Fafsa

[Mickeyluver37]

Duplicate post

 

[dminnie]

Happy Snowman, please elaborate on the bolded part. Do you think if a student graduates with mostly A's, they have a good chance of academic scholarships? I am just getting familiar with the process (my oldest is 11 but I want an early start).

Thanks!

Happy Snowman(and others) summed it up great with the info. about extra curricculars in addition to good grades and test scores. It can be a lot of pressure on kids, thus part of the reason for the eye rolls from many of them.

In our area, good grades can also mean free tuition at our community college. If you're in the top 10% of your class you automatically get free tuition for 2 years. Many students go this route and then transfer to a 4 year university.

Also, at many 4 year colleges, being in the top 10% makes you eligible to apply for various scholarships.

 

[Happy Snowman]

That's absolutely what we're seeing in terms of aid - state schools offer scholarships to top athletes but not much to top students and virtually nothing beyond the federal programs for need, while private unis offer more generous packages for both academics and for need. We joke that DD isn't considering any schools that cost less than we earn in a year, but after everything is said and done those schools would cost us less than the $25K state land-grant university would. Fortunately DD is a very driven child and has the kind of profile schools want to see - excellent grades and deep, consistent involvement with a few extracurriculars that she really loves (although she'll try anything once, as long as it doesn't get in the way of softball, swim, or 4H) - so if she keeps to the path she's on now I think she's got a good shot of getting into a top school.

And I've heard the bolded before. The one I suspect she'll end up choosing is about 30 minutes from my SIL's house - DD has already been there, just sightseeing, and we'll be making our first "official" campus visit over summer vacation. It would be a little too far from home for "visit early and often" to be practical if not for the fact that family takes us to the area frequently anyway, but since we're there she'll get the chance to see that campus at a variety of times of year.

Unfortunately the "she" vs "he" will hurt her some....as long as she is realistic and understands that a 10% acceptance rate, or even 20%, isn't a reflection on HER!!! There are only so many seats they can fill and "love thy safety" is a good mantra to instill early and often .

 

[Happy Snowman]

This is a good example of what various private LAC's will offer based on GPA and test score--some figure class rank too, but not many:

http://miamioh.edu/admission/merit-grid/

 

[barkley]

not to be a wet blanket-but just keep in mind on the scholarships (non athletic-they are whole unique breed of their own): REALY read and research the duration they are offered for AND the real cost of continued (to graduation) attendance of any individual college/university.

I say this based on in-depth discussions with financial aid personnel at these institutions as well as administrators of private scholarship foundations.

what I've learned is the bulk of offerings (to those who meet the qualifications) go to freshman, with on average smaller offerings subsequent years. this might not be an issue if a cost issue can in subsequent years be solved by a student transferring to another lower cost college/university if worse comes to worse, but unfortunately some (esp. private from what I've been told) places don't always have easily transferable units. sadly, some institutions (including public) will ply freshman with 1st and 2nd year generous offerings of scholarships only to offer next to none their 3rd year FULLY KNOWING that when those kids go looking at their options they find that while they met their general ed requirements for their major at their current school they are severely lacking at others. the institutions look to the availability of student loans and gamble that the kids will opt to pay a huge out of pocket amount vs. feeling that they have to 'start over' at a lower cost alternative.

imho-it pays to look at a potential institution in the same way you look at a potential career opportunity-does it meet my needs now/are the skills (credits) transferrable for my future. I currently know a young person who was given a freshman 'free ride' at a very well thought of private college, only to find out last summer that the ride was over and she was faced with a potentially huge tuition bill this year. the discussions with her financial aide office resulted little more than them pointing out how much she would save going there vs. transferring (with next to no transferable units) to a state college where she would be 'starting over'

 

[Happy Snowman]

not to be a wet blanket-but just keep in mind on the scholarships (non athletic-they are whole unique breed of their own): REALY read and research the duration they are offered for AND the real cost of continued (to graduation) attendance of any individual college/university.

