<p>Really, it’s not whether any college gives good financial aid in general that matters to you. It’s whether you have a good chance of getting a good financial aid package from any given school. I have seen colleges that are notorious in gapping students and not meeting need in general give certain students a great package.</p>
<p>You job is to find those schools where you are likely to be accepted and are definitely affordable. Once you have a few of those schools, really just one, you are set to start playing the lottery in terms of admissions and good financial aid packages. </p>
<p>A problem is that those schools that offer the absolutely best packages, with no loans, tend to be the most selective. Get into Harvarad, for instance, and many high income families that wouldn’t get a dime of fin aid may find themselves with a nice package, and no loans at all. Not so with many schools that guarnatee to meet 100% of need. many of these schools themselves define the need; not FAFSA need or Harvard need, but using their own criteria. Also many of them have a pretty hefty student contribution requirement in that meeting 100% of need, and if you can’t find a job, haven’t saved money, you have a problm. Also many schools use self help in terms of loans and work study in meeting aid. On top of all of that, these schools are not shoo ins for admissions even if you have NO need. They are highly selective schools. Some do have need aware admissions which can affect the likelihood of them being the school for you if you have need. </p>
<p>Where you are the most likely to gain acceptance and money for college is by applying to schools where you are truly the cream of the crop. That you are best 5-10% of the applicant pool. Even then you are not guaranteed to get enough pure grant funds, but it increases your chances. Also makes acceptance into the school more of a sure thing.</p>
<p>So a number of those schools should be on your list. </p>
<p>Once you have those layers covered, you can add schools that you like with wild abandon, because you have your base covered, and also some chances in the basket that have better than lottery ticke odds. So then you can go for those schools where admissions and money are truly lottery tickets.</p>