| School | No-loan financial aid for families meeting these eligibility requirements: |
|---|---|
| Amherst College | No max of income |
| Arizona State University | Arizona residents with family income of up to $25,000 [1] |
| Bowdoin College | No max of income [2] |
| Bridgewater State College | Offers unsubsidized or subsidized loans to any student who files the FAFSA.[3] |
| Brown University | Family income below $100,000 [4] |
| Caltech | Annual income below $60,000 [5] |
| Claremont McKenna College | No max of income [6] |
| Colby College | No max of income; all students [7] |
| Columbia University | All students eligible for financial aid regardless of family income[8] |
| Cornell University | Annual income below $75,000 |
| Dartmouth College | Annual income below $75,000 [9] |
| Davidson College | No max of income |
| Duke University | Annual income below $40,000[10] |
| Emory University | Annual income below $50,000 |
| Haverford College | First-year students with financial need. [11] |
| Harvard University | Annual income below $60,000 |
| Lafayette University | Annual income below $50,000[12] |
| Lehigh University | Annual income below $50,000[13] |
| MIT | Annual income below $75,000[14] |
| University of Maryland, College Park | Maryland resident with 0 EFC. [15] |
| Michigan State University | Michigan resident with family incomes at or below the federal poverty line. [16] |
| Northwestern University | Family income lower than approx. $55,000. [17] |
| North Carolina State University | Income less than 150% of the poverty line. Requires the family to have "limited assets," regardless of state residency. [18] |
| University of Chicago | Students who demonstrate financial need and whose annual family income totals $75,000 or less.[19] |
| UNC Chapel Hill | 200% of federal poverty line ($24,000 to $37,000) |
| University of Pennsylvania | Annual income below $100,000 [20] |
| Pomona College | No max of income [21] |
| Princeton University | No max of income |
| Rice University | Annual income below $80,000 |
| Stanford University | Annual income below $45,000 |
| Swarthmore College | Anyone with financial need [22] |
| Tufts University | Annual income below $40,000[23] |
| Vanderbilt University | No cap.[24] |
| Vassar College | Annual income below $60,000.[25] |
| University of Virginia | 200% of federal poverty line ($24,000 to $37,000) |
| Washington and Lee University | No max of income |
| Washington University in St. Louis | Annual Income below $60,000[26] |
| Wellesley College | $60,000[27] |
| Wesleyan University | $40,000[28] |
| College of William and Mary | $40,000 (VA residents only) |
| Williams College | No max of income |
| Yale University | No max of income |
Some of these universities are the most expensive and most prestigious universities in the country. These universities give grants (and I believe federal work-study opportunities) to allow admitted students under the specified circumstances to have no loans. In addition there are outside scholarships listed in websites like fastweb.com and questbridge.org that further award scholarship money to students. Public universities are subsidized by the state, although the percentage of state funds has dramatically decreased, and further democratize going to university. For some students that do not have the qualifications to gain admission to the colleges mentioned before then it is hard to pay for college. However, there are thousands of resources that may allow students to pay for college, however these students have to be actively looking for information. Scholarships are not just knocking at the door, the student has to find them. Students seeking aid should not limit themselves to the overworked counselor or to staying in a specific region but rather be open to possibilities. Maybe the "perfect fit" college is not affordable but there are still various other schools that provide a quality education. Maybe schools, especially underfunded schools, should provide early information (freshman year) on these scholarships so that students are motivated to work hard and find these opportunities. Today, anyone in the United States with the motivation and the academic abilities (including extracurricular activities) can gain admission to Ivy Leagues and in some cases not even have to pay. The information is out there, one just has to find it.
Reading this table and considering the information that Daniel presented in his post once again brings up a very interesting question with regard to the financing of a college education: who should pay for it? Jeffrey Williams attempted to tackle this same question in his article, "The Pedagogy of Debt" and concluded that the state is not only most capable of carrying the cost of higher education but that it is also in the best interest of society for it to do this. With our current system, financial limits are a primary reason that most students choose to attend certain schools over others and also a reason that some people are not able to go to college at all. Although the schools listed in the above table have no-loan policies for students who meet certain criteria (although a few do have unconditional no-loan policies), this still means that household income becomes a factor in deciding what school to attend. In high school, I remember hearing from counselors and teachers that there is "so much" scholarship money out there that is "just waiting to be grabbed by somebody," and that this can be a great help to pay for college and widen ones horizon. However, as it turns out, most of these scholarships are applied for by countless students yet only awarded to a select few. As a result, it is very easy to put hundreds of hours of hard work into applying for something that has little or no payoff. It means that almost from the beginning, students see themselves as limited by their ability to find scholarships or the amount of money that their parents have saved up, not their own skills and abilities. I think Williams is right in arguing that with government-financed education, talent and effort comes to gain much more importance than it would have otherwise, because nobody is limited by anything except for their own effort and determination. I find it interesting that the same people who complain about the potential monetary costs of government involvement in education often seem to have no problem spending money on other apparently more important things like a $3 trillion war in Iraq (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/07/AR2008030702846.html). While it would be expensive if the government decided to pay for higher education for Americans in one form or another, we must remember that it is a direct investment in our future: not one that sees money and resources drained overseas, but one that strengthens our domestic workforce and economy in the future.
ReplyDeleteIt is an inevitable fact that the universities in the USA are too expensive in comparison with the universities in the other developed countries. Sometimes the only possibility of students to study at these universities is only if they have scholarships or other means of financial aid. Most of the universities are giving actually merit-based scholarships that help successful students to study at the most expensive universities in the country. But most of the students do not meet the requirements and so they have to find other ways to pay their tuitions and fees. As we discussed in class, one of the possiilities is to take loans on their names to pay their college degree cost and then return them to the state when they start to work. But what about the international students who do not have such an opportunity? They are obliged to meet their requirements only with their families' efforts.
ReplyDeleteAnother major problem with the scholarships offered by the universities are the admission criterias. The most appreciated criteria is the SAT score which is a test that does not determine how much English or maths you know, but just how well you take the SAT. Although you may have a good performance in high school and a hogh GPA, you may e mot good at taking the SAT and because of this you do not earn a financial aid. Later you may continue to have a good GPA, even higher than the students who have scholarships, but you are not ale to earn a scholarship anymore because they are determined before you enter the university by your SAT score. So I think that the university administrators should take this unfair fact into consideration when they make their policies.