<p>I've heard that private colleges with a lot of money will cover a lot of need-based aid. I believe my EFC is ~$3,750. I want to major in chemical engineering or materials science and engineering.</p>
<p>Ok, there are lists of ‘meets full need’ colleges, I will give links to. But private colleges don’t use FAFSA EFC. That is used for determining federal aid only. Use NPCs on college websites to get estimates of cost and aid for you from each college you are thinking of. </p>
<p>A lot of the meets full needs colleges are LAC most of which do not have engineering, so you can whittle it down to just a handful and those will be <em>very</em> selective. You will need to find low cost colleges that you can afford as well.</p>
<p>In another thread, you reveal that you have a non-custodial parent. At the schools that “meet need”, those schools do NOT use FAFSA…they will use CSS Profile AND they will require your dad’s financial info as well…including the info of any new spouse.</p>
<p>You asked about Alabama earlier. You would get the free tuition plus 2500 per year for Eng’g/CS. And since you have a Pell eligible EFC, you would also get a Pell Grant. You might also get Work Study if you submit your FAFSA early (important!) and you would get a 5500 student loan. </p>
<p>The COA is padded. A student doesn’t have to take the most expensive dorms, which are included in the COA. Some kids buy used text books or rent textbooks to save even more. </p>
<p>Your mom would also qualify for the Tuition Tax Credit, which would make it easier for her to help you a little bit.</p>
<p>Alabama would likely be affordable as a safety, so get your app in before the scholarship deadline to get the money (Dec 15).</p>
<p>Since the “meet need” schools will want your dad’s info, do you know how much he earns and how much he’ll help with college? </p>
<p>I don’t know any school that guarantees to mee 100% of need as defined by FAFSA. That is, meeting need as: COA minus FAFSA EFC. There may be some specialty schools that do, and there are the militiary academies and such that pay for just about everyone, but off hand I can’t name one “regular” university/college that makes that guaranteed. NY state schools tend to meet full Tuition and Fees costs for those who have the need from the FAFSA formula, but with their low tuitions, after they use PELL, TAP (state money), federal loans, SEOG, workstudy, it’s not like they have to come up with very much for very many students. Which is why our state schools tend to be very heavily regional with a lot of commuters. Living expenses are high, as are “discretionary” costs, so many kids live and home and commute. </p>
<p>So there are a number of state schools that have a lot of commuters that do tend to meet full need of the tutiion and fees component. When it comes to room and board, that 's a whole other story. </p>
<p>A person has living expenses everywhere, and a question that arises is why anyone should be paying them for a student to get a “sleep away” experience when there are colleges within commuting distance. Few expect student to go to a "sleep away’ setting for k-12, but it has become an expectation of sorts for college. This poses a lot of problems for a lot of families. They’ve absorbed the cost of the students living there. Yes, the utility bills will be lowered, but rent and mortgage will still stay the same unless the family downsizes in that respect. So families have to come up with the money for the student to live elsewhere and eat,not to mention meet the everyday costs of going to school and living. Gotta wash up, wash clothes, need certain supplies, including school related ones like books, paper, computer often. </p>
<p>The most generous school, tend to have their own definition of need, and often start out with a required student contribution for all students regardless of EFC. So an EFC zero student may still be asked to come up with, say $2-4K. And then need is defined by the school, not the family, student or the FAFSA. If there is a NCP in the picture, the financial are needed from that parent as well, even if that parent refuses to pay or give the numbers. For that matter even custodial parents can balk and refuse to do the same. IF schools gave parental refusal to pay any standing, most all parents would assume that position to max out aid. </p>
<p>So it’ s important to have some idea of what you and your family can and are willing to pay, as well as the income and asset numbers for them to run through the NPCs of each school considered. If a school comes close to affordable, then it is a good consideration for the list If you and your family can come up with $25K, and the NPCS are saying that you are expect to pay most all of the $60K cost, that’s a huge gap, and unless there are some high merit awards that are possible from the school, it’s unaffordable. </p>
<p>In our case $35K was always the max we set out for our kids. we did not qualify for financial aid. So our kids tried to get $5-10K in merit to bring the cost down to about the $50K level, had $5-10K they could kick in from savings and working, that could bring it to the $40K optimistically, and then considered the Direct loans which start at $5500 freshman year. At the end of the admissions seasons, every single one of them had affordable choices including schools that required every bit of money we had budgeted, and what they could muster, down to costing very little at all. Some nice choices in the mix. Yes, I had twinges of regret. I wish I could have paid for any school any of them wanted, but they just took off the schools that were too expensive and enjoyed picking from what they felt were embarrassments of riches. They could commute to a number of schools, go away to a number, not take loans, take loans, not work, they could mix and match it all from a nice list of choices.</p>
