<p>I was looking at the Reed website and was shocked to see that they offer no merit aid. I get that I'm a newb, and am happy to discover this early-ish. Is this common? My assumption was that schools with gold star reps HAD to offer merit aid. I always see list on here of schools with a lot of scholarships. Is there a list of schools without?</p>
<p>No, there isn’t a list exactly . . . but I’d be cautious about any school that claims to meet 100% of each student’s financial need. You can find that list [here[/url</a>]. I know that some of these schools do offer merit awards . . . but the majority of them probably do not. You can check each school’s website to find out.</p>
<p>I’d also guess that many of [url=<a href=“http://projectonstudentdebt.org/pc_institution.php]these”>http://projectonstudentdebt.org/pc_institution.php]these</a> schools](<a href=“http://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/paying-for-college/articles/2012/02/16/colleges-that-claim-to-meet-full-financial-need]here[/url”>http://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/paying-for-college/articles/2012/02/16/colleges-that-claim-to-meet-full-financial-need) - that commit to not including loans in the financial aid packages of low income students - also don’t offer merit aid. Again, you’d need to check each school’s website to know for sure.</p>
<p>Hope that makes your research a little bit easier! :)</p>
<p>I guess I still don’t understand. In order to meet 100% of need for everyone, they exclude scholarships, just offering loan and work study pkgs? Are there honestly no scholarships at these schools? I feel like an anvil is about to fall on my head.</p>
<p>Why don’t they offer merit aid?</p>
<p>Meeting need is determined by each individual school. I attend Harvard and it is a 100% need meeting school. There are NO loans in anyone’s financial package, only grants. “Scholarship” can mean grants, not necessarily merit only. A school’s financial aid website will detail this. If not, you can always call or email.</p>
<p>Some schools don’t offer merit aid because 1 they are need based only or 2 the caliber of their students is high enough that they can’t offer merit (because everyone is high achieving, like my institution).</p>
<p>^^^ Yes, this. </p>
<p>Merit aid is used by schools to attract more competitive students. If School X wants to lure a good student away from School Y, it offers him or her a big merit scholarship to “sweeten the deal.”</p>
<p>The most competitive schools in the country - the Ivies and a few others - don’t need to do this in order to attract more competitive students. They’re already receiving more applications from competitive students than they could ever handle. They turn away competitive students in droves! So why would they need merit awards? The short answer is: they don’t.</p>
<p>So why do they offer need-based awards, then? In order to ensure a more diverse student body. They want to have kids from all sorts of backgrounds because that enhances the educational environment. Different backgrounds = different perspectives.</p>
<p>But if you’re a higher income student looking for a competitive university that offers merit awards, you have plenty of options. There are many, many more colleges that do offer merit awards than colleges that don’t.</p>
<p>If you’re looking for a school like Reed (okay, I admit, Reed is one-of-a-kind!), look at the schools listed on the [Colleges</a> That Change Lives](<a href=“http://www.ctcl.org/]Colleges”>http://www.ctcl.org/) website, or take a look at the book [Cool</a> Colleges](<a href=“http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1580088392/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_sr_1?pf_rd_p=486539851&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe-1&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=B002EBXBEU&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=1CR6JFTAE91F8MSDNBXX]Cool”>http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1580088392/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_sr_1?pf_rd_p=486539851&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe-1&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=B002EBXBEU&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=1CR6JFTAE91F8MSDNBXX) by Donald Asher. (You should be able to find it at your library.) Both of these are amazing resources for one-of-a-kind schools you might not have heard of.</p>
<p>This surprises me so much! Up til now I thought the best advice I had gotten came from a teacher who said that my daughter shouldn’t apply for local scholarships because they won’t be renewable after freshman year and that THAT is when you get the real sticker shock. Does anyone have any experience with that?</p>
<p>The teacher is right that most private scholarships are only for freshman year. That means scholarships that are from private corporations or private entities (clubs, etc). </p>
<p>Yes, many people have that sticker shock. Their child is awarded a few local private scholarships from the Rotary Club or wherever. But the family doesn’t consider that the money is only for freshman year, so they think X school is now affordable. But, then the next year they realize that they have to pay all costs. </p>
<p>*My assumption was that schools with gold star reps HAD to offer merit aid. *</p>
<p>The exact opposite is true. Since most top schools are FULL of top kids, there’s no reason to offer merit scholarships as everyone would qualify. These schools focus on “need based aid” for those who qualify. The schools determine what your “need” is…not the family. </p>
