the benefactress aunt

Prep School Admissions Prep School Parents
1

<p>Okay, this is a mini-rant . . . just a warning.</p>

<p>The financial aid waitlist notification is two-pronged: (1) we don't have the $200,000 we'd need to fund your kid for four years, but (2) if you can come up with it yourself, we'll welcome your child with open arms!</p>

<p>Now perhaps, having been at the receiving end of that notification one time too many, I'm bitter. But, as far as I'm concerned, anyone who claims penury on Monday, but is able to come up with $200,000 on Tuesday should be barred from admission simply on the grounds of their prior deceit.</p>

<p>Look, I get it, rich Aunt Tilly's money isn't yours, so why should you declare it on your parent financial statement? Because it's there, it's available, she's offered it to you . . . and I consider it less than ethical to say, "Well, hold off a bit, Aunt Tilly. If we can get the school to pay for the kid, why should we bother you?" There are, after all, plenty of other families applying for aid who don't have a rich Aunt Tilly . . . and why should it be up to the school to try and figure out which ones are which?</p>

<p>I guess what I'd want to do is extend the financial aid statement to include disclosure of wealthy relatives. No reason you can't say that Uncle Burt is loaded . . . but is also a nasty old coot who wouldn't help his dying mother. There is, after all, the option on the application to disclose a "non-compliant" ex-spouse, so why not a non-compliant relative?</p>

<p>Yes, I realize that this is naive, impossible, and a host of other adjectives . . . but I am still less than amused that a full ten percent of FA waitlisted families somehow manage to come up with the needed funds . . . from a deep pocket that just wasn't worth mentioning before that letter arrived!</p>

2

<p>I fear that many times it is not that the parents wanted to “try to see” if the school might come up with the money. It’s that their own potential source is so unpleasant to contemplate that one would rather try to obtain aid without going to that particular relative. In the end, the parent might suck it up, and go to a relative who is potentially available out of desperation. In the end, I am certain that some parents will go to a source which might have been abusive (or worse) to them, if it means giving their child the education they feel they want.</p>

3

<p>Just appreciate whatever you got! Do not complain! Move on…</p>

4

<p>OMG - can you imagine what you’d have to do in return for Aunt Tilley’s money? Pinched cheeks, smelling 100 year old perfume, sip from ancient china tea cups while the cat curls up in your lap shedding enough hair to knit a sweater? Live with the constant “I gave you money so you owe me” muses implied in a soft but firm tone of voice?</p>

<p>Darn. For $50,000 I’d do it. I have no pride. Not with two in school and BS being more expensive than my D’s college. :)</p>

5

<p>I’m confused that schools admit students this way at all. Are they seeing something between the lines (ie a benefactress aunt)? I know many students who were admitted without FA to schools their family could not afford. It seems as if that is putting a second stress on the situation for the family. I can see the concept that it would mitigate the blow of a flat out rejection but it seems to me that would be erased by the pain of a parent having to tell their child “sorry you still can’t go.”</p>

6

<p>

</p>

<p>That’s how I feel about it, too. I think it’s cruel and puts the parents in an awful position.</p>

7

<p>These schools have limited funds. They want to admit as many good students as they can. They know that 10% (from the above posts) of people on FA WL will come up with the fund. They just want to try their luck. So do not blame them for doing that. Do your best and move on if you still can not afford it. FA is a privilege, not a right. BS is not for every family…</p>

8

<p>

</p>

<p>I don’t think that is what people are implying for this discussion. What it does is put a terrible burden on parents who are already feeling like “less than” to have to tell a student you were accepted but we can’t afford to pay for you to go. I talked to one parent whose child got a “packet” from a school that put him on financial waitlist and then, throughout the spring, kept getting enrollment forms, course listings, etc. when it was obvious the family had no outside resources to tap.</p>

<p>I tell parents a different way to look at it is that the school had too many good candidates and not enough funding for them all, but that they were really wanted and if money does free up there is still a chance. If not, at least they were ranked higher than the thousands of others who were declined that year and while cold comfort, is still a compliment.</p>

<p>BTW - looking at PFS forms should tell a school what parents are likely able to suddenly find a way to get $50,000 (home equity, stocks, retirement, loans) and which ones have no resources to tap. The former is the school “playing the odds”, the latter is salt on an open wound.</p>

9

<p>Is it possible that those 10% who found funds just got a loan? Maybe not a commercial loan, but through friends or relatives. Although, just because someone has a wealthy relative, doesn’t automatically mean they’d share a single cent. :-)</p>

