So my son is eligible for Tuition Exchange (a benefit of about 35k in scholarship for children of faculty members in participating colleges). We applied for TE at 3 schools that participate. For all the schools, his stats are well above the average range. So far my son got into 2 out of 3 (we are waiting for 1) but without the exchange. The disturbing thing is that when I have followed up with schools, it appears that now they offer very few of these exchange scholarships. While getting the TE money was always somewhat competitive, it used to be that high standardized scores and grades, well above the average for the school, was enough to get offers. Now it seems that a student has to be at a level that would get them merit funds almost anywhere, rendering the TE benefit rather worthless. For example, at U PItt, they said to get TE one must have a 33 or over ACT and all A’s on one’s transcript (my son has a 33 ACT and an A- unweighted GPA). However, if you look at U Pitt’s merit policies, most students with that academic profile would have a decent shot at merit money (including a full tuition scholarship) even without TE. Furthermore, such students have a decent shot at more merit at other, non-TE participating schools.
I was wondering if there are any other TE parents out there? If so, are you finding that TE this year is kind of like a shill (i.e. it doesn’t really exist, and just serves as a another name for merit funds that would have been given anyway?)
Depends on the school. My wife is employed by a university that gives 50% tuition scholarship for any accredited college, regardless of grades. I know another friend of mine who is employed at Duke, and they offer 75% tuition scholarship
And it depends on how many outside students apply to your home school. It’s an exchange, and while it is not a 1 for ` swap of students, those schools that are more popular as an intake schools do get more of their students place at other schools.
My kids received TE at almost every school where they applied. The important fact to remember is that every school sets their own rules. If you look at the TE web site, they list the typical % of applicants that receive awards. We made sure the kids had several schools on their list where 90-100% received awards. They also applied to some schools where the % was lower, but they were well within merit range (and in almost every case, TE was higher than the merit award, and always was higher than any non-competitive merit award). Looking at Pitt’s stats, fewer than 10% of applicants receive TE - which does make it more difficult than some merit-only awards.
The schools mentioned by @sgopal2 (definitely Duke, and sounds like the one the wife is at) are NOT part of TE. Schools like Duke or Vanderbilt set their own policies and award money to any school rather than participating in the exchange.
Did your home university provide any statistics on past performance of TE applicants? Ours did, and also a list of schools that were being sanctioned by TE - we found that very helpful. And did you use the % awarded statistics in refining your list? There are well-known schools on TE that offer as few as 5 awards per year - there are other schools that may not be as well-known but offer full tuition to every applicant. A balanced list is key to success with TE.
I’ve been very happy with TE. Our home university is a great school, but the kids wanted to spread their wings - and TE increased the number of significant scholarship opportunities available to them.
@InigoMontoya: No our home school does not list any stats or really do anything to help other than fill out the appropriate paperwork. It is a smallish school and few faculty use the TE benefit. But some years ago people who applied for TE were much much more likely to get it than now. That is sort of the point of my thread.
Curious Inigo – did your kids apply this year? I get the sense this year things may have changed. A few years ago lots of parents were talking about TE on CC – this year not so many.
BTW, the stats on the TE website regarding admissions are incorrect. For example, American is listed as offering the scholarship to 10-40% of applicants, but this year they offered to less than 5% (my information comes directly from the relevant officer at AU).
Our home school was not an option for my younger son – it is a professional science school and my son has no interest in going into science. He would literally have no relevant major.
Both my daughters have benefited from TE and my younger daughter is a freshman so I can’t believe it’s changed so much in one year. However I learned a lot between D14 and D16 and the younger one had many more TE offers than her older sister (plus she was a stronger student which helped). Like was mentioned above- some schools give fewer TE than others and we had poor luck with state schools like PITT for example.
One important bit of advice I can give you is to let the schools where your son got in but didn’t get TE know that you’d like to be considered for it if one becomes available. Not only did my daughter get offered TE at the last minute from the school she is now attending, but at the last minute got both an offer off the wait list AND an offer of TE at another top school! So definitely let those school your son is interested in know how important TE is to him.
With two kids in college TE has been a godsend for us…
@sgopal2: Wow that is an amazing benefit at Duke. I wish my spouse worked there… Around here, even deep pocket schools offer less – for example, Penn offers 40% of Penn’s current tuition fees, which actually adds up to less than the 35k for TE.
@psycholing Chatter about TE on CC is very sporadic. I don’t think you can judge how well the program is doing using that as a basis. If you are looking at a set of students who applied to all schools as competitive as Pitt, then yes, it’s likely many of them got shut out. There can be all kinds of reasons, including the relationship between your home university and the school your student is applying to. We expect it hurt our D’s chances at one school after we found out another student at her high school with a parent at the same U had applied to the same university and her class rank was just a bit higher - she got TE, D didn’t. A school that offers very few TE scholarships is unlikely to offer two to students with almost identical demographics.
There are good solid schools on TE who offer money to almost every student that applies. There are some that allow stacking of TE and merit up to full tuition. That’s why building a diverse list is so important. I agree that some of the stats on TE are not up-to-date, I always took the approach of assuming the percentage were likely lower than reported and so our chances were lower. On the other hand, we had one school offer S full tuition TE even before he was accepted!
Note there are also some schools where only a small fraction of faculty are even allowed to have their kids apply for TE, some schools that limit the benefit to one kid and such. These are often the schools that are not competitive for imports. TE schools are monitored for the balance of import and exports, and can get dropped from the program if they only export and aren’t taking in any imports. TE schools that have lots of kids trying to get in are limited in how many they can allow into the program as exports. That was a problem at our home U for a while - it’s a well respected school, so everyone was sending their kids there rather than exploring options at other schools using TE.
