Paying For College Archives - Dobler College Consulting

Comparing Your Financial Aid Awards

If you’re fortunate enough to have been admitted to multiple colleges one task you will now be faced with is deciding which one is going to be the most affordable option. If you’ve done your homework ahead of time, and know your Expected Family Contribution (EFC), you should have a ballpark idea of what your net, or true, cost is going to look like.

Note that I didn’t say net price.

Net cost is your out-of-pocket cost – it’s what the college will cost you after gift aid (read, free money!) is applied to your overall cost of attendance. If the school’s cost of attendance, which includes tuition, fees, housing, a meal plan and insurance, is $60,000 and they are going to award you with $25,000 in gift aid, your net cost will be $35,000.

If you’re noticing that I didn’t mention loans, then good for you! Loans, while a part of financial aid awards, are not gifted money. Loans have to be paid back, with interest, and therefore should be factored in after your net cost has been determined. They are helpful, but you can’t dismiss the fact that they have to be paid back later.

So, what do you do with all of this information as you try to decide where you will enroll?

First, gather all your award letters and take a close look at them. Award letters are not created equal. Some will be incredibly detailed and will include your EFC and the complete cost of attendance broken down into semesters with the award broken down into categories (gift aid, loans, work-study) while others will show just a total for the year.

Second, create a little spreadsheet for yourself so that you can compare apples to apples. Make columns for each school and then break down the costs and the awards so that you can see the total for each school.

Third, subtract the gift aid from the cost of attendance and you will get your net cost.

Keep in mind that the lowest net cost isn’t always the best offer. And this is where you have to look at what kind of loans you’re being offered and if you’re being offered work-study.

You already know loans have to be paid back, but if you were to take out a small loan and that makes up the difference between your top choice school and the second place one, that loan may make sense for you. Work-study can be a great help as well, but you have to remember that you will be required to work on campus for so many hours each week to earn it. Even then, it is not applied to your bill because you earn the money on a week-to-week basis like a paycheck.

At the end of the day, be honest with yourself in regards to how much you can handle. You are making a decision about the next four years based on information you have for your first year only. What happens when the cost of attendance goes up in your sophomore year? What if you’re working for your work-study money and its affecting how much time you have to study? What if you struggle and lose your merit scholarship?

These are all questions you need to ask yourself before making any decisions. Just keep in mind that you have to make a final decision by May 1st.

If you would like some assistance with your college search or financial aid process, contact me today for a free 60-minute consultation.

Here’s what other families like yours are saying about how Dobler College Consulting made a difference for them.

Eric Mar 16, 2017 College Admissions, College Advising, College Costs, College Counselor, Dobler College Consulting, EFC, Eric Dobler, Financial Aid, how to pay for college, merit aid, Paying For College, Scholarships, Student Loans, Tuition, work-study No Comments

Blog, EFC, Financial Aid, Paying For College

Comparing Financial Aid Awards

Comparing Financial Aid Offers If you’re fortunate enough to have been admitted to multiple colleges you will now be faced with the task of deciding which one is going to be the most affordable option. If you’ve done your homework ahead of time you should have a ballpark idea of what your net cost is going to look like.

Note that I didn’t say net price.

Net cost is your out-of-pocket cost – it’s what the college will cost you after gift aid (read, free money!) is applied to your overall cost of attendance. If the school’s cost of attendance, which includes tuition, fees, housing, a meal plan and insurance, is $55,000 and they are going to award you with $23,000 in gift aid, your net cost will be $32,000.

So, what do you do with all of this information as you try to decide where you will enroll?

Third, subtract the gift aid from the cost of attendance and you will get your net cost.

Keep in mind that the lowest net cost isn’t always the best offer. And this is where you have to look at what kind of loans you’re being offered and if you’re being offered work-study.

These are all questions you need to ask yourself before making any decisions. Just keep in mind that you have to make a final decision by May 1st.

If you would like some assistance with your college search or financial aid process, contact me today for a free 60-minute consultation.

Here’s what other families like yours are saying about how Dobler College Consulting made a difference for them.