<p>To clarify…SOME schools using Profile require the NCP Profile. Some don’t. You need to check the requirements on each school’s website.</p>
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<p>New this round…University of Chicago uses the FAFSA only. They do gather info via a short form of their own as well, but their goal is to make U of Chicago more accessible to low income students…more easily.</p>
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So that would make this operate like Princeton’s FA process? I’m not sure how “short” each school’s data collection sheet is but I think the goal would be the same for each.</p>
<p>Actually…no. Princeton doesn’t use the Profile, but their school based form does ask for non-custodial parent information…and custodial parent info…very similar info to the Profile…but they use their own form. Princeton does have some different policies on how they treat step parent income, or non-custodial parent income…but that is a whole other story.</p>
<p>U of Chicago is trying to streamline their need based financial aid process. They are using the FAFSA only to gather information. Then they supplement that with a short form for additional information. Their goal is to offer easier access to need based aid than the complex Profile/non-custodial parent Profile process. This is the first year of this new initiative.</p>
<p>Start here -
<a href=“http://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/paying-for-college/articles/2014/09/15/colleges-and-universities-that-claim-to-meet-full-financial-need”>http://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/paying-for-college/articles/2014/09/15/colleges-and-universities-that-claim-to-meet-full-financial-need</a></p>
<p>and here-
<a href=“Colleges That Meet 100% of Financial Need”>http://www.thecollegesolution.com/colleges-that-meet-100-of-financial-need/</a></p>
<p>I have visited a dozen LAC on this list, and all say that they will meet the need as defined in FASFA. That is after required student work contribution ($1500-$2500 on campus), Pell Grants etc. Use the Net Price Calculator on their site and you will see. I have run the numbers at colleges from HPY to Dickinson to Colgate, and the net cost comes out the same, give or take a few grand.</p>
<p>WaitingED…please do tell us which LACs are GUARANTEEING to meet full need for ALL accepted students based on the FAFSA only.</p>
<p>I think your information is false.</p>
<p>ETA…you applied ED to Vassar…which requires the CSSProfile for consideration for institutional need based aid. Not just the FAFSA. Hope this was not on your list of FAFSA onky schools!</p>
<p>Agree, I can’t think of an LAC that meets need as defined by FAFSA. The FAFSA is an INPUT to make sure they are getting accurate information. But each school does their own calculation, and “meets need” per THEIR definition of need, NOT the FAFSA definition of need. </p>
<p>Plus, FAFSA only has the custodial parent’s info on it. Most LACs (including Dickinson and Colgate) require the NPC and take the non-custodial parent (and stepparent if there is one) assets and income into account as well.</p>
<p>I just looked on the lists that you posted. The schools that guarantee to meet full need for all accepted students all require additional information than just the FAFSA.</p>
<p>I think that for SOME students, some scenarios, the expected contribution for some schools will be the same as the FAFSA EFC, except for the student required contribution even for a PROFILE school. But that usually means no NCP in the picture, no home equity, no owned business, no other thing that is treated differently on PROFILE than on FAFSA. That can happen in some situation. Also student assets and some types of parental assets are treated differently on PROFILE than on FAFSA. Heck, in some situations, one can get a LOWER expected contrib from PROFILE than FAFSA (some schools take sibling private school costs into consideration) due to special factors. </p>
<p>But over all, the NPC comes out more than FAFSA EFC for most people. </p>
<p>@mom2collegekids My dad is currently unemployed… By the way, I did apply to Alabama and got the scholarship! It’s definitely a possibility.</p>
<p>Are both parents unemployed? If so, then your dad (or mom) may qualify as being “displaced workers”. I’m not sure but that may mean you’ll have an EFC of 0 and get a full Pell grant of $5700.</p>
<p>The displaced worker status is only valuable if their income for,the year is below $30,000. Otherwise, no auto $0 EFC.</p>
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<p>Almost no school meets need with only grants if need is defined as COA - EFC (whether FAFSA or institutional EFC), since nearly all schools have an expected student contribution (ESC, usually between $4,000 and $10,000). Federal direct loans and/or work study may be offered to cover the ESC.</p>
<p>Of course, most good financial aid schools also use their own definition of EFC and need, not the FAFSA EFC. Most also require non-custodial parent information, so if the non-custodial parent is unwilling to pay or cooperate with financial aid forms, you will not get sufficient financial aid from such a school.</p>
<p>As described above, use the net price calculator at each school to get an estimate. Run it twice, once with current parental income and assets (including both parents), and once assuming your father gets a job (i.e. adding the expected level of income for a job he may get).</p>