Tuition Exchange for Fall 2023 (Class of 2027)

FACHEX at LoyNo and Xavier. (No decisions on award yet).
TE at Jacksonville FL. Stetson. DePaul. Baldwin Wallace. U of Dayton. UNF. Syracuse. Gustavus (who gave set rate). All others still waiting to hear on awards.

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Hey everyone. I have been following this years tuition exchange thread closely, and it has helped me a lot in deciding where to apply for the program. This year I have applied to 8 TE schools, and 3 non TE schools.

Seton Hall University (accepted, TE approved full tuition)
St. Lawrence University (accepted, TE approved 41k+9k stacked merit)
Salve Regina University (accepted, awaiting TE)
University of Dayton (accepted, awaiting TE)
University of Pittsburgh (denied TE)
Skidmore College
University of Richmond (deferred)
George Washington University

GW and Richmond seem slim right now, hoping for a shot at skidmore. I really hope colleges were more transparent in this long and stressful process.

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Interesting because my daughter received the Pitt TE and her email said to let then know if we don’t want to accept so they can offer to someone on their extensive waiting list.

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Hmm, I’ll have to ask my son to show me the email to see exactly how they phrased it. I suppose it’s possible that some people haven’t been notified of denial yet and thus they have an unofficial waitlist? I know that’s how some schools do it.

Can someone explain tuition exchange? I feel like I have dropped the ball for considering this for S23 but S24 might benefit. If there is a guide or informational link that would be helpful for someone who doesnt know but has tuition benefit, that would be also greatly appreciated.

you should definitely check with HR at your institution, as the availability/eligibility for it varies greatly and is determined by your home institution.

Where I work, full time employees with at least 7 years of service are eligible to be entered into a lottery. Each year, based on some formula that is a mystery to me, our institution determines that 3-7 employees can take advantage of the benefit. So, once this lottery is held (literally, they pull names out of a hat), if your name is pulled, it means your kid can apply to be considered for a TE scholarship by the school they have been admitted to. The likelihood of being awarded it then relies on the admitting school. Different schools have different formulas for who gets it/how many they can offer. Basically, it is an academic scholarship at the receiving school with a much more limited pool of applicants.

We got it for my D20, and found good luck in applying to schools where her stats landed her squarely in the top 25% of applicants to the school. It seems in the 3 years since then, it has gotten much more difficult to get one at many schools. I’m not as hopeful for our chances when my D24 is up for consideration (assuming I’m lucky enough to win the lottery again).

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My D has not heard back from Pitt yet regarding a TE decision.

thank u. I will goto employee benefits/HR to see how/if they determine eligibility. I suspect as everything else, its more limited/more selective. But we got to try, right? lol

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Son got his TE denial email from Pitt on Feb 6. It says “Since we have a limited number of scholarships available, we are unable to offer a waitlist option for students who are not initially awarded the Tuition Exchange Scholarship.”

It does seem like there’s conflicting information that was given to those who received the award and those who were denied.

Perhaps people who haven’t heard either way yet are on some sort of unofficial internal waitlist?

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A full tuition TE surprised me at one school as did merit aid that surpassed TE at a second school. The final cost would be $13k at one and $27k at another.

I scanned though this thread and what I said last year. Many of the schools that I thought we might apply to were removed from the list for various reasons.

We’re going for a scholarship day at one school and an admitted student visit at a school they haven’t had a chance to visit yet.

We’re also awaiting RD decisions from a few places.

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Surprising - I’ve found that rarely does university merit surpass TE, even at set rate. There are a few with highly competitive full tuition scholarships, but usually the non-full tuition offers are quite a bit less than TE (or at least in the schools I’ve looked at).

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At my husband’s school, it is fewer years of service (I don’t recall how many), and there is no lottery, I think pretty much everyone can use it who is a full time employee. Maybe there is a limit but they generally don’t meet it.

So far my DD has been awarded 2. One was at a school that awards to less than 10% of applicants and the other to a 40% school. There are also full tuition and set rate schools.

St. Lawrence’s highest merit is 40k and TE is 41k. They gave my DD an additional 9k. Also said that if her eligibility ever ended for TE (due to employer), it would be replaced with their 40k merit.

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That’s great - not many TE schools stack. What I’ve found (in the 20 we focused on) is the top merit (again, not the full ride scholarship weekend merit opportunities) is usually 5 - 15k under TE’s set rate. In any case, most TE schools on set rate are unaffordable even with TE - to make it realistic, they have to stack. Particularly if the school’s tuition is 60k+

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Yep. It still makes COA 30k without loans. We were hoping max of 25k no loans.

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I’m befuddled–
Their letter stated, “If you decide not to enroll at the University of Pittsburgh, please still complete the information on the provided link as we hope to offer Tuition Exchange Scholarships to other students on our extensive waiting list.”

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We have a few where COA would be low 30s (w/o loans) but I’m also hoping to max at 25. We do have three TE offers at great LACs with full tuition so COA would be 15k max at those, but D23 wants to wait to hear back from all before acting on those (which I understand).

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The inflation is way too high. Most college’s room + meal alone is about $20k, let alone the tuition.

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Yeah we have Pitt full tuition, Bama tuition plus a year room + more. But she wants an LAC. The rest of those are meet need which may be close. Also waiting on Syracuse which does stack. I just want all the numbers. It will be hard to visit many before May 1.

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D23 is more excited about larger schools. Her three present TE offers are all LACs. I’d prefer to see her go to an LAC (I think the educational environments are better generally), and she likes all of them, but still needs to get over the “but they are small” hump. She also applied to Syracuse. We’re still waiting on 15 schools - maybe 8 we’ve visited before knowing anything about admission or TE. From this point out, we’ll visit only after TE. Just too busy.

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