10

<p>I recall that there was someone on here a year or two ago whose parents sold their home. They were explaining their situation and it made no sense to me…unless their parents were selling (and, in addition, moving to where the kid could become a day student). I couldn’t make sense of the post and the person replied that that was exactly what her parents were doing.</p>

<p>Also, most people can’t ask a relative outside the immediate family for a payout unless they need to do so. Prior to admission, it’s premature. And not knowing whether you’ll be the beneficiary of such extraordinary and unusual largesse, it would be irresponsible, as a parent, to withhold a financial aid application. What if, after disclosing the aunt’s deep pockets in the financial aid materials or not filing for financial aid on account of the wealthy aunt, the child is admitted and then the aunt decides not to help out? What if she dies before you hit her up for a commitment of funds? Well, you might have just screwed over your kid. How does the ethical calculus shake out then? I can see the aunt committing to give money only after the family has exhausted all possible avenues for other assistance, like loans and making other sacrifices – and, of course, applying for financial aid. If people had to disclose these wealthy relatives who very well may not offer the first nickel of support, it would only whittle down the pool of competing aid applicants but it would not necessarily yield a more honest analysis of ability to pay.</p>

<p>Given the very decided boost full-pay applicants have (or, conversely, the decided admission disadvantage that need-seeking applicants have), people are taking a big gamble with the admit/rejection decision if they have a firm commitment in hand from a wealthy aunt that they’re playing close to the vest in order to seek financial aid from a boarding school. There’s a good chance that they won’t get to the point where they’ll even see that financial wait-list letter. I doubt that very many people are trying to game the situation in that way, knowing – with certainty – that the money is there for the taking.</p>

11

<p>

</p>

<p>This parental predicament would be the same as an acceptance with a complete shut-out on financial aid that was requested. I can’t distinguish the parent’s position between the $0-aid admit and the financial-aid waitlist. Can you?</p>

<p>In both situations, they’re saying that your kid has what it takes and your kid has done his or her part to get in and now it’s you, the parent(s) who alone represent the obstacle for the child’s matriculation. You either earn too much or earn too little (depending on how you want to look at it) to make it happen. It becomes your fault and you shoulder 100% of the guilt. Partly for your earning capacity and partly for having led your child down this path in the first place.</p>

<p>That’s when it hits you that you’re going to leave no stone unturned.</p>

<p>You’re even going to call Aunt Dotty despite the fact that you haven’t spoken to her since she made those awful, hateful remarks to your husband that made you personally ask her to leave your wedding reception – all because this situation is something you’re going to fix if there’s any way humanly possible.</p>

<p>You have days or weeks to get this figured out. (You had months to figure it out but, like almost everyone else after March 10, you find yourself scrambling because you were too close to the situation to be able to anticipate it.) Suddenly, you’re identifying every possible source of funds – many of them absurd or unfeasible – and you’re groveling and bending over backwards for your kid because you’re the kind of parent who does that for your child. You’ll swallow your pride, you’ll eat humble pie (and rice and beans) because you want everything for your kid and you don’t want to be the roadblock. Not for this.</p>

<p>So here’s the big question – for those who can relate to this or see themselves in this uncomfortable position of being the road block: Would you rather take a chance and see what happens after going through that little-slice-of-hell or would you prefer that boarding school (or college) financial aid materials include a check box that gives you the option of saying, “Please send my child a rejection letter in the event you cannot offer financial aid in the amount of at least $________ for next year.”?</p>

<p>I’ve been through that paddy mill and I still wouldn’t check that box. Would you?</p>

12

<p>On two grounds:</p>

<p>o the feelings of the child</p>

<p>My daughter was wait listed <em>twice</em> in a row for her first choice school (I was told the second was very highly unusual indeed). I was probably more upset about this than she was at the time. But… I asked her recently if she preferred the wait list to a rejection, despite the anguish, and to my surprise, she said yes, that it had been less painful than a rejection would have been. So I’m not sure it’s even possible to know (at least for sure) as a parent if an outright rejection wold be preferred. I think as a parent I would have liked the option to be asked in advance if financial aid were the issue; but I’m not sure I’d have made the “right” decision.</p>