I say this based on in-depth discussions with financial aid personnel at these institutions as well as administrators of private scholarship foundations.

what I've learned is the bulk of offerings (to those who meet the qualifications) go to freshman, with on average smaller offerings subsequent years. this might not be an issue if a cost issue can in subsequent years be solved by a student transferring to another lower cost college/university if worse comes to worse, but unfortunately some (esp. private from what I've been told) places don't always have easily transferable units. sadly, some institutions (including public) will ply freshman with 1st and 2nd year generous offerings of scholarships only to offer next to none their 3rd year FULLY KNOWING that when those kids go looking at their options they find that while they met their general ed requirements for their major at their current school they are severely lacking at others. the institutions look to the availability of student loans and gamble that the kids will opt to pay a huge out of pocket amount vs. feeling that they have to 'start over' at a lower cost alternative.

imho-it pays to look at a potential institution in the same way you look at a potential career opportunity-does it meet my needs now/are the skills (credits) transferrable for my future. I currently know a young person who was given a freshman 'free ride' at a very well thought of private college, only to find out last summer that the ride was over and she was faced with a potentially huge tuition bill this year. the discussions with her financial aide office resulted little more than them pointing out how much she would save going there vs. transferring (with next to no transferable units) to a state college where she would be 'starting over'

Every single school we researched, ALL of the scholarships, merit awards, that were available were ALL available for 4 years. Most had a stipulation for maintaining a certain GPA or adequate progress but we never saw a single scholarship for the major merit awards granted by colleges that was not a 4 year award providing them met the criteria. Now, some schools have a really high GPA that must be maintained and that isn't always easy but most were pretty reasonable--3.0-3.2 ish or less sometimes. Several schools even had a 2.5 because they didn't want their students to hold back from taking challenging courses. I think the "give it to freshmen and take it away for later years" is a myth. Schools are very concerned about their retention rates and do not want students transferring out. In our experience, there has been more and more money available to students in subsequent years, not less.

If you can provide links that back up your position, fine, but I just don't see that happening with our kids, any of their friends, any of the schools they researched or anything on any of the college dedicated boards that backs that up. I suspect your "young friend" had academic issues that disqualified her from her "free ride". Also, many of the "well thought of" private schools do not give merit aid at all.

Financial aid can and does change depending on your financial situation but the merit awards do not (well, many schools will adjust the awards up to match cost increases).

 

[undertheradar]

Honestly, some of the best sources of information are on college confidential. There are fafsa tips, school reviews, listings of schools that provide higher merit aid, etc. Great source for students and parents and we were guided to it by a poster on the Dis.

 

[barkley]

Every single school we researched, ALL of the scholarships, merit awards, that were available were ALL available for 4 years. Most had a stipulation for maintaining a certain GPA or adequate progress but we never saw a single scholarship for the major merit awards granted by colleges that was not a 4 year award providing them met the criteria. Now, some schools have a really high GPA that must be maintained and that isn't always easy but most were pretty reasonable--3.0-3.2 ish or less sometimes. Several schools even had a 2.5 because they didn't want their students to hold back from taking challenging courses. I think the "give it to freshmen and take it away for later years" is a myth. Schools are very concerned about their retention rates and do not want students transferring out. In our experience, there has been more and more money available to students in subsequent years, not less.

If you can provide links that back up your position, fine, but I just don't see that happening with our kids, any of their friends, any of the schools they researched or anything on any of the college dedicated boards that backs that up. I suspect your "young friend" had academic issues that disqualified her from her "free ride". Also, many of the "well thought of" private schools do not give merit aid at all.

Financial aid can and does change depending on your financial situation but the merit awards do not (well, many schools will adjust the awards up to match cost increases).

I can't post links to conversations i had but if you want to research the concept-check out the Princeton Review article "Will You Get Less Financial Aid After Your Freshman Year" dated 8/2/13. If you read it off the Review's website it provides a link to the College Data website (courtesy of the College Solution website) with instructions on how to access individual school's "money matters data" where it shows how much freshman offerings can differ at individual schools vs. what they offer "all undergraduates". depending on the individual school the difference can be significant.

 

[Happy Snowman]

I can't post links to conversations i had but if you want to research the concept-check out the Princeton Review article "Will You Get Less Financial Aid After Your Freshman Year" dated 8/2/13. If you read it off the Review's website it provides a link to the College Data website (courtesy of the College Solution website) with instructions on how to access individual school's "money matters data" where it shows how much freshman offerings can differ at individual schools vs. what they offer "all undergraduates". depending on the individual school the difference can be significant.

