<p>You're right. Missed that entry. My EFC is low so it hardly makes much of a difference.</p>
<p>COA: 39000
EFC: 3800
Fed FA: 1500
School FA/Sch: 7000
Stafford: 10500
Unmet: 16200</p>
<p>I qualify for the higher Stafford limits as an independent upperclass student.</p>
<p>Wow. That's rough. Are you transferring, or is this a continuing aid package? If you are a transfer student ... I hope you have less expensive options you are considering! You would have to take out a huge loan, and the alternative loan to cover unmet need is not going to have very good rates/terms.</p>
<p>Pepperdine. My EFC was under 3,000....they offered me a Pell Grant at about $1,500, a "scholarship" for about $1,000...oh yeah, and over $40,000 in loans.</p>
<p>For a sop transfer student, Dartmouth was way below Yale. D's COA was 2k higher than Y (due to higher tuition and fees) and they only offered some Stafford loans. Y gave over 27k in grants and work study.</p>
<p>my experience with Pepperdine was the same as strandlib.</p>
<p>duke was bad financial aid</p>
<p>Transfer student. (I really wish there were some transfer-specific CDS)</p>
<p>Strand: That's outrageous.</p>
<p>Strand, that is called an "admit / deny".</p>
<p>A bit off point....
I'm skeptical if admit/deny isn't just unfortunate consequence of rising tuition and flat federal aid programs. With colleges focusing on admission numbers, why hurt your admit or yield percentages? There's no impact on academic measures as most use data from enrolled students. And there's no way to prove or disprove a college's claim to be need-blind (except through painful personal anecdotal evidence).</p>
<p>I think that it is done to fish for near full paying seats. I know plenty of C+ students who are at very nice schools because grandma, parents, or Uncle Joe can write a check for the full amount of COA (or full amount after nonsubidized Staffords). One might need to admit/deny 25 students (I would think enrollment management knows the exact # of students within a certain demographic) before one finds a student who will sadly take out huge pivate loans with a cosigner, or with a rich aunt who is willing to fund an edcuation.</p>
<p>From what I hear, Berkeley is bad about FA. I heard some grumbles about Hopkins and Carnegie also. Any others?</p>
<p>Most people have complaints about financial aid. Even Harvard, known to give the absolute best financial aid has garnered complaints. However, Berkeley is a state school. State schools rely much more heavily on government funds as they do not generally have as large endowments. Schools that use only FAFSA usually fall into this category. Since the vast, vast majority of scholarships come from the private sector, this puts an ornerus burden on public schools as they do not have those sources. Since the Pell Grant only gives out less than $5K for the absolute lowest income folks, and most of the other government aid is comprised of loans, the state schools are at a huge disadvantage in meeting full need. Out of state students, in particular, do not tend to get much from state schools. Though some state schools have merit money, it just does not tend to cover cost. Schools like the UC schools, and other state schools with high sticker prices really are not a good deal if you need financial aid and do not qualify for the few merit awards they offer.</p>
<p>Hopkins and CMU are a different story all together. They are schools that typically meet a fairly high % of need of their applicants, but using PROFILE or their own apps, their definition of need is much more stringent than what FAFSA uses. They both use preferential packaging in that those students they want the most get the more generous packages, and the awards can exceed need since they also offer some merit money. So you get kids who are VERY pleased with CMU and JHU offers, but there are many who are gapped or get packages that are primarily loans. I believe Princeton Review has a section where they rate financial aid offices determined by polled students' impression. You would do a bit better looking at USN&WR averages on what the amounts and % of aid and its make up are at those and other schools.</p>
<p>I have a son at UC Berkeley and Cal met his EFC in full ($5K in loans, $4K in work study and the rest were grants). Second son also got into Berkeley as a Regents Scholar and they replaced loans & work study with more grants. So I would say that Cal really came through and gave my sons excellent financial aid packages.</p>
<p>We live in CA</p>
<p>Congrats, Fresnomom, for hitting the jackpot that way. Many kids do not even get need met at the UCs, as they make no such guarantees. I wish the system could do the same for all kids as they did for yours.</p>
<p>Thanks for the response. I guess this is one of the reason why so many students are applying to an unseemly numbers of colleges. You just never know what makes you attractive to a college and therefore qualify you for more aid. I know it's best to apply to schools where you are on the higher end of the average applicant to be attractive but you hear plenty of stories of students that are rejected with the higher stats to schools such as Hopkins and Carnegie.</p>
<p>UC Berkeley met 100% our FAFSA-determined need as well with $3,500 subsidized loans (Perkins and Stafford), $2,500 workstudy, and grants for the rest of our need. They also agreed to apply outside scholarships to loans and workstudy first, instead of reducing the grant. D did not choose to go to Berkeley, but their financial aid was on par with the other schools she applied to. We are California residents.</p>
<p>I've been having non-stop problems with the Ithaca College financial aid department. Currently, I'm trying to get them to tell me why they reduced my grant aid while I still have significant loans after I sent in my outside scholarship form, even though the materials sent to me with my original financial aid offer clearly stated that they did not do this. </p>
<p>However, my financial aid package from this school was generous compared to those of other in similar circumstances. Lesson learned: Ithaca College is not the greatest school for those with a zero EFC. I'm somewhat starting to regret my decision.</p>
<p>hyperjulie, I am sorry that you are having a tough time. I read some very disappointing comments regarding FA this year at Ithaca. I can tell you, that although our efc is not low, their offer to my son was okay. Their offer was not the least expensive out of pocket for us, and it was a big stretch, but it was doable. My son had 5 other offers that weren't even close to doable. This school was one of 5 that my son was allowed to pick from because of our financial constraints.</p>
<p>I only applied to four schools, including community college, which in hindsight was a mistake. My aid to state schools (in-state), even after a small scholarship at one, was really not much better.</p>
<p>And on our end although Ithaca did come through with a decent offer and counter offer we were still looking at about $13000K per year in loans for D. Our state school where D is going will probably be more along the lines (still waiting on a couple outside scholarships) of about $3000 in subsidized loans, if that. That is on COA though, we haven't gotten the exact figures for her bursars bill. We can shave off a little more when we figure out how much she really needs to live on.</p>