<p>o the situation with the Aunt and honesty.</p>

<p>There was very bad blood between my mother and her sister, for reasons I can’t go into here, to make this example more concrete. So if my own attendance at boarding school 40 years ago had been contingent on my mother having to ask her for funding (it wasn’t), I sure find it hard to believe my mother could have/would have been able to ask in advance for help (and pay the pounds of flesh for possibly no reason). On the other hand, my mother probably would have considered trying such a request once the offer had become real (and there would have been little way in advance to know whether my aunt would have helped anyway).</p>

<p>So I can’t categorically say that someone able to come up with funds later is necessarily being dishonest, knowing how “interesting” family relationships can be…</p>

13

<p>Dodgersmom, you have a good point and I’d be ****ed too. That said, I think that there is more than an “Aunt Tilly” scenario possible. Sometimes people have sources of income they’d prefer not to touch – like retirements or second homes that they’d now take on bath on – and they are given the choice, like gambling, to liquidate. When it comes down to it, I think I would liquidate (if I could) to get my kids the best education. But what if parents are close to retirement, or the second home IS the retirement? I can’t believe I’d defend the 1%, but I have learned here that things are always more complicated than we know. Yes, some people misrepresent their wealth, and I’ve seen it and resented it, but 10%? No. You know, what I always come back to is not the people here who game the system, it’s anger that I have to be a part of this system to get my kids educated.</p>

14

<p>Do not ignore another purpose of FA waitlist. You may be granted FA if funds are freed up due to declination of FA recipient. Top tier schools share the same pool of applicants. It is not uncommon that an applicant gets FA from multiple schools. So FA WL is NOT equal to acceptance with no FA. It does give you some hope. I do agree that schools should not call in advance to inform this not-very-good news.</p>

15

<p>At our school, which is a private day school, you can not receive or apply for financial aid if you have certain luxuries. For example, you are required to give up memberships in country clubs and other things like that. So maybe some of these folks got their bond back on their clubs, which would probably cover that payment. Others might use 401k.</p>

16

<p>

</p>

<p>Thus, 90% can’t come up with the needed funds. </p>

<p>As for the remaining 10%? Well, I think the generous aunt’s rather a rare creature. There may be grandparents who help. Then again, the only people who know for certain are the schools’ business offices, and they don’t talk.</p>

<p>There are quite a few people in this area who have second houses on Cape Cod. I believe many people have regarded the “house on the cape” as retirement savings, if they own them outright. Many of them inherited those houses, and the property may be shared with relatives. They may be able to use the house for a week or two in the summer, because there are so many relatives. I assume it’s difficult to sell an inherited share to those relatives, and probably very difficult to sell it to people outside the family.</p>

<p>I assume that most families who come up with the money sell property, or take on a mortgage. They may tap into retirement funds. </p>

<p>Is it fair to other families to offer FA to families who could pay, although it will be painful? No. And the schools don’t, as far as I can tell. Is it better to be accepted, but not granted FA, or to be rejected/placed on a waitlist due to FA? I don’t know.</p>

17

<p>

</p>

<p>Actually, once the financial aid is off the table, the business office only knows that the money comes in, not where it came from unless the funding source is writing checks directly to the school. For all they know, I could be moonlighting as a mafia hit man to pull together some extra scratch. If I’m not getting financial aid, I’m not filing forms and as long as the money gets there and the checks clear, that’s all they need to know in the business office. So even the school is mostly clueless as to how these 10%ers are pulling rabbits out of hats…which means it’s hard for the schools to create a better method for ferreting out these rabbits in a new and improved PFS.</p>

18

<p>

</p>

<p>They’d better be writing checks directly to the school. Otherwise, it’s a gift, subject to gift tax.

</p>

<p>[3</a> Tax-Friendly Ways to Pay Grandkids’ Tuition - SmartMoney.com](<a href=“Online Tax Advice - Tax Preparation Help - Income Tax Tips - MarketWatch”>Online Tax Advice - Tax Preparation Help - Income Tax Tips - MarketWatch)</p>

19

<p>…Yes, some people misrepresent their wealth, and I’ve seen it and resented it…</p>

<p>How can they hide their assets? Is SSS supposed to check and verify the financials?</p>

20

<p>A friend of mine use to be on the board of Trustees at one of the schools commonly mentioned here on CC. It certainly did not surprise him of how so many people on FA pulled the rabbit out of the hat, in fact it downright ticked him off. If he had his way, the vetting would have been a lot more thorough. He said so many would arrive in their luxury SUV’s with a year or two worth of tuition right there. It tells me that at least the board is aware of the games that are played. With tuition rising and the economy blowing smoke, I would think that maybe the schools would be more vigil but it is easier said than done</p>