<p>If a school costs $55,000 and the EFC is $30,000 and if student gets a $40,000 outside scholarship over 4 years (ie, 10K per year), where does the $10K per year get applied?</p>
<p>Is it the case that the EFC remains at 30K and the 10K is considered assets and therefore gets applied to the college scholarship. Or the 10K gets applied to the EFC and the family is now responsible for 20?. I have been told that it is the second scenario that would occur which then begs the question whether these outside scholarships are helpful for anyone getting need-based help as it makes no difference with regards to the EFC.
Thanks</p>
<p>In most cases your scholarships will not reduce your EFC. If you are getting need based aid, and you get a merit scholarship…the merit scholarship will reduce your need…and therefore will reduce your need based aid.</p>
<p>However, some schools allow “stacking” of financial aid including both merit and need based awards…up TO the cost of attendance. You need to check the policies of the schools.</p>
<p>If a school costs $55,000 and the EFC is $30,000 and if student gets a $40,000 outside scholarship over 4 years (ie, 10K per year), where does the $10K per year get applied?</p>
<p>Typically it works like this…</p>
<p>$55k COA</p>
<p>$30k EFC</p>
<p>$25k “determined need”</p>
<p>$10k per year scholarship usually gets applied to the $25k in need. How the school covers the remaining $15k in need is anyone’s guess. If it’s a school that doesn’t meet need, the all you may get is a $5500 loan and get a $9500 gap.</p>
<p>I’ve read that some schools will eliminate or reduce the loan and work-study portion of their financial aid if the student brings in an outside scholarship. Then, they could be meeting all of your need with grants.</p>
<p>Is there a list of schools that “stack” their aid?</p>
<p>I’ve read that some schools will eliminate or reduce the loan and work-study portion of their financial aid if the student brings in an outside scholarship. Then, they could be meeting all of your need with grants.</p>
<p>Yes…that can be true…however, many schools that give good scholarships also gap…so you can’t assume that you’ll have your need met with grants.</p>
<p>thumper and 4tran4::::
you both used the term “stacking”. what does that refer to??</p>
<p>also, reading these posts, it seems that a 40K scholarship ( ie, 10K per year) would not be at all helpful if EFC is more than 10K per year. So it sounds like it would not make sense to go for merit scholarships of that amount…save it for people with full EFC?</p>