<p>When it comes to FA, either you or your parents can call. I usually call for my kids because I understand our finances and how FA works better than they do, but I agree that it’s very important to be polite and patient, getting upset will not help. </p>
<p>This really is heart-breaking. I applied SCEA and was deferred. I sent a powerful letter after my deferral to my interviewer from admissions and to my regional counselor. I had a second interview and send two update letters to Yale. I feel like I put in so much for this school only to be rejected.</p>
<p>… But oh well. I guess you really learn something from going through the whole college application process. It’s important to learn lessons like these and to have to rise back up after coming down.</p>
<p>That being said, I’m going to try my luck on the waitlists at Brown and Cornell. Failing that, it’s UCBerkeley for me.</p>
<p>Alright, so we ran the Yale aid calculator with numbers just slightly higher to be safe, and whoa- our family contribution is suddenly halved. And entomom, since one of our FA forms (which are pretty standard from school to school) was messed up, all of my FA awards came in really low. JHU and Rice, for example.</p>
<p>So since I sent the mistake-blighted FA forms to every school I applied to, all the acceptances I got came back with too-low FA awards and too-high family contributions (these are 100% need-meeting schools). I’m worried because this isn’t about wrangling a couple more hundred bucks out of Yale’s endowment; it’s actually a matter of going bankrupt/heavily in debt vs. feasibly paying while tightening our belts.</p>
<p>@randomazn14: Given your description of your parents, you should call – maybe with your parents within earshot, just in case you need to ask them a tax-related question.</p>
<p>@randomazn14 glad to know I’m not the only one with financial aid issues!!!
Harvard offered me practically a full ride, but Yale were like ‘$20k?’ so I’m so confused…</p>
<p>lemming101, I have the same issue. My Harvard aid award is substantially higher than my Yale aid award. </p>
<p>I was wondering, if Yale happens to adjust my aid award this year to match Harvard’s, would Yale expect me to pay substantially more next year because the Yale aid calculator is inherently different from Harvard’s?</p>
<p>^^ Ask Yale to re-evaluate your financial aid based upon Harvard’s offer. You will have to fax Yale the letter from Harvard detailing your aid. If Yale come’s back with a better package of aid, something within a few hundred dollars of Harvard, then ask them about your aid for sophomore, junior and senior years. Specifically ask them if you can get a side-letter stating that if your family makes about the same amount of money, Yale will guarantee to give you the same percentage of aid as the re- evaluated amount during your sophomore, junior and senior years. Yale may, or may not, agree to the side-letter – in which case, you will have your answer.</p>
<p>I Will…
Thing is if the Yale package doesn’t improve by quite a lot, my parents are shipping me off to Harvard. That wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world haha but I really really want to go to Yale. </p>
<p>I will make sure I add that side letter too…</p>
<p>So first I called, and then my dad called. There seems to be some error in the retirement savings numbers in the Profile. We’ve faxed them JHU’s similarly error-induced (but a few thousand dollars higher in aid, amusingly) FA in the meantime, just to get a head start. Oh boy this is going to be a hard few weeks.</p>