First, this is talking about financial aid, which is not the same thing as merit scholarships. Second, it talks about the possibility that it MIGHT happen. Third, it's not comparing apples to apples. Comparing what they give to freshmen vs all students just isn't an accurate comparison. Say Freshman A gets $20,000 in financial aid as a freshman, but A gets a big departmental scholarship for $15,000 as a sophomore, but only gets $5000 in financial aid because their need is reduced because of the scholarship, it's going to appear that she got less as a sophomore. I think your conversations were not fully disclosing all facets of what really happened. Yes, you do want to look into this but for merit awards, it is pretty unheard of (for the institutional awards) that they get reduced after freshman year.

 

[barkley]

Honestly, some of the best sources of information are on college confidential. There are fafsa tips, school reviews, listings of schools that provide higher merit aid, etc. Great source for students and parents and we were guided to it by a poster on the Dis.

that's a very good site.

if people are interested in learning how their individual efc is actually computed they can go to the ifap.gov.ed website and access the 2015/2016 formula guide that's used by the financial aid offices at the schools. it provides all the forms/tables to manually do your own calculation. it's interesting to look at and see how the calculations can differ for 2 individual students in identical financial/family size situations but residents of different states (because of state and other tax allowances).

 

[jt'smom]

I just want to throw in that not everything is written in stone as far as merit scholarships. My kid, who does have a 3.8 unweighted GPA, but absolutely horrible SAT scores (480R, 460M, 440W) and an even worse ACT composite, got the highest merit scholarship available offered to him from one top tier liberal arts college. He wrote a really great essay and even though he has never taken AP classes, he did pretty much take all honors classes. Plus, he had absolutely no EC's. He does have a long, documented history of not being able to take standardized tests, even though he makes super high grades. He's just a hard worker with no test taking skills, I guess

One other thing, all of the merit scholarships he was offered on his acceptance letters, and there were several of varying amounts, explicitly stated that they were renewable for all four years as long as he maintained a 3.0 GPA, and gave the total four year value.

We must be sucky parents because we've just always said "do the best you can, and somebody will want you somewhere". And a few somebodies did!

 

[WDWMom]

Every single school we researched, ALL of the scholarships, merit awards, that were available were ALL available for 4 years. Most had a stipulation for maintaining a certain GPA or adequate progress but we never saw a single scholarship for the major merit awards granted by colleges that was not a 4 year award providing them met the criteria. Now, some schools have a really high GPA that must be maintained and that isn't always easy but most were pretty reasonable--3.0-3.2 ish or less sometimes. Several schools even had a 2.5 because they didn't want their students to hold back from taking challenging courses. I think the "give it to freshmen and take it away for later years" is a myth. Schools are very concerned about their retention rates and do not want students transferring out. In our experience, there has been more and more money available to students in subsequent years, not less.

If you can provide links that back up your position, fine, but I just don't see that happening with our kids, any of their friends, any of the schools they researched or anything on any of the college dedicated boards that backs that up. I suspect your "young friend" had academic issues that disqualified her from her "free ride". Also, many of the "well thought of" private schools do not give merit aid at all.

Financial aid can and does change depending on your financial situation but the merit awards do not (well, many schools will adjust the awards up to match cost increases).

I totally agree with this. When DD was looking at schools, the two private schools had merit aid for four years. In fact, DD only paid $900 her freshman year plus loans. Her second year was about $1600 as was the rest of the years.


On another note, I did DS's fafsa last night using last year's taxes and his efc went down. I even upped his income because I know he made more money. Go figure. Not sure how that works.

 

[Colleen27]

Unfortunately the "she" vs "he" will hurt her some....as long as she is realistic and understands that a 10% acceptance rate, or even 20%, isn't a reflection on HER!!! There are only so many seats they can fill and "love thy safety" is a good mantra to instill early and often .

Fortunately she does. She attends a camp there every summer through 4H and would be perfectly content there if it works out that way. Ideally she wants to be further from home - her "safety" is only two hours' drive - but she likes the town and the campus and they have a very strong bio program which is her intended field of study.

Every single school we researched, ALL of the scholarships, merit awards, that were available were ALL available for 4 years. Most had a stipulation for maintaining a certain GPA or adequate progress but we never saw a single scholarship for the major merit awards granted by colleges that was not a 4 year award providing them met the criteria.

That's what we're seeing too. We've come across some smaller non-renewable scholarships of a couple-few thousand dollars for freshmen who meet certain conditions, but most are renewable if the student maintains a specified GPA or other qualifying criteria.

