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It can. The top schools typically give FA to students with family incomes below $180K. If one parent is making $125K the other parent's income could certainly move him to the point where he will not qualify for any aid. It will almost certainly affect the amount of aid he will get.
As I mentioned earlier, this was definitely not out experience with Carnegie Mellon.
The simple answer: all Top 30 universities will offer substantial scholarships/merit aid with most meeting financial need 100%. Public universities can get dicey with the scholarships/merit aid, and most of it seems too competitive (that is, the student needs to apply for it to be considered), but some of it is automatic (not enough to meet 100% of need, however). There are a handful of small, elite, private colleges that do not give financial aid, period, but those are schools that are not on anyone's radar unless they happened to attend a (New England) prep and the parents are on the wealthier side of things.
No, they don't: MIT - Student Financial Services - "We award undergraduate aid on the basis of financial need only. This means that we don’t offer any merit or athletic scholarships."
General Questions | Financial Aid - "As a member of the Ivy League, Brown does not award academic or athletic scholarships.. All financial aid awarded by Brown is need based."
People are clearly mistaking 'scholarships/merit aid' with 'full need'. All of those schools (and several more) are full need.
Full need means you will receive whatever aid you need to make up the difference between your expected contribution and the school's estimate of expenses, but it has nothing to do with 'merit.' It has to do with getting into that incredibly selective and/or well-endowed school in the first place. They consider everyone there as worthy of being there, so official aid is based on need. A student may get a non-school sponsored scholarship, but that's a different kettle of fish.
Don't mistake 'full need' and whatever aid you need as a grant. It can be loans. They just guarantee the funds will be available.
Nor should you mistake 'need' with 'want.' They won't grant you the money for a 3-bedroom apartment off campus and a car just because you'd rather live there than the dorms.
Those last two points are based on my experience actually working for a couple of years at a needs-blind, full-need school. Students felt it should all be grants, and in a few cases, should be 'all you can eat' (but WHY can't get the money to live off campus? I NEEEEED to).
My friend graduated from UChicago and she claims to have received a lot more financial aid through them than when she was accepted to UMichigan. I think her schooling was almost completely paid in full. Of course, she probably came from a household income of less than $50k if I had to guess.
Something is wrong with your math. If one parent is making $125K, then the other parent has to make $0. Any number larger than $0 for the other parent, would bring the family income to above $125K.
For example, if the OP makes $125K. And the other parent makes $100K. That's $225K for the family. That is more than the $125K family income that the OP has. In fact, it exceeds it by $100K. Here's the math:
$225K - $125K (OPs family income) = $100K (excess beyond OP's family income)
If the OP says they have a family income of $125K, there cannot be two parents that make more than $125K.
The OP indicated a single parent family so it absolutely matters what the other parent makes.
Quote:
Originally Posted by NJBest
Read the rest of the thread. Top 10 universities for a particular field. Not top 10 universities overall. Also, check your reading comprehension. I didn't say that only 10 universities have strong faculty. In fact, my statement disputes that.
Whether you meant Top10 or Top 10 by field your comment is equally ridiculous.
People are clearly mistaking 'scholarships/merit aid' with 'full need'. All of those schools (and several more) are full need. .
Exactly. Merit aid gets tossed around all too often as common place in the most selective schools (including K-Luv's post). Per Strawflower's numerous links, that is simply not true. Yes, several schools are "full need". But only after they extract $$'s from the taxpayers (FAFSA). Like you said, many others want the student to contribute via student loans. But the proud mom or dad tell others that their smart child got a "full ride". Now that exaggeration gets re-told with a new level of conviction.
Large universities are research institutions that do not do much for undergraduate students. They even admit this: Harvard and Berkeley have talked about it for years -- and done nothing to make substantive changes.
The typical college professor at a top university is judged on research, not teaching. And many of them can't teach even if they wanted to (they mostly don't.)
From their point of view, teaching undergraduates (beginners) is like the world's greatest violinist teaching beginning violin. The student is simply not advanced enough to benefit from such a master any more than he would benefit from a lesser violinist who would probably better understand the student's problems.
