What colleges allow you to stack merit and need based aid?

Paying for College
1

<p>My understanding is that if you have financial need that the college is going to cover, and you get merit aid, that merit aid is usually subtracted from the need aid the student was going to get, so the net amount of aid is the same.</p>

<p>I have read that some schools might allow a student to stack the merit aid, so that the student gets the need based aid and then gets the merit aid, in addition. </p>

<p>OR </p>

<p>The college might not let the student stack the aid, but will subtract the merit amount from the amount that may have been given as a loan.</p>

<p>Is there any list or resource that can help determine what schools allow stacking or will subtract from the loan amount first? For some schools I see explanations on their websites, but for others it isn't as clear, or isn't mentioned.</p>

2

<p>University of South Carolina stacked awards up to the cost of attendance when my kid applied there in 2006. I think Duquesne did also. </p>

<p>Really, the only way for you to know the policies of each college you are interested in is to contact THOSE colleges. </p>

<p>There are 3000 or so colleges in the U.S. I’m not sure you will be able to get a comprehensive list anywhere.</p>

<p>In any event, your aid cannot exceed the cost of attending the college…except in the small number of cases where a student receives a full cost of attendance merit scholarship, and then also is entitled to the Pell grant.</p>

3

<p>I really do think that most schools will let you stack aid up until the COA or the COA-EFC.</p>

<p>I know both Michigan State and Michigan let you stack. </p>

<p>Like thumper said, you’re not going to find a comprehensive list. Get a list of schools your child is interested in and ask them specifically. Most will have it listed somewhere on the site- though you might have to dig.</p>

4

<p>Actually, Romani, many schools do not allow stacking. Merit awards, especially from outside sources, reduce your actual financial need, and schools do adjust this.</p>

<p>But really…you need to contact each school to find their specific policy.</p>

5

<p>^ I didn’t say many didn’t. I know many don’t. I do think most do though… especially since most give dismal financial aid (most as in most colleges, not most on CC).</p>

<p>But “many” or “most” is pretty irrelevant if they don’t include the OP’s schools.</p>

6

<p>Right. All that matters is the OPs schools. If I were a betting woman, I’d say that most schools do not allow stacking of aid (we were actually told,that at the info session at South Carolina…that they allowed stacking while MOST colleges do not.)</p>

7

<p>I agree with Thumper1-- most schools will not allow “stacking.” Sometimes scholarship may add a $1,000 “student contribution” or replace a $1500 work-study offering or something of the sort, but after that, it just reduces need and doesn’t actually affect your bottom line.</p>

<p>This applies to need-based grants, at the very least. Not sure on loans.</p>

8

<p>shoeboe,</p>

<p>the one big factor that you must remember is that the overwhelming majority of colleges do not meet 100% demonstrated need. Even if you are looking at the financial aid section of the CDS, while it is a good umping off point as far as looking at data, they are giving you averages. Averages are just that. YMMV because you may get more or less than the average</p>

<p>I am a little confused by your question so I need to test for understanding (I also hope I an answering your question or giving you more to think about and ask in this process):</p>

<p>Lets say that your child gets accepted to a school that cost $55k/year</p>

<p>Your EFC is 20K, leaving you with a demonstrated need of 35K</p>

<p>S/he receives the Joe & Willie scholarship for 20K, (remember that most merit scholarships are only going to reduce tuition, unless otherwise stipulated. Also, any monies over the cost of tuition, books and I believe direct fees are going to be taxable income to your child).</p>

<p>your child now has a need of 15k</p>

<p>In the financial aid package, your child is given 5.5k in direct loan and 2k Work study</p>

<p>Now your son has a “need” of 7.5k.</p>

<p>If your son/daughter has any aid that he is entitled to (Pell grants), s/he will receive that aid (there will be no Pell in this example because you are not eligible). However, if your child is eligible for any state aid, they will most likely receive that . Your job is to check to make sure what the state aid can be used for. For example in NYC, the state aid is TAP (tuition aid program), this aid can only be used to offset tuition. The school will almost always disburse the "free money before going into their own pockets). If your child is eligible for $1k in state aid, they may end up receiving the aid without any reduction to the merit $$, now leaving you with 6.5 k in unmet need.</p>