My kids went through the process last year and 4 years ago, so no we weren’t doing it this year. I haven’t heard any issues from others at our home U indicating they have had a significantly different experience this year, however many of the people we talk with had already spoken with us and other about experiences so they had realistic expectations when building their lists.
So is there anyone who applied to TE this year who can add information? Several people have been extrapolating from other years, but the entire point of my post was that it seems like the game may have changed THIS year. I would love to hear from parents (or students) who applied this year, where they applied, and if they got an offer. Thanks.
And by the way @InigoMontoya – I have been reading ALL the CC postings about TE for the past 4 years, interviewed previous applicants for TE at my husbands school, and met with the HR staff. I have a pretty realistic sense of the process and probabiity of awards. I am an academic myself and quite capable of doing research. I think my expectations were perfectly realistic across this whole process.
To clarify, we only applied to TE institutiions that met other requirements for my son. We were not going to apply to places he didn’t want to go to just because they had a shot at TE. After all, Pitt in-state is about the same price as GW +TE, so he would have applied to Pitt regardless of the TE possiblity. Since one of his requirement was an urban/urbanish campus, PSU was not in the cards. He visited Bard and immediately ruled it out owing to the isolation. There are other limits on his placements owing to a variety of factors: Major, health issues, distance, proximity to cultural opportunity. Some of the local more likely TE schools are places where I taught in the past, and I didn’t think he would fit in.
Really, I wish people would actually respond to the question at hand instead of patting themselves on the back for doing such a good job with their own children. I wasn’t actually asking people to assess if my son applied to the right schools. So far he is 5 for 5 admissions (plus one deferral) so I guess he did OK. I was actually asking about whether there has been a dramatic reduction in TE awards this year such that the stats on the TE website are not accurate.
Hi, This is our second time doing the TE. Our first child only received it at 2 places: small private college and large private university. His stats were decent but not outstanding. This time our child has received it also at 2 places: 2 small LACs. This time the stats are excellent. Some of the schools we applied to don’t have TE but offer merit in about the same amount. It’s really hard to not consider the TE when making the final decision. Our situation is such that we don’t make a huge amount but have 529s that are healthy. Our second child has been accepted to all schools with the exception of 2 waitlists. One waitlist is heartbreaking but I don’t think they would have done TE and it’s just too much without comparable merit. I assumed for a long time with great grades, scores TE would be easier than it actually is. Just feel incredibly lucky we have/had options with limited TE.
Thanks @CFE2008 that is helpful. Do you mind me asking – what were the acceptance proportions listed on the TE website for the places your second child applied?
First child is at a 91-100%. Second child’s offer is a 61-90% and 41-60% Second child did not get at Occidental (<10%). Hope that is helpful.
I’m at the very early stages (have kids in 10th, 9th, and 7th) but I created a massive spreadsheet that includes piles of info. One of the most important is the % of TE acceptances paired with average testing information (SAT and ACT) as I believe that will be crucial in developing our lists when the time comes. My guess, and this is a guess right now, that students should aim for colleges where their testing puts them at the 75% to have the best shot. Especially if they are aiming for a <10% college.
Are any of you are at an institution that also has CIC? I’m wondering if the success rate is better in that consortium.
@psycholing - never said anyone should apply at a school JUST because they had a shot at TE. My strategy was to help my kids find schools that were fits and that spread the range from schools at <10% to schools at 90-100%. TE continues to add schools, so it’s unlikely there are fewer awards being given - it’s more likely that a larger number of eligible students are applying to the schools with the biggest name recognition, making it more competitive. Which also increases the likelihood of “hidden gem” schools that don’t receive a ton of applicants, but need imports in order to be able to offer TE to their faculty/staff.
You said the merit funds were rather worthless - I know many people whose students received awards this year that were far from worthless. But I’ll just go and keep patting myself on the back and ignoring your question about this year, since obviously the faculty/staff that I know had students apply - and receive awards - this year do not count. You also had said your school did not offer any assistance beyond forms - glad that you were able to find ways to make yourself uber knowledgeable.
@MAandMEmom - sounds like you’re on the right track I did something similar, and with S had to cross-reference against ABET schools as well since he’s majoring in Mechanical Engineering. Make sure you include all deadlines (especially if there are early application dates to be eligible for scholarships) and check whether scholarships/honors require separate applications. You want to make sure to apply for everything possible since every school sets their own rules about how money is handled.
I’m checking out of this thread now. Hope the OP gets the affirmation they are looking for.
Funny @InigoMontoya ABET is important to us as well for S19. I have that in my spreadsheet as well as noting whether a school actually has a college of engineering. Probably the civil route though. My son will likely test well but GPA might be the trouble. He has some processing difficulties and his recent WISC has him with a super high IQ but processing is 40 points lower than visual spatial. Our net will need to be cast wide enough to match this.
@InigioMontoya I did not say that “merit money is rather worthless”. I said that TE funds are rather worthless if they only give the funds to students who would already warrent equivilent merit at the same school, for the same scores. But I guess in these days of fake news any poster can just misquote another and, if they shout loudly enough, others will believe.
At I am really looking for a discussion as to whether tuition exchange is mistating statistics on their website about proportions admitted from schools.
@psycholing what are your child’s stats comparably for the schools where your child was offered admission yet no TE? Did he reach the 75% for SAT scores?
Hi @MAandMEmom: yes actually he did reach the 75% in ACT – 33, 34 superscore. He did not take the SAT. Also two SAT subject tests that were high (710, 760), and some rather unique EC’s.
@psycholing it certainly will be a worry of mine in a couple of years. I think the raising costs of higher ed are driving demand so much that these scholarships are difficult to come by. Does your institution participate in CIC?