Reed Admissions Need Blind this year?

Every year, usually, wait listed kids who require a lot of aid are usually discouraged. This year, while I still cling onto some hope for getting off the wait list, I noticed that the wait list letter I received said ‘If you are accepted off the wait list and you qualify for aid, you will receive funding. Reed is committed to meeting full demonstrated need of accepted applicants,’ I was just wondering how true that might be, and how much of a chance do wailiated kids asking for aid have? Oh and esp if they are international

Reed is not need-blind, but it used to be non-need-meeting for waitlisted students. Reed is not going to be need-blind for domestic students, let alone international students, unless there is a >$200m increase in its endowment.

@QWERTY678, I think you need to read the words again. To paraphrase: “If Reed does not have Financial Aid funds available to meet your full need, you will NOT be selected from the waitlist.” Since Reed commits to meet full need of accepted students, they will scrutinize your finances prior to accepting you off the waitlist. They will not accept you unless they are sure they can commit to meet your full demonstrated need. A corollary may be that they prioritize full-pay waitlisted students over full-need students (or at least weight them).

It does seem like a discouraging statement if you require a lot of aid; and encouraging if you are full pay.

I believe Reed is need-blind until FA funds are exhausted, then full payers are accepted.

@vonlost, I must admit that I have never heard this sort of policy explained this way, and it sounds much nicer than what I have heard.

I have heard an explanation along the lines of:

Full Pay (FP) and Financial Aid (FA) students are sorted into separate piles. FA students are accepted by merit (and needed attribute- sport, skill, URM, etc.) until the allocation of FA is absorbed. FP are accepted until the number of allocated acceptances are met. Often, significantly more (by percent of applicants) FP students are able to be accepted than FA-requesting students. The pool of available FA slots is smaller than the pool of available FP slots.

Therefore, if a FA student decides to go elsewhere, a slot may open up on the waitlist for a FA student.

Both explanations end up describing the same thing. Your description is shorter and simpler. I like it!

Does an international student have a realistic chance of getting lots of aid?

Yes. Reed has 50 intls who get an average of $50k in aid. Intl aid competition is around 10%, like that of most schools that promise to meet need.