<p>At many schools, this may be all that you get because most schools gap (meaning they do not meet 100% need). Unless the school guarantees to meet 100% of your demonstrated need, you probably won’t get any more institutional aid (free money).</p>

<p>Your family’s job is now to pay the gap (un met need) of 6.5k + your EFC. Your immediate OOP costs are now 26.5k , not counting your child’s loan which must be repaid + the work study, which has not been earned yet. This now brings the total OOP cost to 34k. </p>

<p>Should your child receive an out side scholarship, many schools will let him/her apply it to the self- help portion of the financial aid package (reducing the loan, work study). Lets say your child receives the CC financial aid poster scholarship for 2k and the Sybbie scholarship for 3k for a total of 5k. These would be your options:</p>

<p>You can ask the school if they will apply the 5k to your “gap” leaving you now with 1.5k of unmet need and reducing your immediate OOP cost to 21.5 k ( or 29k once you factor in the work study and the loans).</p>

9

<p>$40k = COA</p>

<h2>$10k = EFC (so not Pell eligible)</h2>

<p>$30k need</p>

<p>School will FIRST award merit (merit is almost always awarded FIRST by the school), then if there’s any need, then more aid might be given.</p>

<p>Are you talking about OUTSIDE merit? </p>

<p>Thumper…at South Carolina…did the school stack MERIT…or did they stack MERIT AND need-based grants???</p>

10

<p>I am really trying to understand this. I do understand that if you qualify for financial need aid at a school that DOES meet 100% need, unless a student gets large (full ride type) merit scholarship, a smaller merit scholarship from the school really doesn’t help you since it just gets subtracted from what they would give you for financial aid. </p>

<p>But I thought that at schools that did not meet 100% need, the merit aid could basically fill the gap, or even help you pay your EFC. It seems many people are seeking schools that offer merit aid and financial aid. I thought it was for this reason.<br>
Maybe I am just having trouble accepting the idea that earning merit scholarships may not actually be beneficial. it would seem that awarded merit money should be used for that gap, or at least to replace the amount the student was going to have to take out as a loan.</p>

<p>We are primarily looking at in-state schools, or private schools that meet 100% need.
Each time I read about merit/need aid, I come away with a different impression of what is possible.<br>
We have an EFC in the low 20s range, and that is the max we think we can come up with.</p>

<p>Besides state colleges/universities (Florida)
on the list right now are:
Furman University
Agnes Scott
Univ. of Miami
Emory
Rollins
Wellesley</p>

11

<p>Under the federal guidelines, colleges and universities cannot award federal money (other than unsubsidized federal loans) if the merit money meets (or exceeds) the student’s need as determined by the FAFSA.</p>

<p>However, colleges and universities can award as much of their own merit money as they feel like. So in some cases families end up responsible for less than their EFC because the student has received a ginormous merit scholarship. </p>

<p>Each college and university determines for itself how it will handle outside scholarships. In some cases those are used to replace the institution’s scholarships. In some cases they can be stacked, or used to cover the loan portion, or the unsubsidized loan portion, or the work-study portion, or whatever.</p>

<p>You really do have to ask each place separately.</p>

12

<p>This is just for one school, and our personal experience, so don’t know if it is really helpful. We are typical middle class, not full pay, but what seems impossibly high FAFSA EFC, and house paid for, so many schools punish with CSS depending on how they consider home equity. I hear HYPSM have amazing aid but didn’t apply to those, so can’t compare. Wouldn’t have gotten in, so wouldn’t be able to compare in any case.</p>

<p>This spring D’s initial offer from Vanderbilt(RD) was very generous- EFC much lower than FAFSA, all need met with need-based grants and work-study, NO loans or gap. When we told them of NMF status, as they give $5K/yr for that, expected them to erase work-study and reduce grant. They erased work-study, but only reduced grants partially. We got to ‘keep’ about $1500, so net aid increased, which surprised us. Especially since it was all their money, not outside scholarship. </p>