<p>Top schools give “need based grants”…sometimes called scholarships…but they really aren’t scholarships because they are based on “need” not academic performance.</p>
<p>Schools that give merit scholarships tend to be mid tier schools or below. They do so to attract more high stats students.</p>
<p>Ome…those schools that don’t offer merit aid are amongst the most competitive in the country. All of their accepted students are at the top of their game. They have chosen to make their schools accessible for ALL students who gain admission (like I said…all are top and all would be worthy of merit aid at many other places) regardless of family income.</p>
<p>I know Georgetown doesn’t give any merit</p>
<p>aid. I always see list on here of schools with a lot of scholarships. Is there a list of schools without?</p>
<p>I may be wrong, but some of the schools that don’t give merit are:</p>
<p>All the ivies
Stanford
Swat
Amherst
Williams
G’town
Boston College </p>
<p>There are other top schools that may award a tiny number of merit scholarships…too few to really expect one. Those few awards likely go to students who are highly desired because they add to the schools’ ethnic or regional diversity or the student has some amazing other hook. For instance, a school like UChicago might offer a merit scholarship to a tippy top student who is from Alaska because the school wants students from all 50 states. The school would be assuming that the student will also be accepted to an Ivy, and therefore wants to snag him via a merit award.</p>
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<p>Okay, hang on a sec . . . I missed this when I read post #3 earlier. Maybe there’s a misunderstanding about the meaning of the word “scholarship.” So, here are some definitions of pertinent terms, as they are used in this forum (and on most, if not all college websites):</p>
<p>Scholarship = an award based either purely on merit (GPA, SAT/ACT test scores, class rank,and/or any other criteria the college finds relevant) or on a combination of merit and financial need.</p>
<p>Institutional Grant = an award funded by the school that is always based at least partly on a student’s financial need. The school may or may not also consider the merit factors listed above in determining a student’s eligibility for an institutional grant.</p>
<p>State or Federal Grant = a grant funded by the state or federal government based solely on a student’s financial need.</p>
<p>Subsidized Federal Student Loan = a government loan based solely on a student’s financial need.</p>
<p>Unsubsidized Federal Student Loan = a government loan independent of financial need.</p>
<p>Work Study = a student work opportunity on the college campus that is funded by the federal government and made available solely on the basis of a student’s financial need.</p>
<p>Parent Plus Loan = a loan to the student’s parents the availability of which is dependent solely on a limited review of the parents’ credit history, and is independent of financial need. (So, you can consider it an additional resource in all the scenarios listed below.)</p>
<p>How does this play out for the student?</p>
<p>A very, very high income student will likely be eligible for merit scholarships and unsubsidized loans only, at those schools that offer them, because the student’s finances will render him or her ineligible for need-based aid.</p>
<p>A middle to high income student may additionally be eligible for an institutional grant, depending on the individual school’s criteria for awarding such grants.</p>
<p>A lower income student may additionally be eligible for a federal grant, a state grant (where available), a subsidized loan, and/or work study (to the extent it is available at any particular school).</p>
<p>Eligibility for all of the above (except, in most cases, merit scholarships) is based at least in part on the FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid). Some schools also require the CSS (College Scholarship Service) Profile to determine a student’s eligibility for institutional grants.</p>
<p>So, depending on your family income and assets, your student might be eligible for institutional grants, even if you are higher income, but this would vary (sometimes dramatically) from one school to another. Your student might also be eligible for merit scholarships, depending on her GPA, SAT/ACT test scores, etc. To estimate your student’s eligibility for institutional (and other) aid, run the Net Price Calculator on the school website. Accuracy varies depending on (1) the school’s interest in producing an accurate result (the more questions you’re asked, the more reliable the result) and (2) the complexity of your family finances. (Business ownership can often be a wild card that will skew the results.)</p>
<p>As you’ve already been told, the most valuable scholarships (with a very few exceptions) are those offered by the college itself, because they are most often awarded for the entire four years of the student’s undergraduate education (so long as the student meets certain GPA and/or other requirements while enrolled).</p>
<p>Some universities offer automatic scholarships based solely on a student’s GPA & SAT/ACT score. If the student with qualifying scores applies by the stated deadline, he or she will automatically qualify for that scholarship. These are listed here:</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/848226-important-links-automatic-guaranteed-merit-scholarships.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/848226-important-links-automatic-guaranteed-merit-scholarships.html</a>
