Strictly anecdotal, but when my older D was accepted to MHC for Fall 2008, no merit offered (in fact, it kept her from attending – she decided on a slightly lower ranked school with about 1/3 off the cost in merit aid). Her sister (with higher stats, but D1 was also fairly strong) was accepted at MHC for Fall 2013 with a significant merit aid package. I don’t think MHC gave out much merit back in 2008.
Inparent, MHC has been at it for more than a decade. They must have been refining the strategy in 2008.
Here’s a post from the days Mini was preaching about Smith’s et al generosity vs Harvard.
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/572128/#Comment_572128
@xiggi, you had in mind the English undergraduate system? Much more inflexible system, however.
In any case, you can get something similar in the US with AP credits.
@intparent, many colleges started discounting aggressively after the Lesser Depression destroyed pocketbooks.
Thanks. But I need more help understanding discount rate. Would schools like Amherst with high sticker prices and need blind admission and no loan policies show a high discount rate?
I understand discount rate as it applies to merit, but have trouble with FA piece.
How is discount rate realavent to FA?
Do colleges publish the discount rate?
I don’t know about NYU or Brooklyn, but Yeshiva has serious financial issues: http://commercialobserver.com/2014/09/struggling-yeshiva-university-refinances-manhattan-properties-in-turnaround-effort/
“Would schools like Amherst with high sticker prices and need blind admission and no loan policies show a high discount rate?”
Yes. It’s about the net tuition they’re collecting from the (groan) customer.
Maybe. It depends on how many students who receive generous financial aid are actually admitted.
http://www.collegedata.com/cs/data/college/college_pg03_tmpl.jhtml?schoolId=18 indicates that Amherst’s list price is $64,606. 56.4% of students receive financial aid, with an average amount of $46,809.
(1 - 0.564) * $64,606 + 0.564 * ($64,606 - $46,809) = $38,205 is the average price paid. This is 59.1% of list price, so the average discount is 40.9%. Of course, individual students may be paying anywhere from almost nothing to list price.
So, if a school is need blind then a high discount rate indicates “diversity” not “desparation”?
Most colleges are need-blind, so that is a poor indicator of anything else.
Though few colleges meet full-need for everyone.
But yes, I think it’s safe to conclude that any school that truly meets full-need for all isn’t having money issues.
The list of them isn’t all that big:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Need-blind_admission#U.S._institutions_that_are_need-blind_for_U.S._applicants_and_meet_full_demonstrated_need
It looks like the three year degree program examples in that article (Lake Forest, American, Hartwick, Manchester, UMass - Amherst) all involve some combination of overloading (e.g. 18-20 credits per semester instead of 15-16), course work during summer or intersession terms, and/or entering with AP or college credit. Bates is similar in this respect.
http://www.lakeforest.edu/academics/programs/accelerated/communication.php
http://www.american.edu/sis/globalscholars/courses.cfm
http://www.hartwick.edu/academics/3-year-bachelors-degree-program/program-requirements-and-qualifications
http://fastforward.manchester.edu/courseload.htm
http://www.umass.edu/newsoffice/article/new-umass-amherst-pilot-program-offers-three-year-path-college-degree-saving-students
In other words, these are not especially unusual (other than the school formalizing such a thing), since students at many other schools can build their own three year bachelor’s degree programs in a similar manner (although it is more difficult for majors with long sequences of prerequisites that cannot be compressed).
If you have something else in mind for a three year program, would you like to describe it?
However, they can manage their financial aid budget while still being need-blind by adjusting admission criteria to target a specific number of needy versus full-pay students. How much they count things like first generation status and work experience versus extracurriculars associated with high SES, interviews, ED, and the like can be used to adjust the financial need of the admission class, even if they are need-blind for each individual applicant.
PT, it is not that hard! Forget AP for credit … As I have now written several times. Take the curriculum of AWS or the 5C and reduce the 32 credits to 30 with a 5 load. No abroad glorified tourism. No AP Credits needed. First summer for work or internship. Second one for work plus assigned thesis. Let HS be HS and college … a college.
It takes about 30 months to complete or 3 years from HS graduation.
Wow surprising that only 56% of Amherst students receive aid.
I.e. just overloading one’s schedule (5 courses instead of 4 per term, or 20 credit-hours instead of 15 per term), which can be done at lots of schools (basically any school which does not have rules against overloading), if one’s major does not have long prerequisite sequences.
Interesting discussion!
Three things:
-
it seems that both Mount Holyoke and Smith are helping out by offering places to academically qualified Sweet Briar students, despite the transfer application having closed.
-
Regarding MHC: I was reading the strategic plans and updates from the past 6-7 years and it looks like MHC took a really hard look at their financial situation (calling it unsustainable, as noted upthread) and made some changes. It seems they even explored gapping FA -they are currently meeting 100% need via institutional grants, work-study, and fed sub loans- as an option. I’m SO glad they have not done that, and remain meets-full-need…
-
Here’s an interesting response to the SBC closing by AAC&U president and MHC alumna Carol Geary Schneider defending liberal arts education:
http://www.aacu.org/leap/liberal-education-nation-blog/liberal-arts-colleges-still-setting-standard-quality-and
I’m a little concerned about people listing colleges that could close in a public forum. Sometimes it becomes a self-fullfiling prophesy - people talk about financial problems at a college, new students don’t attend, and then alums stopped donating, which makes financial problems worse.
^ Good point!
I just want to point out that Bowdoin is not in fact a “rural” school. 
I am on the board of trustees of an historic church. I’ve seen this sort of death spiral happen to other historic congregations. They start spending more and more of their endowment as income from pledges–the equivalent of tuition in that context–and rentals declines. Typically, this is accompanied by a decrease in membership. In the city of Portland, where my church is located, two formerly significant churches closed their doors in recent years. Location and mission is a problem, just as it is for a rural school with a specific mission like SBC: city churches are often landlocked, with no ability to provide convenient parking, yet not enough people inclined toward their denomination in the immediate neighborhood to fill the congregation.
Of the two churches that closed, one joined a sufficiently like-minded church of another denomination. Their buildings are, I believe, being redeveloped for other uses. The other closed entirely, and their building has similarly been redeveloped: their parking lot is the site of a stylish condo building with parking, their sanctuary is now a restaurant, and their rather extensive office space is now offices. (If only WE could have laid hands on those offices and that parking lot!)
It really is similar to the situation of small colleges: can you continue to offer something that a sufficient number of people will find compelling enough to “pay” for.
Our current spend plan is 4.5%, BTW, based on preceding quarters, while one of the articles linked above says that colleges typically spend 5%, and SBC was spending 9%.