount to give us. At Providence,Bryn Mawr, they gave less, but we still were eligible more than others. Other schools, most schools, we weren’t.</p>
<p>My D had similar offers last year. The no Perkins school told us that they only award the loan to returning students, hence the “unqualified”.</p>
<p>SCM, I had been hearing that this year’s education bill might change Perkins to an unsub loan. I then read somewhere that it was removed prior to the vote on the health reform/education bill. Do you know if the Perkins changes are dead or just being added to some other pending legislation?</p>