<p>Once again, I seek the wisdom of the sages on CC.</p>
<p>Suppose you have a few offers in hand and your first choice school doesn't have the best finaid package relative to others, how do you bargain with the school to improve its package?</p>
<p>I have heard a few cases of successful "negotiation", which is a mysterious process to me.</p>
<p>Kalman Chany of “Paying for College Without Going Broke” advises against using the word “negotiate.” Asking them to take a “second look” is better phrasing. </p>
<p>Some schools state on their website they will not consider what you got from another school to be any kind of a determining factor in revising your FA package. </p>
<p>Do you have some quirky things going on that they have overlooked that you informed them about? Example: High out of pocket medical expenses, very high state & local taxes that a FAFSA/CSS Profile will not calculate accurately, (you may live in one state, work in another state) Or one-time income in 2009 that will not be repeated in 2010. (example withdrawal from 401k account for an emergency) These are examples of the types of factors that may result in a revision, if the FA office deems it necessary. </p>
<p>How badly do they want your child to enroll? Is he/she in the top of the applicant pool?
Or in the bottom of the applicant pool? If your child was a marginal candidate for admission & is in the bottom of the applicant pool, chances are there will not be any revision in the financial aid package. There are “Enrollment Managers” who do have a lot to do with what is offered, and they work very closely with Admissions and Financial Aid. </p>
<p>Look around on the internet to see what Enrollment Managers do, it might be rather eye opening to you! I know it was to me!</p>
<p>SLUMOM, thanks for the suggestions.</p>
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<p>How do you find the answers to these questions? Just on stats?</p>
<p>What i did with my Finaid counselors is to talk to them personally or the head of the Financial aid department about the package. Have them look over your information and be very persistent but not a pest. I got an extra 5,000 in grant</p>
<p>*Look around on the internet to see what Enrollment Managers do, it might be rather eye opening to you! I know it was to me! *</p>
<p>Once I learned about Enrollment Managers and enrollment consulting firms, my eyes opened. No school gives money out of the “generosity of their hearts”. They get something out of it, too…ranking, grabbing the best students they can, etc.</p>
<p>I think the most “eye opening” was the “admit/deny” strategy…that’s where they’ll admit a low-income kid, but then give them a crappy FA package, so they’re effectively denying him.</p>
<p>This type of negotiation only happens with schools that are comparable. Brown is not going to meet Harvard’s offer but Yale might ‘take a second look’ if they missed something Harvard didn’t. MIT could not care less what CMU or RIT offered you. Williams might meet Amherst…</p>
<p>And yes, at the non top schools where you’re talking merit money, how much they want the student will largely depend on stats.</p>
<p>PaperChaserPop, I am sure you will be able to figure out where your child falls into the applicant pool! Look at the stats of the Entering Freshmen for the previous year! Many schools report this right on their websites! </p>
<p>Remember colleges are a business! They aren’t all warm & fuzzy with those ivy-covered buildings! Can your child help boost the entering freshmen class stats for his/her class year? They may not want you to think they are a business, but they are! 
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<p>For D1, B and A met our highest offer (Princeton); and Y also went a little higher to match P. My take is that the school with the higher FA offer must be either comparable or more selective than the one you are requesting a FA review from. When you request a review, you mention that the other college found that you had more need, from my experience, the college will then request that you FAX them a copy of the other FA offer.</p>