High income families - did you fill out/send the FAFSA and CSS?
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Anonymous
They are discussing merit aid not financial aid. Income has nothing to do with merit aid. |
Anonymous
| No. Did not fill out either form and still got merit aid. |
Anonymous
| What’s the harm in submitting the forms? If a HHI family isn’t sure whether the school requires the forms for merit, shouldn’t they just submit anyway? The worst that happens is they don’t get any aid, which they already knew was likely. Is there a drawback to submitting? |
Anonymous
| Yes, the info should be available on the website somewhere. Yes, some schools require you to fill out the FAFSA even for merit aid. It’s the easy way for them to make sure that they they are using all available buckets of money- in case you mistakenly think you are ineligible. It’s not many schools that do this. |
Anonymous
nope. mine got 28k per year merit-named-scholarship at Fordham, no FAFSA or CSS. Complete surprise merit award came a couple weeks after EA. |
Anonymous
100%. True merit does not need a fafsa/css |
Anonymous
I called all of the schools all my kids applied to. None required FAFSA or a CSS to get merit. So we did not ever fill it out. I would question a school FA dept that cannot answer that question for you. I got quick answers at all the schools. And my kid's got merit at most schools (except T30 schools) |
Anonymous
| No |
Anonymous
Why? My check with each school. My kids applied to 25 schools between them. None of them required FAFSA or CSS in order to be eligible for merit awards. Why provide a school and the government with all that information neatly compiled in one spot? So that it can be compromised? In reality, the only reason to fill either out is if the school says they need it for merit if one parent lost their job, would it put you in the range for FA (you would have to have low assets to begin with). Since that is not the case (we would literally never qualify for any FA), we never filled it out |
Anonymous
So ask to speak to someone else, someone who should know the answer |
Anonymous
Because I don't care to take the time to fill them out. Don't need the school and/or government having ALL of our financial data stored in one place, one place that can be compromised. Sure the govt knows a lot of it from my taxes, but they'd have to work to put it all together. And no university needs those details, unless they are giving my kid merit awards (still not sure why it's needed for Merit anywhere) |
Anonymous
No, some schools require the fafsa/css in order to award a kid merit. Strange, don't see why it's needed, but a small amount do require it |
Anonymous
| No, not worth the time and hassle |
Anonymous
Interesting, when we were at the Fordham open house this fall, they were very clear that students hoping for merit aid needed to submit the CSS and FAFSA. I have submitted the CSS and intend to do the FAFSA this week. My income is not as high as the OPs but likely well above the threshold for financial aid -- but my income fluctuates as an independent consultant and if I were to lose (and be unable to replace) a key contract, we would probably be in FA territory. One of the schools DC applied to was very clear that if you anticipate needing financial aid at any point, you need to submit the CSS and FAFSA when DC applies for freshman admission. So between that and Fordham, I need to get it done! |
Anonymous
| No. Kid got merit aid offers from Pitt and Rutgers. |