Financial Aid and Loans for Students Crash Course

Different schools have different policies regarding how they offer
financial aids to students. A student seeking financial aid from
any particular institution will, therefore, do well to stay abreast
of information about that particular institution and its regulations
regarding financial aid. Each of these schools has different aims
regarding how much of student financial needs they are willing
to meet. While some schools, like Columbia University, intend to
meet 100% of the students' needs financially, some other
schools go less. Grants are given to students without
repayment. The amount of grant varies based on the level of
education and also the complexity of the study work or project.
In the case of New York University, for example, grants
provided only meet 68% of the student's needs; this means the
student may experience budget gap. This same school gives
most of its aids to its students in the form of loans, which the
student is expected to pay back after graduation.
Some conditions also determine how much of the student's
needs the school can meet. A student with solid academic
performance, for example, can benefit from a higher percentage
of financial aid compared to another student not having such
performance. Some other schools consider the financial strength
of the student or that of his/her parent when offering financial
aids. However, a school like Columbia University, mentioned
earlier, does not utilize such measure to determine who to give
student loan and who not to give; they give their students aids
based on merit alone. It translates to the fact that even Bill
Gate's son can get student aid based on merit in this school.
There are several other schools in the same category; some of
such schools offering their students merit aid are Brown
University, Pomona College, Amherst College, Williams College,
Princeton University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
In calculating merit award, the institutions concerned would
consider the percentage discount off tuition. Private colleges
offer average tuition discount of 33.5%; this means a student
can end up paying only $19,650 if the actual tuition fee is
$30,000. The cut represents 33.5% of the actual fee. In public
college, on the other hand, the student is given just 15% cut
off the actual price.
When seeking for school financial aid, the school can give the
student verbal assurance, but this is never enough. The best
guide a student can have regarding financial aids is the
Common Data Set. Each of the schools in the united states
has a Common Data Set; it is an amazing document, more or
less a treasure trove of statistics on the characteristics valued
by the school in its application, retention, freshmen class profile
and enrollment. The document will equally show the number of
students requiring financial aid from the institution concerned,
as well as the number of students that are given. Furthermore,
the document reveals information about the percentage of
student's needs the institution can meet, how the awards are
split between loans and grants, as well as what average
package is worth. The student can easily search the major
search engines for "Common Data Set" specific for any school.
The internet can reveal information about in-house scholarship
and college aids for easy access. Such information can equally
reveal if a student is qualified for financial aid or not.