<p>Has anyone had any luck appealing scholarships? If so, how're you doing it? I've called a few places that hadn't used my newest grades to compute my scholarship award and I keep getting the "we're all out of money! :o" speal, even though with my new stats I should be getting a bigger scholarship. Is there a good way to word it? Also, a couple of other schools have given me about 80 percent of their tuition; how do I use this as a bargaining chip without sounding conceited?</p>
<p>sorry, I don't have experience with this, but I have been told many times that money is more available earlier in the process...</p>
<p>I've also read and been told that you can certainly use your other packages as leverage, as long as they are from similar or higher prestige schools. Just be diplomatic yet straightforward.."I have really always wanted to attend your school but finances are an issue and I received x dollars at school Y..can you do something similar for me?"</p>
<p>you can still try and say that other schools ranked similarly gave me x dollars. I like your school the most and its my #1 so i would really enjoy going here. describe any discrepencies between aid your requesting and your fafsa. but as the above poster said, you shouldve done this bout 3-4 wks ago</p>
<p>at the same time, if u say that they're number 1... i think they'd figure that you'd end up going eithe rway.... be smart... tell them that if your aid matches the aid of college X, then it would tilt your preference or whatever</p>
<p>Wellesley increased my grants from $3,000 to $16,000 after I appealed... but Dartmouth gave me over $25,000, so in the end it really didn't make any difference. :D</p>
<p>^Actually, it seems as if they really didn't, considering that Bryn Mawr gave me $21,000 and Dartmouth and Macalester both gave me over $25,000 (and I didn't even need to appeal for them to offer me that much). :rolleyes: I think they must have misunderstood my family's (admittedly complicated) financial situation, because we can't even afford the considerably lower EFC at Dartmouth-- even with a $25,000+ grant, I'll graduate over $50,000 in debt.</p>
<p>While I agree that early in the process there is alway smore money available. But how about these last few weeks when kids are sending in their cards or calling the schools and telling them that they plan to attend or not attend? Won't more money open up as kids tell the school they are NOT attending?
JW</p>
<p>My son's EFC (CSS profile - IM methodology) was estimated on the College Board site to be around $22K. With this knowledge in hand, I allowed him to apply to some fairly expensive private schools. Subsequently, he was accepted at a well-known and respected private university where total costs are around $45K or so and statistics posted on many sites suggest grant aid is very generous. Yet, we are appealing the offered financial aid package because he was only offered around 7K grant (gift) aid, the rest in loans. This comes no where near the grant aid normally offered by this college based on published statistics of past years. When I called the financial aid office, they said they had his EFC figured out around $32K or so (I don't remember the exact number) and suggested sending a letter of appeal. I have a second son who commutes full-time to a community college. Having a second child in college was entered on the CSS profile and into the calculations for the EFC estimate I computed. Does anyone have any idea why the financial aid office came out with an EFC so much higher than all the CSS profile calculators I found on line? I did not make any mistakes in entering data. It is directly from the data I sent on the CSS profile.</p>
<p>I am a transfer applicant to several schools and I am under the impression that most schools don't give much cash to transfers. However, I have been fortunate enough to receive the Eliot scholarship from WUSTL (19k) but my dream school is still Wesleyan. Is it still possible (and practical) to negotiate financial aid for transfers...keeping in mind I haven't received a decision from Wes yet, but preparing for what may be an acceptance with considerably less money. I like WUSTL a lot, but I know my parents will basically force me to attend there over Wesleyan now if I don't get a comparable grant/scholarship package and I'm kinda happy and nervous at the same time.</p>
<p>The thing I really don't understand is how all of the schools comes to such wild swings in their calculations. I understand that each school has a different financial makeup itself, but you'd think that with similar schools (similar endowments, size, etc.) that there would be consistency. That is not at all the case. I wish the system were a bit more transparent.</p>
<p>rich -- when colleges that use an institutional method look at a family where two will be in college, they don't split the total family EFC 50/50. They expect the family to pay 60% of the total EFC. I also know that some (not all) colleges also take into account the school that the sibling is attending -- and with community college costs very low, they may have expected more since the assumption will be that your other some is not recieving aid and the cost to you is still much less than his EFC, since the cost of attendance is so much less.</p>
<p>Also -- they will load the package with loans for most people. If they calculated your EFC at $32,000 (my guess is that it is higher because the sibling is at a CC, among other factors) and the cost of the school is cost of the school is $45,000 then your need was $13,000. With grants of $7,000, I am guessing loans/work study/student contribution from summer earnings was about $6,000 -- which sounds about right.</p>
<p>Try and see if you can find out the reasons the EFC was higher than expected (and don't mention your other child goes to a CC if you did not already disclose that info)</p>
<p>hsmomstef,
Thanks for trying to help out. Unfortuanately, the CSS profile requires the name of the CC school the other son is attending and, so, the 45K school already has this info. I suspect that everything you say is true. It's sad that if one child wants to save his money and attend CC first, then the other one essentially has to suffer accordingly. Worse of all, I found nothing anywhere suggesting that the IM EFC would depend on WHICH school the other child attended, or exactly how much it costs. If I had, I would have been very cautious in allowing my son to apply to these expensive schools. In other words, if the EFC estimate calculators on the College Board site mentioned that how much the other kid's college cost could have a LARGE effect on the EFC, I would have made much different choices. I have a decent relationship with my kids such that I tell them directly what is and what isn't affordable. I am of the belief that there are many great schools --- what's most important is the match between the kid and the school, not whether one is ranked 10th or 15th. It really s----ks that a kid can get into a great school, not very far from home, one that is reasonably tough to get into, with a campus and student population, majors, extracurriculars, etc... and cousings attending, that matches up very nicely but have no chance of attending because of finances and to have all the major "helping kids get into college sites" on line giving very erroneous estimates of EFC.</p>
<p>rich -- I know exactly what you are saying. My oldest will not apply for school for two more years and I am amazed at the amount of information that I have learned from reading this forum the past two years. </p>
<p>Your situation came up last year and I remember that the parent finally determined that the cost of the older siblings school (which was a very inexpensive state school) effected the EFC of the younger sibling. </p>
<p>I would still appeal -- especially if a few thousand would make a difference.</p>
<p>how exactly would you go about making an appeal (successfully) and how long would the process take? i feel like simply emailing or calling the financial aid office won't do any good..</p>