<p>My S was accepted to RIT. He was offered a total of $18K/year in merit scholarships (includes $1K honors scholarship). He was not offered any need-based aid other than loans/on campus employment. He has full tuition scholarship offers at Northeastern and Drexel, which I assume they consider peer schools. Because RIT's costs are a bit lower, if they were able to increase his scholarship offer by about 5K per year, their overall cost to us would wind up being in the same range as those other two schools. </p>
<p>My S doesn't yet have a favorite and is planning on re-visiting schools that are still in the running financially after we get all his final information in the next week or so. At this point S isn't feeling that RIT is worth spending an extra $5K/year over Drexel or Northeastern. So we're on the verge of putting them in the "ruled out" pile on the basis of finances. So the question is, is it worth having him visit again and decide if it would be a top choice for him if they would give him more money, or should we just assume that they will not and move on. </p>
<p>I don't think he should go to them and ask for more money unless he's at a point where he'd go there if they gave it to him. So he'd definitely need to visit again to see if he would feel that it would be his first choice if they gave him more money. But our time for visits is running thin and I don't want to waste time if it makes more sense to just move on. </p>
<p>I feel I am a better fit at RIT, but am being priced out to Buffalo. I might ask for more money at RIT. But I have great doubts. Northeastern being in Boston looks very intriguing as I feel the city atmosphere will be a huge plus over an RIT. Drexel almost the same feeling, but Northeastern has better campus atmosphere in my opinion and Boston is a better college city than Philly (in my opinion).</p>
<p>Joseph, my S is a National Merit Finalist so that is why he got the big offers at Drexel, Northeastern and RIT. Ideally we would revisit all the schools, but that could be a challenge in the short time we have left to decide. He’s still waiting to hear from a couple of other schools as well. And of course none of them are near one another.</p>
<p>We attended an info session at RIT today and were told by the admissions officer that if you REALLY want to attend RIT but get a better fin. aid offer elsewhere, let them know and they’ll see what they can do.</p>
<p>This is the third child going through the college selection process, and I’ve NEVER heard an admin officer say this. I even asked my wife if I heard what I thought I heard. Colleges usually say they don’t negotiate.</p>
<p>I did speak to financial aid when we visited, and they seemed more than willing to look at any competing offers my S had. As it turned out RIT ended up being his second choice, so we didn’t end up finding out just how “negotiable” the financial aid was, but it would definitely be worth asking. The told my S’s friend to send the offer along with a letter stating why he wanted to attend RIT more than the other school(s).</p>