<p>Since it’s on your list, I’ll say UMiami Fla(EA) was also generous. They gave merit offer with admission notification and FA a bit later. The merit filled gap between FAFSA EFC and COA. But it turned out they calculate EFC in Vanderbilt’s generous way and they filled that additional with need-based grant, NO loan. I guess no stacking of need with merit, as then school would have been free. (She also got invite to the big scholarship weekend, Stamps, but had pit for school musical, so wouldn’t go. Guess she wasn’t interested by that point…)</p>

<p>At D’s school, ASU, she is able to stack her NMF, departmental and outside scholarships. But leftover is so little, no need for sure, so I don’t know how they deal with that. They did offer loans to help us pay it anyway, LOL. They do have a policy of not stacking additional NMF money on their NMF scholarships. If you get the NMSC or corporate scholarships, they absorb it into their ‘tuition/fees’ scholarship.</p>

13

<p>Emory: </p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Seems they stack to COA-EFC if I’m reading right. </p>

<p>Agnes Scott: reduces need-based by merit. </p>

<p>Wellesley allows stacking: </p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Those were the ones that were very easy to find. I didn’t dig for the others but the policies should be on the website somewhere.</p>

14

<p>shoboemom, when you talk about schools that claim to meet 100% of need, you do know that part of meeting need can be offering loans, right? Because then at those schools, you could be also thinking about whether the scholarships would count against loan or grant part of package. Some of these 100% need schools use large loans freely in their packages. Seems more than a bit deceptive to me. I personally don’t consider loans as ‘meeting need’, but I don’t get to make the definitions, just have to try to keep up and understand so I won’t be surprised at the end.</p>

15

<p>Of course, schools that do not give any need-based financial aid grants of their own trivially allow stacking of merit scholarships, since anything stacks on top of $0.</p>

16

<p>But if some of the scholarship money is from the university, the stacking policy of those scholarships with others may vary. Some schools have a policy that you can get only one university scholarship, whatever is the largest possible. Outside scholarships may or may not reduce the university scholarships depending on school policy. That doesn’t say how scholarship interacts with FA, but it also is not trivial. And for true full rides, outside scholarships almost surely will reduce amount of university money, unless you can get COA adjusted.</p>

17

<p>OP, it seems almost like a moot point to me–maybe I’m missing something? If your D is applying for any of the big-ticket private scholarships, like the sorts of things that are stickied at the top of this forum, then stacking is going to make a big deal. I could see trying to find schools that would allow you to get maximum leverage out of those awards. On the other hand, if your D is a serious contender for that level of scholarship, then she’s already a strong candidate for the various meet-100%-of-need colleges.</p>

<p>If your D is applying for smaller one-off scholarships and you found that not a single one of the schools on her list allowed stacking I could understand you saying it wasn’t worth the effort. But you don’t know what kind of offer they’ll make if she’s accepted, so of course the effort is worth it. </p>

<p>Really, the bottom line is the bottom line :). Her best offer, with the lowest overall COA for you, may come from a school that doesn’t allow stacking.</p>

18

<p>Does anyone know how University of Rochester handles this?</p>

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<p>It’s not on your list, but St. Olaf’s(100% meets need school) policy demonstrates the range of possibilities. You can apply for various merit awards from university and depts. and can stack, but only up to $24K/yr. That is the max annual merit money you can get from university. But you can stack outside scholarships on top of St. Olaf merit to go above the $24K limit. St. Olaf merit money reduces their financial aid award, but not necessarily loans and work-study first. Policy statement is a bit murky, makes it sounds like they might divide between reducing self-help and grant reductions. However, outside scholarships have explicit policy of being applied to work-study and different types of loans in a specific order before reducing grants.</p>

20

<p>U of Rochester: </p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Google name of university + outside scholarship + reduce aid or some close variation and it’s almost always the very first link.</p>