<p>Are students from private schools, day or boarding, less likely to be eligible for financial aid at the college level -- even if they got FA when they were attending private school? A woman who works in the admissions office of a selective local public high school (it has an IB program and does not take everyone) told me as much this morning. I know things keep changing but wondered if anyone has any sense of this.</p>
<p>Good luck to all. I'm a parent awaiting word on applications to four day schools for my rising Seventh Grader. The accumulative effects of all this waiting are getting to me this week!</p>
<p>I don't see any reason why that would be so. FA has to do with your income and need level.</p>
<p>I second keylyme's notion.</p>
<p>Yes that's what I thought. I'm going to research this a bit to make sure there aren't any surprises lurking out there.</p>
<p>My older son attended bs from 1999-2003 and received fa in the combination of loans & grants which covered 75% of the tuition. In college he is still receiving fa. I don't believe it affected anything. As a matter of fact, I was looking at the matriculation list for my younger son's current school. It is "message board" style, so students write about their admissions. Many of them mention receiving substantial fa with their admissions notification.</p>
<p>I will throw out 2 additional thoughts here...</p>
<p>First, consider the source. The counselor works for a competitor of boarding schools - a selective public. Unless she has experience in the university environment, I wouldn't put much credence in her opinion.</p>
<p>OTOH, I think you should post this same question in the College FA forum. I've read many a thread and it seems like I've come across a thread where someone was talking about colleges not considering private school tuition for a younger sibling in their calculation of FA (perhaps they consider that an optional expense?). I cannot find it right now. It may very well be a onsie twosie kind of experience. It might be something to consider if your older child needs significant FA and your younger child is in private K12 education.</p>
<p>In our case, my son will be attending local public university, living at home with some state-sponsored merit FA. However, the SSS EFC went down considerably, when his tuition showed up this year, so the Boarding school FA analysis does recognize the situation. But our grant did not change, not that I expected it to, though.</p>
<p>Thanks, goaliedad. I did consider the source. She may have said "some financial aid," which changes things a bit. Though I understood her to be speaking broadly. And I made clear I had only one child (to her four), so it wasn't like I'd ever have one in college and one in private school. </p>
<p>I will post this in the College FA forum as well.</p>
<p>One more thought... Even if this were to be true and you could afford to either send your child to a great private high school or a great university, I'd rather have my child well prepared for a mediocre college than mediocre preparation for a great college.</p>
<p>The only FA that might be effected is certain merit scholarships -- there are a handful of scholarships out there that require a student to graduate from a public high school. There are probably a few others that "prefer" a standard public school student (due to the perception that all BS students are wealthy).</p>
<p>Other than that, your circumstances prior to the year you apply for FA have no bearing on your FA award. If you take out loans to pay for BS, they will not be taken into account when calculating your EFC (some private colleges might).</p>
<p>Another thing to consider -- when your child applies to college, you fill out the FAFSA and Profile for the calendar year prior to the year your child will attend college. for instance, kids applying to college for 2008-2009 will fill out the forms for the 2007 year. If you paid $20,000 for BS tuition in 2007 that will show as available income -- and private schools will probably expect a similiar contribution for college (probably more).</p>