Eric Mar 17, 2016 College Admissions, College Advising, College Applications, College Costs, College Counselor, Dobler College Consulting, EFC, Eric Dobler, Financial Aid, how to pay for college, merit aid, Paying For College, Student Loans No Comments

Blog, Financial Aid, Paying For College, Scholarships

Scholarship Searching Made Easier

With the frenzy of college application deadlines finally winding down families are starting to apply for financial aid. And while some of you will qualify for need-based aid, some of you will not. Or, you will qualify but the award may not be enough to get you where you need to be.

Having said that, if there is a gap between what the college is offering you and what you can afford to pay, spending some time applying for private scholarships can help ease that burden. Scholarships can be found just about anywhere and sometimes getting started can be rather difficult.

Today, I’d like to share a few tips to help make that a bit easier:

1. If you know what you want to major in, you should start looking for scholarships through professional organizations and associations affiliated with that field. For example, here’s a list of scholarships offered through the National Society for Professional Engineers (NSPE) for students interested in majoring in engineering.

2. To narrow down internet search results, trying searching more specifically such as “biology scholarships 2018 2019”.

3. Make good use of social media. The ScholarshipExperts.com Pinterest board has over 1,400 scholarships!

4. Beware of scams. It should never cost you more than a postage stamp to apply for a scholarship. Also NEVER give out your social security number or bank information.

5. Start your search locally and be prepared to do the work that other students won’t. Check out scholarship opportunities through your parents’ employers, local organizations, your bank or credit union, the town library, your church and, most importantly, your school counseling office.

6. Searching for scholarships is like a part-time job. It’s not a one and done deal. The more you search and the more you apply, the more likely you are to win something.

7. When you are using a scholarship search engine like the ones on FinAid or FastWeb you must fill out the profiles completely if you want to have the best chances of finding and winning scholarships. Incomplete profiles are not going to help you.

8. If you have to write an essay, apply the same rules for college application essays: Grab the reader’s attention in the first two sentences and tell a story. If your essay bores you, it will most definitely bore the scholarship selection committee person who has to read it.

9. Keep in mind the essays you’ve already written for college applications. Recycle and re-purpose where you can to save time, but pay close attention to what each essay prompt is asking you – a recycled essay that doesn’t answer the prompt will not help you win a scholarship.

10. Look for “livelines” versus deadlines. Find out what the earliest date is you can apply and apply on that date. Be the one to lead the pack of applications!

At the end of the day, scholarship searching is a process and a time-consuming one at that. Pace yourself and stay positive. Also keep in mind that private scholarships can often affect your financial aid award. Colleges treat scholarships differently, but some will reduce your merit scholarships dollar for dollar for each private scholarship that you earn.

If you’re unsure of how colleges will treat private scholarships, give them a call and ask. It’s better to know up front before you invest a lot of time in your scholarship search.

If you would like some assistance with your college search or financial aid process, contact me today for a free consultation.

Here’s what other families like yours are saying about how Dobler College Consulting made a difference for them.

Eric Jan 14, 2016 College Admissions, College Advising, College Costs, College Counselor, Dobler College Consulting, Eric Dobler, FAFSA, Financial Aid, how to pay for college, Paying For College, Scholarships, Tuition No Comments

Blog, EFC, Financial Aid, Paying For College

Starting Your College Search? Here’s Why You Should Know Your EFC

If you’re like most families, when it comes to finding colleges that will fit, cost is going to be a significant factor. Looking at price tags of $30,000 to $60,000 or more a year for college is overwhelming if not downright scary.

What’s even scarier is that most people don’t even know how much of that price tag a college will expect them to pay.

Sure, they have an idea of what they can afford to pay, but when it comes down to how much money a family will have to contribute towards college costs, and their true financial aid eligibility, most people are in the dark.

Parents of freshmen, sophomores and juniors, I’m talking to you. Go figure out your EFC.

