Scholarship plus grandparents

My parents have always been very generous to my (an my sibling’s) kids, but have also always made it clear that they were not going to pay tuitions. That’s fine: everyone has their line in the sand, and I can see why that’s a hole they don’t want to go down with 5 grandchildren that they want to treat equally. However, they believe in experiences over toys, and they’ve almost always given their grandkids lessons and extracurriculars as birthday and Christas presents.

2 of my children got into private schools with a lot of financial aid. Both of these schools have additional opportunities for travel and music and certain sports that cost additional money: the kinds of experiences that my parents like to provide. My question is: are schools going to look askance if I suddenly come up with a few extra thousand dollars for extras? Will they wonder why that money isn’t being put towards tuition? I am grateful that these schools were so generous, and I’m worried that I’ll seem like I was lying or holding out. Am I overthinking this?

I can understand why you are concerned about this. I was in a similar position…my child’s godmother paid for one of those pricey “extras” while she was at BS. Since we were receiving very generous FA from the school, I personally did feel that it was important to mention the source of that 'extra" support to the FA director.

Sometimes, these extra experiences are prorated — so, say for example you are on 40% FA. Then you may only have to pay for 60% of the “list price” of the experience (lesson/trip/etc.).

@nantar it probably depends on the school. Our kids were on significant financial aid at PEA and we never discussed “extras” with anyone. We were expected to contribute as outlined above for terms abroad, school trips or music lessons. We payed for laundry service and plane tickets as need be and never felt guilty or weird about it.

If it were something really expensive, I would probably do what cameo43 did and mention it to the FA director. I think a lot of people must have extra sources of money for these activities. FWIW, I think my son’s German teacher was very surprised that we couldn’t come up with the money for the trip to Germany that everyone else in my son’s class was going on.