[snip]
The only reason to go to Harvard is to gain a prestigious degree, network with people who can help you, and be around other extraordinary students.
From a learning standpoint, the only reason to go there is to be around those students, who I hope are as amazing as I found them many years ago. It doesn't take long to realize that such students would succeed no matter what. They are doing much more for Harvard than Harvard is doing for them.
The OP has the answer/info he sought, but being that it's Christmastime, I didn't want this chestnut of what I consider dubious wisdom to go unchallenged.
As noted earlier in the thread, I attended Harvard as an undergrad in the 1990s. Are they institutions that place a great deal of energy on research? Absolutely. But does that mean there is not an amazing, engaging experience for undergraduates? Absolutely not.
There are certainly a number of very large lecture courses where the "sage on the stage" imparts wisdom and much of the discussion takes place in graduate student-led sessions. These will generally represent a quarter to 40% of one's time at a school like Harvard. However, the opportunity to have (for instance) Michael Sandel lecture on moral philosophy, or Greg Mankiw or Marty Feldstein on principles of economics, is an amazing experience.
Yet I and my friends got to engage with leading faculty at a very one-on-one level. I had an eight-person seminar class with an eminent, top-rank faculty member who was past president of the American Political Science Association; spending two hours a week with a person like that, and getting to know them on an engaged, first-name basis is also part of the undergraduate experience at a school like Harvard.
My wife had a chance to work in a research lab as an undergraduate assistant for three years with an eminent psychology professor -- a colleague of B.F. Skinner and a National Medal of Science awardee. Although she did not pursue the field of psychology as a graduate student as she thought she might, the experience was powerful and meaningful. She also had small classes and thesis advising time with pre-eminent faculty who knew her on a first-name basis.
I certainly gained a prestigious degree. Networking? Hasn't been something I've leveraged or needed to leverage as an alum. The four years spent there were life-changing, yes, as they are for many college students.
There are plenty of good reasons not to go to an "elite school" -- depending on the field, the strength of an in-state school, in-state tuition options. Residents of NC, VA, MI, CA and TX have far better options on this front than, say, folks from NH, FL, LA, AL, and ND, to pick on a few states. And, I think you can get a great education at many places.
But, if you have an opportunity to attend an elite institution, it is an opportunity to consider and ponder carefully.
The OP has the answer/info he sought, but being that it's Christmastime, I didn't want this chestnut of what I consider dubious wisdom to go unchallenged.
As noted earlier in the thread, I attended Harvard as an undergrad in the 1990s. Are they institutions that place a great deal of energy on research? Absolutely. But does that mean there is not an amazing, engaging experience for undergraduates? Absolutely not.
There are certainly a number of very large lecture courses where the "sage on the stage" imparts wisdom and much of the discussion takes place in graduate student-led sessions. These will generally represent a quarter to 40% of one's time at a school like Harvard. However, the opportunity to have (for instance) Michael Sandel lecture on moral philosophy, or Greg Mankiw or Marty Feldstein on principles of economics, is an amazing experience.
Yet I and my friends got to engage with leading faculty at a very one-on-one level. I had an eight-person seminar class with an eminent, top-rank faculty member who was past president of the American Political Science Association; spending two hours a week with a person like that, and getting to know them on an engaged, first-name basis is also part of the undergraduate experience at a school like Harvard.
My wife had a chance to work in a research lab as an undergraduate assistant for three years with an eminent psychology professor -- a colleague of B.F. Skinner and a National Medal of Science awardee. Although she did not pursue the field of psychology as a graduate student as she thought she might, the experience was powerful and meaningful. She also had small classes and thesis advising time with pre-eminent faculty who knew her on a first-name basis.
I certainly gained a prestigious degree. Networking? Hasn't been something I've leveraged or needed to leverage as an alum. The four years spent there were life-changing, yes, as they are for many college students.
There are plenty of good reasons not to go to an "elite school" -- depending on the field, the strength of an in-state school, in-state tuition options. Residents of NC, VA, MI, CA and TX have far better options on this front than, say, folks from NH, FL, LA, AL, and ND, to pick on a few states. And, I think you can get a great education at many places.
