<p>"In a radical change to its financial aid program, Stanford University will announce today that it will no longer charge tuition to students whose families earn less than $100,000 a year.</p>
<p>In addition, the university will waive room and board fees for students whose families earn less than $60,000 a year."</p>
<p>"The university said it would continue to take into account a family's assets and overall situation, in addition to earnings, in determining the financial aid it could receive. "</p>
<p>Thanks for those additional links, iandoh. They're extremely helpful. For students, I see the assessment rate for assets has dropped from 25% down to 5%. That's a big change which now puts Stanford in line with Princeton regarding student assets. I'm not sure how other schools students commonly apply to compare. And no more student loans. </p>
<p>So far as parents go, the explanation of what would be considered "typical assets" for families earning under $100,000 is the only such explanation I've seen. Three cheers for the transparency.</p>
<p>The base amounts are not on par with Harvard now. Harvard increased aid for people from families earning $100k-180k and Yale $100k-200k, in addition to improving aid for sub<$100k. As an admitted student, this doesn't impress me much.</p>
<p>As a student going to Stanford, it doesn't impress me much. They are offering free TUITION from 60,000-100,000, without even covering the cost of room and board (although I would hope they still kick some in). An enormous chunk of the additional money spent on financial aid is going to cover the cost of the rising tuition price next year, which is about $2500.</p>
<p>Are you guys kidding? Why should someone, whose parents make $90,000, expect a university to pay for thier food and housing?? I think it's great that Stanford will ask for less than the FAFSA EFC. If you want to pay less or nothing at all, I'm sure State U. still has your scholarship available. Don't forget...It's Stanford!</p>
<p>Uh, we aren't forgetting. Remember, Stanford was founded on the premise that it would be free for all admitted students. While that may not be as realistic today as it was 100 years ago, someone making 90k in an expensive place (Bay Area, NJ) after paying income and property tax may not be able to shell out the money for room and board. And remember it's not "State U.", it can be Harvard or Yale that still have "our scholarship" available. This isn't to bash Stanford, which is an excellent school (for me the best) in virtually all aspects-it's just that I believe that they could have done better.</p>
<p>Well, in defense of Stanford here..
Free tuition for 60-100k is reasonable, this only leaves a 12-15k gap to fill if you don't splurge on everything. Attending a good public school out of state will cost more than this even if you have a good merit package. Berkeley = 34K out of state with room and board.
Please also remember even with increased donations this year Stanford's overall endowment is 1/2 that of Harvard's, with about the same number of students who need aid. </p>
<p>And honestly, people making 100K-200K don't really need the aid.</p>
<p>Remember, people making 100K-200K still do get financial aid, just not more than they got before. </p>
<p>And in the end, if you get offers from multiple schools, and other schools offer you a better financial aid package, you could always talk to the financial aid department at Stanford and see if they can give you a better deal. It might even work.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Attending a good public school out of state will cost more than this even if you have a good merit package. Berkeley = 34K out of state with room and board.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Actually, Berkeley costs ~43k/year for OOSers, though if you do get some financial aid, it will be lower.</p>
<p>I second marlgirl's comment -- top universities are more willing to bargain with students. I know someone who bargained with both Berkeley and Stanford, and ended up getting comparable packages at both (he/she was also admitted to Yale, where her financial aid package was better initially).</p>
<p>Does anybody know how this applies to summer session? If I'm admitted, as a transfer, it's apparently an option to start off in the summer. I'd love to take advantage of it, but I wouldn't be able to shell out for it if it were full tuition. I only ask because some schools have different policies for their summer terms.</p>
<p>I dont think this applies to summer. The summer fin aid policy sounds to me like "we expect you to work your asses off to try to pay off as much as you can for the regular quarters."</p>