Net Price Calculators will not always tell you about merit aid awards. If the calculator does not ask about grades and test scores, it may be underestimating your aid, especially if you undermatch a bit.
Also the bit about Hispanic scholar - some schools like do give extra merit aid for minority candidates even when they do not offer merit to everyone. Again, if the school’s NPC does not ask for ethnic identity, it would be underestimating your aid.
It sounds like you have your safety school in Wright State. It’s just a matter of picking out reach schools that might be more generous with aid and deciding which ones to go for.
With my kids, one of the resources I’ve used to learn how to research schools that are generous with aid is thecollegesolution.com. Lynn O’Shaughnessy is doing a free sample class this week. If you and your parents could attend, you might find it a good introduction to terms like EFC and NFC and how to find low cost schools. http://www.thecollegesolution.com/free-master-training-learn-how-to-cut-your-college-costs/
I’d like to attend, but right now I’m a sophomore and my parents don’t really get why I am so interested in searching for colleges already, so I may not be able to. I hope that they are underestimating my aid!
It is really important to understand the basics of how aid is awarded while you are still in the stage of building your college list. You should forward the link to your parents and see if they can make time. It is all online, and she does a good job of giving real information, not just a sales pitch for her paid class. I did her “free stuff” when my oldest was a sophomore and used the paid class during my daughter’s junior year. The class is usually recorded and a link is emailed to participants. I’m not sure if she takes attendance or not, but if you sign up and don’t show up, you might actually get the link to watch it later. (No promises - I’m a customer, not the business owner here.)
If you could re-take your ACT and score 34, you could be eligible for automatic merit at University of Alabama-Huntsville of four years tuition plus room. That would get the remaining costs close to what your parents were imagining.
To get a more accurate prediction of what type of financial aid will be available at different schools, ask your parents to sit down with you at the computer to run the Net Price Calculator, with a copy of their 2015 federal tax return, and information about savings accounts etc. If your income is around $100k, I’d be surprised if the cost of attendance at Ohio small schools like Kenyon and Denison is above $20,000, but maybe I’m wrong.
Denison in particular gives very generous merit awards (based on your achievements and not your family’s financial scenario), and works hard to create a diverse community so they could be very interested in getting a candidate like you. Go the the colleges’s website, Admissions, and check the “send me information” box. If you are around Dayton area, I would bet Denison comes to local college fairs as well. College of Wooster is another very generous merit award school in Ohio. Earlham, in Richmond, IN, which is just across the border, has good merit awards as well, and has strong sciences (I hear, my kid is not a science kid), and a very diverse (lots of international) student community.
Good luck, it’s great that you are thinking about affordability now!
So I was messing around with NPC at really good schools, and Stanford said I get a NPC of $13,000??? Is this for real? I did not make any underestimates on incomes or overestimates on deductions.
So basically my biggest worry for the schools that meet all my financial need is to get in?
^ yes. The financial aid at many highly selective schools that ‘meet need’ is going to be really helpful because their understanding of 125k isn’t the same as elsewhere.
I’m surprised at the numbers you got for Kenyon etc though.
The issue will be to apply to universities beside the super selective ones and thus combine universities with high merit and universities with great financial aid.
Another financial consideration – If WSU gives you a tuition benefit for schools other than WSU, be aware that it will reduce your financial aid. Do talk to your family to understand all the parameters of WSU employee benefit – whether it is only for attendance at WSU or whether there is some amount which is “portable.”
But on Stanford EFC – yes, a number of top schools can offer great financial aid. Run the NPC at several schools and compare how much of the aid is loans/work-study job during school year vs. actual grants (which don’t have to be re-paid).
Yes, Stanford is “for real” - they give great aid, including automatic free tuition for families making less than 125,000 per year. The only trick is, you have to have the resume and the luck to get into Stanford!
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So basically my biggest worry for the schools that meet all my financial need is to get in?
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You have to figure out how each school defines your financial need - Stanford considers middle class families “needy” but not all will be as generous at they are.
In general, your out of pocket cost at a meet full need school will be close to your FAFSA EFC or your CSS/Profile EFC. The latter is usually a bigger number.
That does not look right.
For family income of $100K (with $45K in cash assets, no home equity, no siblings) I get an estimated net price of $17,031. Your Mileage May Vary … but I wouldn’t expect it to vary that much (unless maybe you have a very large college savings account, or something like that.)
So my parents sold a house in England for 400k and are using it to pay off the house. Should I say we have our normal bank account and then no mortgage or a sizable bank account and then mortgage?
So with the financial aid, does it stack with any merit scholarships the school might give, and up to what point do they stack? Will merit scholarships come first and then financial aid or what?
For a FAFSA school, the value of the house will not impact your financial aid. However, CSS/Profile schools do consider it, to somewhat varying degrees. (It is not consistent.)
However, your parents 400K in the bank would count against your financial aid either way. About 5 to 6% of your cash assets will be added to your EFC. 400K in bank = 20K less in financial need (roughly).
Ok, anyway by the time that I start actually filling out for financial aid, they will probably have paid a lot off, and most of that 400k will be gone.
^ good. A bank account with 400k sitting in it will greatly diminish your financial aid. If you use it to purchase your current house it’ll add to equity but not all css schools count equity the same.
Also, you’ll be using your 2015 tax return for twO years, so, what does it look like?
Typically, institutional need-based aid and merit aid do not stack. The merit aid offsets your “need”, so you get that much less need-based aid (if you would have qualified for it). So (typically) your bottom line only benefits from merit aid if it exceeds need (for example, if you do not qualify for any need-based aid at all).
You may need to check out the policies at each school you’re considering. This is an issue if you don’t think you can cover your Expected Family Contribution (in which case you’d want total aid that exceeds the school’s definition of your need.)
Ok tk that makes sense. So for example, at Vanderbilt, even if I get the full tuition scholarship, it will be more expensive than the only financial aid grant of 13k?
And MYOS, what do you mean by how does it look?
You need to run the NPC on every single college listed so far, using your 2015tax return paid on April 15.
The numbers you listed for Kenyon and Denison sound very high for your parents ’ income, and I believe it’s due to assets, so try to figure where youl’‘be on that account, or make simulations To see what’ would result in various scenario of using your English house 's sale.
Kenyon will be $26,619 with all the house paid off and Denison will be $33,670, although they did ask me for test scores and they say 23,000-25,000 scholarships and then 2000-3000 need-based. Sorry for the late reply I was on vacation last weekend.