Priority Review (Early Notification)

<p>According to the U of R web site, if you have outside scholarships, they reduce Work Study and loans first but then will start to reduce other need based grants. So outside scholarships will have a limiting affect.
If your child is going to work during the school year, they should take advantage of Work Study because work study income does not count against your child when they apply for aid the next year.
The net price calculator on the U of R web site takes money away from Work Study first. They should take away from loans first because work study does not count against you the on the next year aid.</p>

<p>Work-study is federally funded program with limited funding. By reducing work-study to outside scholarship recipients, UR is able to make its limited funds go farther and to help more applicants with need. Their policy is pretty identical to that of nearly all colleges.</p>

<p>UR expects all students to take out full federal loans first before other need based aid kicks in.</p>

<p>The point is the the amount I have to pay ($27k) did not change even though the Merit Award increased.</p>

<p>Other than making my child feel good, the increase in Merit Aid does not change the amount I have to pay ($27k) whether it is loans or or part time work. The out of pocket cost to me is the same even though they increased the merit aid.</p>

<p>Other than making my child feel good, what was the point of increasing the Merit Aid.</p>

<p>They and every other college knows what I am expected to pay and they arrange the grants to make sure that is the number that I pay.</p>

<p>Am I missing something? If it doesn’t lower my cost, why bother. I really don’t care whether it is a general grant from the U of R or a Merit Award, if it doesn’t lower my cost what is the point.</p>

<p>@parent of twins- the same thing happened to me. I added my son’s merit award in but the net price is the same. From what I can see, they take the merit aid of the grants, etc. Bottom line stays the same</p>

<p>Also, the net price on Rochester’s calculator is about 10k higher than what FAFSA says my Estimated Family Contribution should be.</p>

<p>FAFSA EFC only determines a student’s eligibility for federal grants (Pell for very low income families) and loans. Private colleges are under no obligation to use it for any other purpose.</p>

<p>UR uses Profile and uses the info on that financial form to determine its own college-specific EFC.</p>

<p>What you’re seeing happening is that UR has determined your family can pay $27K based upon your Profile info. Merit aid reduces the amount of need-based your student requires. The only way to reduce your $27K EFC would be if your child won merit that would be so large that it would cover 100% of your need and then some.</p>

<p>(Also private colleges don’t split the EFC for 2 college at the same time 50-50. Private colleges usually split the EFC 60-60 between the 2 students.)</p>

<p>It does not matter how they calculate the Expected Family Contribution or how they split the cost for two children in college at the same time…If they increase your Merit Aid and you pay the same amount then the increase was useless.</p>

<p>So again, my question is why did they send out an email stating they were increasing Merit Aid when it does not change the bottom line. The only thing it did was make my child feel good until they realized it did not make the college more affordable.</p>

<p>BlueDog123 I am about 10K more also</p>

<p>Merit aid will only change the your bottom line if you have a EFC so high it approaches the COA or the amount of merit aid is so large that it fills your “need” completely.</p>

<p>Remember that merit aid and need based aid are NOT awarded by same office. Merit aid is awarded by admissions, while need-based aid is awarded by the FA office. Admissions does not know what your EFC is. If your family’s EFC had been high, additional merit aid could have changed your bottom line.</p>

<p>The benefit of increased merit aid is that it’s stable from year-to-year while need-based aid will change every year. As your student becomes eligible for higher Stafford loans amounts ($6.5K as as sophomore and $7.5K junior and senior year), he will be expected to take out the higher loan amounts. Additionally, each year the expected student contribution will rise. (This happens because it’s assumed that a college junior will likely have greater summer earnings than a college freshman.)</p>

<p>And as I said before FAFSA EFC ≠ private college EFC.</p>

<p>WayOutWestMom,
Assume a person has a cold…If they drink plenty of fluids and get plenty of rest the cold will last just 7 days</p>

<p>If they DO NOT drink plenty of fluids and get plenty of rest the cold will last a week.</p>

<p>That is how the Merit Aid is working. The increase in Merit Award for my child said “This is a reward for your hard work in high school and a statement of our trust in your continued success here on campus.” However, since the increase did not lower our cost then his hard work was for nothing.</p>