 

[Happy Snowman]

I just want to throw in that not everything is written in stone as far as merit scholarships. My kid, who does have a 3.8 unweighted GPA, but absolutely horrible SAT scores (480R, 460M, 440W) and an even worse ACT composite, got the highest merit scholarship available offered to him from one top tier liberal arts college. He wrote a really great essay and even though he has never taken AP classes, he did pretty much take all honors classes. Plus, he had absolutely no EC's. He does have a long, documented history of not being able to take standardized tests, even though he makes super high grades. He's just a hard worker with no test taking skills, I guess

One other thing, all of the merit scholarships he was offered on his acceptance letters, and there were several of varying amounts, explicitly stated that they were renewable for all four years as long as he maintained a 3.0 GPA, and gave the total four year value.

We must be sucky parents because we've just always said "do the best you can, and somebody will want you somewhere". And a few somebodies did!

That really is unusual to get that much money with such low SAT's. Maybe they only awarded based on GPA??? Even admissions with just a 3.8 and no EC's is unusual. He must have had something they wanted though?

 

[IDoDis]

I just want to throw in that not everything is written in stone as far as merit scholarships. My kid, who does have a 3.8 unweighted GPA, but absolutely horrible SAT scores (480R, 460M, 440W) and an even worse ACT composite, got the highest merit scholarship available offered to him from one top tier liberal arts college. He wrote a really great essay and even though he has never taken AP classes, he did pretty much take all honors classes. Plus, he had absolutely no EC's. He does have a long, documented history of not being able to take standardized tests, even though he makes super high grades. He's just a hard worker with no test taking skills, I guess

One other thing, all of the merit scholarships he was offered on his acceptance letters, and there were several of varying amounts, explicitly stated that they were renewable for all four years as long as he maintained a 3.0 GPA, and gave the total four year value.

We must be sucky parents because we've just always said "do the best you can, and somebody will want you somewhere". And a few somebodies did!

The good essay is probably what cinched it for him. A friend of mine told me last year that she asked someone in the scholarship office of one of our state universities, how decisions are made since all of the applicants already met the academic criteria. The guy told her it all came down to the essays and that a student who meets the cut-off for ACT/SAT and GPA is not given priority over a student with higher test scores and GPA within each scholarship level. The essay nails it.

My DD received a full tuition and fees merit scholarship with some extra $ left over for other expenses (housing, books, etc) at both of our large state schools. She also received 6k in two outside non-renewable scholarships that she is using this year. One of those scholarships can can reapply for, so we are keeping our fingers crossed that she gets another award. As tuition increases each year, the scholarships generally do not, so that could be why a pp said they paid more after freshman year.

Hard work in high school does pay off.

 

[disykat]

One other thing, all of the merit scholarships he was offered on his acceptance letters, and there were several of varying amounts, explicitly stated that they were renewable for all four years as long as he maintained a 3.0 GPA, and gave the total four year value.

This is what we saw on MOST websites too. That said, older son's chosen school doesn't give gpa based merit aid and younger son's college explicitly stated merit awards are for freshman year only. It all comes down to reading the fine lines at your chosen school to see what's available, what's renewable, etc.

 

[barkley]

This is what we saw on MOST websites too. That said, older son's chosen school doesn't give gpa based merit aid and younger son's college explicitly stated merit awards are for freshman year only. It all comes down to reading the fine lines at your chosen school to see what's available, what's renewable, etc.

the 'fine lines' ARE important, and it doesn't hurt to call the sponsoring agency of a scholarship for clarification as well (we were not notified nor was there anything in the materials dd filled out for one scholarship she was awarded that it was anything beyond a one time award, a call to see if she could reapply the next year found it was a 2 year award that only required we provide enrollment verification for). it's in those 'fine lines' that you find out if a scholarship or merit aid is available multi year and what an individual institution defines as 'renewable'. now that we're helping ds look around we're seeing more places define as 'renewable' vs. 'guaranteed renewable'.

 

[princesspumpkin]

I think that many students could find the best fit school if they shopped a little differently.

Many students want "top" schools, or schools that have great reputations and everyone knows their name. Then they work hard on molding themselves into the candidate that may have a chance at getting accepted. OF course tens of thousands of other students are doing the exact same thing.

