<p>Thanks for coming over at College Confidential!!!!!</p>
<p>MIT people have to be the best admins there are. (For those who don't know, Daniel is the finaid honcho for MIT).</p>
<p>THIS IS SO SERIOUSLY COOL! :) :)</p>
<p>Now we're just waiting for Matt to show up as well ;)</p>
<p>Thanks for the welcome! Ben inspired me. I was a long time lurker, getting some good ideas for my blog from here, but after Ben began posting, I thought I would follow suit. Figured it was important to be able to answer questions relating to aid here and in the Financial Aid discussion. Like Ben, I'll be in here when I can... Life is very busy these days for us at MIT...</p>
<p>Should we address you Mr. Barkowitz? Daniel? Moneyman? :)</p>
<p>LOL! Daniel is fine with me...</p>
<p>Moneyman, what can I do about f. aid if I do not have a SSN as yet? (I have completed CSS PROFILE but not yet FAFSA)</p>
<p>Welcome Mr. Barkowitz! I will be applying for financial aid (and admission.. lol) in the near future!</p>
<p>I didn't know admissions officers "lurked" around here... but a hugo boss welcome anyways!</p>
<p>Yeah neither did I, and it's scary on one hand, but at the same time, comforting that the actual decision makers read our posts and that we weren't entirely unheard.</p>
<p>Welcome!</p>
<p>I have a question about merit aid. I know that MIT, like Stanford and the Ivies, has an official policy of no merit aid from the university. But are there any independant organizations (alumni, booster club, faculty organization, etc) that offer merit-based scholarships to the top students accepted to MIT?</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>Welcome :)</p>
<p>OMG! MIT rocks! Daniel, welcome aboard...</p>
<p>another hearty welcome to a second mit rep on cc!</p>
<p>Wow, definitely appreciate it Daniel...</p>
<p>One quick question, how do IDOC and MIT work together? Does IDOC just give MIT the nod like "hey, all the information provided is correct"? Just wondering, cause we just sent in a HUGE package to IDOC. And also, when will fin aid packets arrive in comparison to admission letters, same time if you get in? Or does that vary based on when things were submitted?</p>
<p>Thanks for joining CC Mr. Daniel Barkowitz. We really appreciate it.</p>
<p>I was going to post a welcome myself, but I see mercurysquad beat me to it! Good job! It's great to have yet another outstanding College Rep here from MIT. Clearly, between their outreach efforts here, their public blogs, etc. MIT is demonstrating that they are in tune with the Web and how it can be used to break down traditional barriers.</p>
<p>As noted in previous posts, the "College Rep" member designation means that at CC we have takens steps to verify the identity of the member and that we believe that he/she is who she claims to be.</p>
<p>Another note - it's great to have Ben and Daniel here, but please take it easy on them. Please don't name threads after them begging for help. These people do have other important responsibilities, and we want the time they spend at CC to be fun and stress-free. Thanks for your cooperation!</p>
<p>wow MIT just rocks :)
Hello Daniel</p>
<p>When do we find out if we have been accepted or not?</p>
<p>before March 20th.</p>
<p>So some answers to questions raised above:</p>
<p>Amrik asked about how to apply for aid without an SSN. If you are a US Citizen or Permanent Resident, GOOD LUCK!! This is an incredibly difficult task. To complete the FAFSA you MUST have a Social Security number (and it must match the Social Security Administration's Database). You actually can apply for the Profile without one, but it will take some jiggling to try to get your records matched on our end. See, everything is keyed off Social Security Number on our database (and on the Federal and College Board databases), so if you do not provide one or do not have one, you may be stuck in limbo-land while we try to match your application with your SSN.</p>
<p>My advice, any college juniors lurking out there, start dealing with this now!!! It is not too soon to begin to take action to get your number and start using it. Do not worry about sharing your number with us, particularly on your Admissions App. We need it to get all of the data matched! </p>
<p>texas136 asked about merit aid. While MIT doesn't award merit aid for undergraduates, many outside providers do offer scholarships to meritorious MIT students. Many of these are the ones with which you probably are already familiar: Westinghouse, National Merit, Gates, Robert C. Byrd, Society of Women in Engineering. Of course there are many others out there, but to list them all would be exhausting. My advice, pursue them, but don't count on them. Remember, since MIT is a full need school, if you do receive scholarships, all that will happen is that your self-help (loans and work) will be adjusted downward based on the amount you receive. Translation, your parents will not end up paying less.</p>
<p>Phew... More answers coming in the next post. Gotta go put the 4 and 1/2 year old to bed...</p>
<p>More replies:</p>
<p>Browski8 asked how IDOC and MIT work together. So, let me give you the short answer and the long answer. The short answer is that we use the IDOC service to do two things: 1) collect the tax information from you when (hopefully) you are already submitting it to other schools, therefore minimizing the time and energy on your end to submit the same documentation multiple places (mimicing more the Profile process), and 2) image and record some information from the tax documents for us, making our reading, awarding and storage process more streamlined.</p>
<p>The longer answer is as follows: the College Board's processer actually images every piece of paper you submit, and then they upload it to their web server (extremely secure) where we can view the document. They also send us every night a file detailing who completed the IDOC and some basic tax information. We enter that into our system every night as well. The images remain on the College Board's site for a year. At the end of the year, they send us a CD with copies of the images on the CD. This process works much better for us since we don't need to keep copies of all of the paper. The issue is that we pay the College Board to process each packet you send them, and we want a tax return when we review files, so we create some confusion by notifying you that we need the 2003 return to complete the review (which you send to MIT), but we will be just as happy to take the 2004 return (through IDOC) instead.</p>
<p>Hope that answers the IDOC issue.</p>
<p>As for when you'll hear. I would predict you will hear by <edited to="" remove="" the="" day="">. :) Honestly, I am not at liberty to release it, but I can say it will be before April 1. As for whether the financial aid award will arrive with the Admissions offer, that depends on whether you were on time or not. We are working like crazy in my office to try to get as many awards out with the admissions letters as we can. Once the admissions letters have been mailed, we will be following up with our letters on a weekly basis.</edited></p>
<p>Thanks for the detailed reply, :).</p>