<p>Assume there are two Families with exactly the same number of children attending college, the same income, the same bank account, everything identical.</p>

<p>Assume also that they are looking only at the U of R so the method of calculating the Family Contribution is the same (private only, U of R only).</p>

<p>Assume that neither family will need a loan. No Loan necessay.</p>

<p>Assume they are expected to pay $27K.</p>

<p>Both have a child that is admitted to U of R.</p>

<p>One family receives a Merit Award of $14K but their cost is the same as the Family with no Merit Award. Both Families still pay $27K.</p>

<p>Therefore the cost is based solely on the Family assets and has nothing to do with how the child worked to earn a Merit Award. The child that worked harder to earn a Merit Award would have the same cost if he or she stayed home in their underware and played Xbox. There is no value in the Merit Award.</p>

<p>The next year the Expected Family Contribution for each family might be $20k. The family with Merit Award still gets no benefit.</p>

<p>The U of R will come up with an Expected Contribution my family can make whether they include a Merit Award or not.</p>

<p>I understand that public colleges calculate the Expected Family Contribution differently than private colleges. Public colleges could calculate it using the number of times I go to the bathroom in day for all I care. The point is receiving a Merit Award from the U of R is useless. If increasing Merit Aid doesn’t lower our overall cost it is just a marketing ploy to get my child to think Rochester cares about them.</p>

<p>It is like getting a new title at work. I am getting paid the same, have more responsability but a new impressive sounding title.</p>

<p>So don’t go to the U of R.</p>

<p>I don’t expect to get MORE overall because my kid got merit aid. I expect if I get more then the amount of FA I get, if any, will be less. Because in theory I NEED less, right?</p>

<p>As WOWM indicated before, there is a difference in that the merit aid is guaranteed and stable (as long as basic requirements met) so I’d rather have more of that than the FA money that may go down within a year.</p>

<p>And if your kid just sat around in his underwear then he wouldn’t have gotten in, period.</p>

<p>You have a good problem.</p>

<p>At the risk of being overly simplistic, you don’t sound very appreciative.</p>

<p>Nice example with the cold analogy, though.</p>

<p>That is what I am trying to figure out, what is there to be appreciative of in this increase in Merit Aid.</p>

<p>Stability is not the answer. I can show you using the net price calculator on the U of R web site.</p>

<p>If in the net price calculator you project future year raises, assume home equity goes up, drop in bank account from paying tuition you will see your cost is very stable even without any Merit Aid.</p>

<p>Cost is based on your assets. Stable Merit Aid will drop other grant Aid form U of R so it is a zero sum game whether there is Merit Aid or not.</p>

<p>What are you doing to calculate the benefit of a stable Merit Aid?</p>

<p>At the risk of being overly simplistic, it sounds like you have been sold a bill of goods on Stability of Merit Aid. How do you calculate its advantage?</p>

<p>Parent of Twins, this happens all the time with schools that meet 100% of need (or close to it). If getting any sort of federal aid, the school can’t offer you more than your EFC (or in UR’s case, as per CSS) and still have you get need-based aid. It only makes a difference when you’d be paying more - full pay or close to it - then the merit aid would lower the cost.</p>

<p>The good thing about merit aid vs financial aid is merit aid stays as long as conditions are met. If you were to win the lottery (or get a windfall from any other source), you still have the merit aid reduction. Your need-based aid would disappear.</p>

<p>Colleges can offer merit aid below someone’s EFC (full scholarships, etc), but one can’t get federal need based aid when this happens (unless they have extenuating financial circumstances that are proven). It doesn’t matter if you go to UR or State U. An EFC has to come from the parent or student - not outside sources (be certain any relatives know this so they give any $$ to the student or parent rather than straight to the college).</p>

<p>Most colleges do not offer 100% need. Those that do are tough to get into. Hence, merit aid can “do more” for these places.</p>

<p>If you’re finding State U (or elsewhere) to be the better financial option for you, you might have to make that call. Some lower level privates may also offer a UR admissions capable student more in merit aid in order to “win” their attendance.</p>

<p>In the end, we all have to decide where our offspring go to college based upon their desires and our finances.</p>

<p>^^^^The advantage to me is that I can count on that merit amount all 4 years as long as my kid doesn’t do poorly. Won’t go away when my other kid with 2 years left is finished.</p>