Students need to focus their research on schools that have what they need, but also on schools that want what the student has. Most schools offer similar majors, but what's going outside of the classroom? Is half of the lacrosse team graduating this year and you were captain of your HS team? Is this school in need of a little more diversity (whether it's race, sex, geography, etc)? Would you be towards the top of the academic class at this school? Looking for schools this way can possibly increase not only acceptances, but also merit money offered.

Most schools have some sort of social media page (FB, Twitter) and lots of informal information can be found there. By looking at my daughter's school's webpage, I can see the demographic makeup of the sports teams, who's graduating, where they're from originally, etc.

For my own D, I helped research schools for her. I found a school with a good reputation for her major, an almost new concentration in that major (so it was up and coming and in need of people to enroll in it to gain a solid reputation), and saw on their FB page that her specific "type" was underrepresented within that major, so I felt pretty good that she would be a competitive candidate. She was accepted, with merit money and is blissfully happy there. There were plenty of other colleges that were better known for her major, but her type wasn't in demand, they were extremely expensive and she probably would not have received much merit aid. So, she focused her applications on schools that were a good match for everyone (her academically and socially, for us financially).

There's no need to go into major debt for an undergraduate degree if one shops smartly.

 

[barkley]

I think that many students could find the best fit school if they shopped a little differently.

Many students want "top" schools, or schools that have great reputations and everyone knows their name. Then they work hard on molding themselves into the candidate that may have a chance at getting accepted. OF course tens of thousands of other students are doing the exact same thing.

Students need to focus their research on schools that have what they need, but also on schools that want what the student has. Most schools offer similar majors, but what's going outside of the classroom? Is half of the lacrosse team graduating this year and you were captain of your HS team? Is this school in need of a little more diversity (whether it's race, sex, geography, etc)? Would you be towards the top of the academic class at this school? Looking for schools this way can possibly increase not only acceptances, but also merit money offered.

Most schools have some sort of social media page (FB, Twitter) and lots of informal information can be found there. By looking at my daughter's school's webpage, I can see the demographic makeup of the sports teams, who's graduating, where they're from originally, etc.

For my own D, I helped research schools for her. I found a school with a good reputation for her major, an almost new concentration in that major (so it was up and coming and in need of people to enroll in it to gain a solid reputation), and saw on their FB page that her specific "type" was underrepresented within that major, so I felt pretty good that she would be a competitive candidate. She was accepted, with merit money and is blissfully happy there. There were plenty of other colleges that were better known for her major, but her type wasn't in demand, they were extremely expensive and she probably would not have received much merit aid. So, she focused her applications on schools that were a good match for everyone (her academically and socially, for us financially).

There's no need to go into major debt for an undergraduate degree if one shops smartly.

i SO agree with you.

along the same lines-i wish more students would take into consideration if the career path they are working towards is or IS NOT one that is heavily influenced by the name of the college they will attend. i understand that choice of college is VERY important with some career paths, but i also know that there are other career paths where with the exception of attending a very poorly thought of institution, going to the much more expensive 'name' college is not going to open any more doors/expand future earnings vs. attending much lower cost alternatives.

now if money is not an issue-that's fine, but what gets me is as a parent i see so much effort on the part of many to educate their kids on budgeting, not falling into the credit card trap, choosing a career path that can be rewarding while balanced with earning potential that will be self sustaining...but then i see a significant population of the same parents actively encouraging their kids to go into horrendous student loan debt in order to attend their high cost dream school with a major that even after generous financial aid (merit and need based) will end up costing out of pocket upwards of 3x what they would have paid elsewhere-and with a degree that gotten at the less expensive alternative offers the identical job opportunities and life long earnings potential. we have family members who did this with their kids, and now wonder why 10 years after those kids graduated they are so 'behind' financially as compared to many of their peers who graduated with the same degrees. what they don't think about is how many of those peers went to the lower cost alternatives and while they may have had student loans they were able to pay them in full in the short term and often quickly secure graduate degrees. their kids will be saddled with student loans for decades and in at least one case is taking on more for a grad degree that i suspect will never (cost vs. increased earnings potential) be so much as a wash

 

[Happy Snowman]

There are very, very, very few career paths that are tied to going to certain schools. I can't really think of any that are really....but the perception that there is is prevalent and that is why some people, well a lot of people, feel like they have to go to one of a handful of schools.