But, if you have an opportunity to attend an elite institution, it is an opportunity to consider and ponder carefully
This is a very balanced view of what it is like at one of these universities. I am jealous.
One of the reasons I think it's balanced is that it's first-person and points out the rich extracurriculars available, yet does not make some of the more ludicrous statements found-on this very board-by some other people.
The best way I can characterize those statements, in a very general fashion, is that the quality of a university experience is related to the chance to publish, or constantly engage in research, and if you don't do those, it's not truly a college education. I find that to be intellectual snobbery, along the lines of 'ha ha! I got mine and you never will.' To your credit, you certainly didn't go anywhere near that.
Those opportunities exist at nearly all colleges, but they're not the end-all and be-all, even at solid, well-known, accredited institutions. Sometimes, you do indeed learn by attending class, doing the reading, and going to office hours-not by reading 2 books a week and constantly 'debating' in class. I'd really like to see how that works when you're learning how to apply differential equations to physics problems.
Last edited by GeorgiaTransplant; 12-23-2014 at 02:13 PM..
Reason: Added original quote
Ok, my oldest is a junior...tons of extra curriculars...top 3 class rank (Good school 450ish in class), will be natl. merit finalist, taking SAT soon but PSAT equates to 1530ish. Solid extra curriculars etc. Caucasian from the state of KS, single parent family, family income 125k.
He's considering a couple of majors, one of which a public university in the area is as good as anybody in and that would likely be a full-ride (or close enough). It's also in a field where you don't go to gradschool so no concerns about that aspect.
I'm naive to what (if any financial help) you can get at some of the top private schools (very rough idea, ball-park) if he were to look at them for something like a business or finance major.
Normally I would think "not much" but the income level is pretty modest if not chump change by many dual-income standards in the higher cost northeast so I didn't know if that impacted anything.
I know there are many other variables but in a general case I looking for something rough like if Harvard is 65k a year would them maybe let him in for 1/2 price? 75%? Etc.
Sorry if this seems like a dumb question for you and yes I will be filling out the FAFSA and so forth but I just doing a quick "smell test" if anyone happens to be able to ballpark.
I'm an Asian-American east coaster and probably over 75% of my Asian-American peers attended Ivy League schools. I'm not bragging, it just is. It's actually kind of a bad thing, but that is another story.
1) Your assertion that 125K is 'chump change' is erroneous, especially from one earner, especially in Kansas. Most of our families made that or less (inflation adjusted). The difference is ... and I'm not trying to be bigoted here, it's just something that happens ... that Asian families save specifically for their children's college education as a #1 priority. They don't go on vacations, buy nice cars or furniture, or go to nice dinners and have drinks. Ever.
2) Nobody gave any of us anything. My parents made combined what you make and we got nothing in terms of grants. Loans yes. The standard stuff. I only got into one Ivy, but a bunch more similar schools (the Hopkinses, etc) and my sister got into a few Ivies and they gave us nothing. My friends also got nothing.
3) I also had white friends in high school whose parents made even less. Probably somewhere on the order of 75-80K today family income, high cost east coast and they got zilch from the Cornells, Columbias, Georgetowns, etc. Again, they got loans yeah. Everybody gets those. You need to probably be significantly lower than median household income to sniff grant $.
4) Again. Need means NEED. Using stingy, education obsessed (to a fault) Asian parents as a model, private schools typically cannot justify giving free $ to people who make 125K a year. If what you say is true and East Coast salaries are inflated, that means that 125K in Kansas is like 175K household a year NY/NJ via one earner. That's a lot of $. That's like a doctor, man. Can you see the kids of a doctor getting free $ to school? Merit is different. But you need to be a superstar beyond superstar to get that at Ivy League level schools.
It is true that some of the Ivies have incredible aid and do the "10% of income up to $180K" thing. In this example, a family making $125K would pay $12K for the child's education - that's a steal. Where it gets trickier is when you get to the non-Ivy but still high-ranking private schools ie Georgetown and Emory. That's why the OP needs to log onto a Net Price Calculator. Every college has one, and they'll give her a much better idea of what she will pay than our speculation here at City-Data.
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