<p>On another topic, does anyone have a theory or opinion on UR’s relatively low 4 and 6 years grad rates (73% and 83%)?</p>

<p>I can write a check for all 4 years right now so U of R is a good financial fit.</p>

<p>I do not like the fact that they gave my child a Merit Award of no value.</p>

<p>If they included in the letter that in addition to increasing the Merit Award that they were also lowering Aid in other places for the same amount so the cost will be the same, then I would have been happy.</p>

<p>To hide the fact that there is no value to the increase is a cruel trick.</p>

<p>ParentOfTwins - It sounds like you didn’t know going in that this is the most common way that merit and need based aid work. It can be an unpleasant surprise. </p>

<p>Need based aid is just that - it’s a college’s calculation of how much help you need to attend, and it usually includes an expectation that the student will take out loans, and then many schools fall even further short in meeting need beyond loans. </p>

<p>Everybody wants merit scholarships to stack on top of need based aid, but they don’t. It can feel like it makes it meaningless - who cares what pot the money is coming from if it all adds up to the same amount? But that doesn’t make it mean or unfair or tricky. A college hands out merit aid however it wants to, and then some colleges tag some need based aid on as well. </p>

<p>I guess I was lucky to learn this hard truth before this stage of the admissions cycle, so we didn’t have any surprises. I fully expected that my kid would get rejected form some schools, and then would have others he was accepted to without enough money to attend. With my oldest, our EFC was about $6,000, and he applied to 14 schools hoping to find one with enough money to not go into debt. Out of those 14 schools, our bottom line was going to be between $12,500 and $35,800 per year! It varies widely. Some schools gave him nothing but need based, some gave him nothing but merit based. None of them stacked merit on top of need based, in other words, none of them brought it down below our EFC + loans. </p>

<p>It sounds like you really want UR to be an option for your child, and you don’t feel like the money is shaping up to make that possible. I’d advise waiting until you have all of you acceptances in and all of the financial information. Compare bottom line amounts - for me that was Cost (tuition, room & board, estimated books, fees, and travel) minus Gift Amount (merit and need, I didn’t count loans because it was still money we’d have to pay eventually). For us, that bumped 6 schools out of the running and left 8 schools worth talking about, although for us the choice was a no brainer, because UR was his favorite and gave him the most money. </p>

<p>Again - I’m really sorry if it’s disappointing to you and your child. I can relate - I was really worried that my kid would have to deal with not being able to attend the schools he was excited about because of money. But I will say again, this is the way all the schools do it, and at the end of the day, they are giving out money for free to try to entice students they want to come, and to enable students to come. </p>

<p>And I know you were just illustrating a point, but there’s a whole lot of value that comes for a kid who gets off his butt and studies and does cool things instead of sitting on the couch playing video games.</p>

<p>Back up - I just read your post. If you can write a check for all four years right now, how the heck is your kid eligible for need based aid at all? That doesn’t make any sense. And why in the world are you complaining about him/her getting a scholarship?</p>

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<p>finalchild - is that relatively low? I looked up some schools i’d list as UR’s peers and the rates were similar. These included Boston U, Carnegie Melon, Case Western, Lehigh, Brandeis, Wash U. Washington U’s was higher, but the rest were very similar.</p>

<p>^^^^I do think it is a bit low. Not bad, but not outstanding either. From my research most of the top 35-40 LACs are 85% and above for 4 years and even higher for 6 years. I think Brandeis also is higher. I’m guessing this is true among the private universities as well in the top 40, and also a few of the publics like Michigan. Won’t be a dealbreaker here, but this is the one stat in the UR profile that jumps out at me. On the other hand, the retention rate looks great.</p>

<p>PinotNoir,
Try it yourself if you do not believe me.</p>

<p>Go to the U of R Net Price Calculator, put 100k for income, $260K for savings, 1 child in public 4 year, parents married.</p>

<p>Again, the problem is notifying a minor that they got an increase in Aid when they didn’t.</p>

<p>I understand that it might get a child that doesn’t have Rochester as a first choice perhaps change their mind because Rochester feels so highly of them but it doesn’t seem ethical.</p>