EFC stands for expected family contribution. It is the amount of money you will be expected to contribute towards one year of college costs. While it won’t paint the entire picture for you, it will serve as a starting point before you venture into how generous a school is with their aid. You won’t know your official EFC until after you’ve completed the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) but knowing a rough estimate of your EFC now will help you plan your college search more strategically.

For example, let’s say your EFC is $25,000. If you are looking at a college where the cost of attendance is $45,000 you can immediately see that you could be hoping to receive $20,000 in aid. Conversely, if the college’s cost of attendance is $20,000, you shouldn’t be expecting anything.

In the case of the former, $20,000 is a big difference to make up. The next step is to understand just how generous a school is and if they are going to help you out. By looking at how much of your need a college will meet, you can then do the math and determine how much you should be expecting, if anything. Staying with this example, a school who meets 50% of your need would have $10,000 in aid for you while a college who meets 75% of your need would have $15,000 in aid. How much of your need a college meets varies from college to college so look closely at the numbers so you know what to expect.

Outside of your ability to pay, some colleges also factor in how competitive you are as an applicant when they determine how much aid to award you. The stronger you are as an applicant, the more desirable you are to the college and, therefore, the more likely you are to receive aid.

So, do yourself a favor and obtain your estimated EFC now. Write it down, understand it and use it when you are researching schools and want to know what a school is going to cost you.

If you would like some assistance with your college search, contact me today for a free 60-minute consultation.

Here’s what other families like yours are saying about how Dobler College Consulting made a difference for them.

Eric Oct 02, 2015 College Admissions, College Advising, College Applications, College Costs, College Counselor, College Lists, Dobler College Consulting, EFC, Eric Dobler, Financial Aid, how to pay for college, Paying For College, Tuition No Comments

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Need Blind Versus Need Aware and Why You Should Know the Difference

Muhlenberg College

If you’re like most families, you’re concerned with how much four years of college is going to cost you. My boys are two and six years old, and I worry about it already. And while so much of the college search is focused on working through the differences between colleges to find that “right school”, all too often one major difference is overlooked.

That difference is whether a school is need blind or need aware.

Need blind schools don’t consider an applicant’s financial need when making admissions decisions, but many are not able to meet applicants’ full need with their financial aid packages without adding work study (which rarely helps a family pay for college) and unrealistic loan options. Highly selective colleges like Yale and Harvard belong to a very small group of schools who are completely need blind and who meet full need. Due to massive endowments, they have unlimited financial aid budgets. If a student is admitted to these colleges they will have 100% of their financial need met.

Need aware schools do consider finances in their admissions decisions, but this control can give colleges the ability to meet full need for all accepted applicants. They must manage an annual financial aid budget that has limitations but by paying honoring these limitations, the colleges are trying to make sure that the student can actually attend. While some students would say a need aware policy is unfair and that decisions should not be made due to financial constraints, the reality is that there is only so much money to go around.

Some schools are a combination of both and while neither approach is perfect, you absolutely need to understand how their application review operates. Earlier this month I was visiting colleges in eastern Pennsylvania and several of them indicated that they are need blind until they get to the last 15-20% of their decisions. At that point, an applicant who has a greater ability to pay would get the nod over a student who was going to need significant financial aid in order to attend.

So how can a family best assess its options? Ask the right questions, of course.

When you visit a college or talk to admission counselors at high school visits or college fairs, ask them if they are need blind or need aware. Let them explain how they review applications so that you can fully understand how your ability to pay may affect your college applications. You may be disappointed by what you hear, especially if you feel your family’s financial situation may affect your chances at a need aware college, but without knowing how a college will treat you, you run the risk of greater disappointment when the financial aid award doesn’t come close to making the school affordable.

In the college search and application process, information is everything.

If you would like some assistance with your college search, contact me today for a free 60-minute consultation.

Here’s what other families like yours are saying about how Dobler College Consulting made a difference for them.

Eric May 04, 2015 College Admissions, College Advising, College Applications, College Costs, College Counselor, College Lists, College Rankings, Dobler College Consulting, EFC, Eric Dobler, Financial Aid, how to pay for college, Paying For College, Tuition No Comments