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/1348012-automatic-full-tuition-full-ride-scholarships.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/financial-aid-scholarships/1348012-automatic-full-tuition-full-ride-scholarships.html</a></p>
<p>At other schools, the scholarship awards are competitive. (They may or may not require separate applications.) Some schools offer both automatic and competitive awards.</p>
<p>P.S. And if you already knew all of this, and I simply misunderstood your post above, I apologize!</p>
<p>While there are schools that claim to offer no merit aid, at least some of them will sweeten the pot for competitive reasons once a student has competing offers in hand. Yield is very important to these schools - since yield affects prestige, and what they really are selling is prestige. A student I know from a moderately high income family was admitted to a HYPSM school with very little aid. He was also admitted to another top-20 school with a full tuition scholarship. The HYPSM substantially sweetened their offer.</p>
<p>Annasdad, that student must have had some demonstrated need or the HYPSM school would not have sweetened the pot. If the student HAD need, then increasing their need based award would have been possible. </p>
<p>These schools DO do preferential need based packaging for preferred students. For example, some schools do package Direct loans in the financial aid award. BUT for a highly desired student, they might reduce the loans and increase the grant awards.</p>
<p>First of all, giving a list these days is very risky since these things change from year to year, and I know of some schools that did not give merit aid to now start doing son. You have to check every single school and find out what their policies are in merit aid. I just read that Holy Cross (on their website, no less) stating they do not give merit aid, and it wasn’t that long ago they were giving out classics, sciences and math scholarships open to non need students on a very limited basis.</p>
<p>Secondly, nearly ALL schools do give merit aid. Yes, even Harvard does. But what you are asking about, I am sure, is about that category of schools that only give merit aid when the student also qualifies for financial aid. Schools like Harvard that have been around for a while, have many endowed scholarships left to them that are to be distributed to students. You can get the Phineaus Q Thistlebottom Scholarship that pays so much a year at a school that gives no merit aid. What some schools have done, is move all of those scholarships so that ONLY those who qualify for aid can get them. THis leads to some interesting situations where $1 of need can put you in the pot for much more in merit money. That may explain why some schools like Harvard give financial aid to students who would not qualify for need in nearly any other school, under any formula. Not saying Harvard does the $1 rule, or any school does, for that matter, but up the amount and, yes, it is done. </p>
<p>Without any doubt, if you qualify for need, how desireable you are to admissions makes a huge difference at many schools as to what kind of aid package you get. If you are a hot prospect, you can get all grants in your package and may be one of those gettting all of your need met at schools that don’t tend to meet full need for the vast majority of their students. That is called preferential packaging which Thumper has brought up.</p>
<p>I mentioned this in BS/MD thread so I will mention it here. There is nothing stopping one from asking for money from Harvard or whoever else when they don’t like the package they receive. I did hear that a HYPS school gave about 1/5 of the cost after awarding 0 upfront when the parent went back and asked for a reevaluation.</p>
<p>Hmmm. I think this thread got a lot more complicated than it needed to. The simple answer to OP’s question is: Yes, there are many schools that do not give awards based on merit ALONE because they are so appealing that they get plenty of meritorious applicants without having to offer them money.</p>
<p>The student’s need was met in the HYPSM school’s original award offer - it’s one of the schools that promises to meet 100% through grants. They came up with substantially more to prevent their prestige from being undermined by a student choosing a lower ranked school.</p>
<p>Although all the meets-full-need have their own formulas, at least some of them say they will match offers from other peer institutions. </p>
<p>At Cornell’s financial aid information session, they stated that some students get preferential treatment, that is, a better package than their standard methodology predicts. They wouldn’t say who those students were, but clearly they use this to attract students they really want. They don’t tell students if they are in that category or not, but they promise that if you are freshman year, you will continue to be for all four years. I think there’s definitely some “give” even among the need-only schools.</p>
<p>Omedog…think others have given good explanations. Bottom line…don’t wait until last minute to research schools. It drives me crazy when kids who are seniors are still asking for ideas. Ideally start junior year (if not before) and make list of dream schools, state schools and everything in between and get on their websites and look at not only money stuff, but test requirements, etc. Run the Net Price Calculators and be sure you have a realistic list with some reaches, some matches and some safeties…academically and financially.</p>