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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]What is the likelihood of receiving financial aid (and enough of it) at DC private high schools to make attending possible?

We are a 2-parent, 1-income family with an elementary age child at home.  I know some schools impute a salary for the non-working parent (though I never in my life made as much as some of the annual tuition costs).

Anyone have a story / financial aid award amount to share?  Thank you![/quote]
This is my income although I am a single parent and have one child. We receive 75% FA, plus FA “discounts” for some of the extras (aftercare so that I can work, the mandatory technology, bus, books, etc).

We are URM, but no other standouts like sports or an amazing talent. What I did when applying was check the 990s of all of the schools where DC had an interest in attending, got a true idea of their average award (not just what’s published on their website) and what their incoming donations/funding looks like. Then DC only applied to the ones that made more sense financially. Applied to 4, admitted to 3 and received FA offers of 50%, 75% and 81%. We chose the 75% because it was DC’s #1 school and they could provide help with the extras which actually made it the bigger award and more manageable (still tight, but everything is paid).

DC was also in private for K-8 somewhere else and we received 50% FA, but that school had much lower financial aid to distribute and was a little less costly than our current school. I’m actually paying less at the bigger more expensive school.

When completing the FA application, there is a space for you to tell the committee anything you’d like them to know and I would explain why in the world both parents aren’t working with two school aged children at home (this will matter, and quite frankly both of you should be), but also how financial aid would positively impact your family because otherwise your child would not be able to attend said school and why it’s important for your child. I was also super active with the previous school as well as the current school (PTO, grade rep, field trip chaperone when I could get the time off work, etc) which can also help.

Finally, you need to also contribute to the annual fund. Not a lot because obviously money is an issue, but 100% parent participation is important, so even if you have to split it in monthly payments, you should be donating at least $100-250 to the annual fund.  [/quote]

Thanks for this. Very helpful (not OP). Question, how do you tell aid by 990s? For example, if they have line item of $3M grants and you know 22% of their student body gets aid, do you assume $3m divided by that amount? But then aren’t there some that get 75% and some that get 10% or do you just get the median and assume from there?[/quote]

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