Student Aid Form 2012 - 2013: Fill & Download for Free

The eight colleges that play sports together in the Ivy athletic league (Ivy League ) and many of the other elite Private universities like MIT, Duke, Stanford, Caltech, etc. offer Up To full financial aid to any student who Requested financial aid during the application process. (see below about Need-blind and need-aware).Most of those universities are Need-Blind for US citizens, permanent residents and legal refugees. However, most of those universities are Need-Aware in the admissions process for international applicants. Most need-aware colleges will Never provide financial aid to an undergraduate student if they did Not request financial aid during the initial application process (freshman application or transfer application). Whereas a Need-Blind university will provide financial aid whenever a student applies for the aid.However, the application can be a tedious process since the applicant and All of her/his parents must fill out a daunting amount of forms which must be verified by an independent agency in the applicant’s country (for the USA, the colleges rely upon the Federal IRS. Twice I had to wait for IRS verification when my son was requesting financial aid from Villanova in 2012 and 2013). You all fill out the FAFSA forms (US only) and the PROFILE forms (everyone else) and there may be another set of forms that are used.FAFSA - Free Application for Federal Student AidApply for College Financial Aid (PROFILE)I know families that:The college demanded complete bank statements for all of the siblings (under the age of 16) of the applicant to make certain that the family was not hiding money in the siblings’ namesThe college demanded a huge amount of additional paperwork for families that owned a small business. Many colleges look at small businesses as places to hide moneyThe Plus side is that some applicants get full financial aid. For example recently MIT stated that 35% of the MIT undergraduates received financial aid in excess of the cost of tuition (i.e. MIT was also assisting with the cost of room and board and books/supplies)NOTE: All of the colleges look to the Family and the Applicant to determine an Expected Family Contribution (EFC). The colleges all expect that the student will contribute to that EFC. Therefore, do Not think that each Summer you will be lying on the beach somewhere for the entire Summer. The student is Expected to get a Summer Job each and every Summer prior to being an undergraduate at college and Earn several Thousand dollars (US) from that and Contribute that money to their education. Or, Borrow from the Federal Government (Direct Loans). Indeed, roughly 30% of the 2017 MIT graduating students with bachelors degrees owed an average of $20,000 in student loans. And this is at a college that guarantees up to full student aid. Every student has “skin in the game”.I did Not borrow money to attend MIT as an undergraduate (1969 - 1973) and I worked an average of 10 hours per week as an intramural sport referee/umpire to make spending money. I graduated with no loans, but times were different back then.Need-Blind admission process, then you can apply for financial aid at Any time as an undergraduate.Need-Aware admission process, then you must apply for financial aid when you apply to the college or you may Never apply for financial aid from the college.FAFSA and PROFILE forms. Go online and read. Also use the net-price calculators that US universities are Mandated by the Federal Government to provide.Enjoy the financial aid application process (and for the males that includes registering with the Selective Service for the draft…) it is part of your overall education.

Q. What is the easiest Ivy League school to get into as a history major?A. Although still in the Ivy League, Cornell then Brown/UPenn/Dartmouth are less selective. Cornell has the largest class size, is more STEM geared and is quasi public/private.A number of factors influence a college admissions decision your grades, test scores, extracurriculars, and recommendations. Your strength as a candidate will depend on how these and other factors combine to form a complete profile of you as an applicant.IVY LEAGUE ADMISSIONSThe term Ivy League actually refers to a collegiate athletic conference composed of sports teams from eight private colleges and universities in the northeastern United States. Though the term officially refers to an athletic conference, it is more commonly used to refer to these same eight schools in other contexts. Ivy League schools are generally known for their academic excellence and their extreme selectivity.Admissions are handled in slightly different ways. The statistics sometimes reveal varying applicant pools and other times reveal differing priorities in selecting incoming students.For example, while the admissions rate at Brown is a mere 9%, the average SAT of admitted students is around 1425. Conversely, the admissions rate at Dartmouth College is slightly higher at 10.5%, but average SAT scores of admitted students are also higher, around 1446.While this could mean that Brown prioritizes other factors over the SAT, it could also mean that more students apply there, despite having slightly lower SAT scores. It’s impossible to say which is the case, and even so, the numbers vary only slightly.GRADE POINT AVERAGES FOR THE IVY LEAGUEA grade point average, or GPA, is a testament to a student’s work in high school and reflects a scoring average from all of their classes. Often, GPAs are weighed according to the difficulty of a student’s selected courses.To learn more about GPAs, read the CollegeVine articles What is a Good GPA for Top Schools? and Can a Good SAT/ACT Score Offset a Bad GPA?The average GPA of admitted students at a particular school gives you a general idea of the standards expected for admission. Of course, there is never a guarantee. It’s difficult to look at the average GPAs of admitted students because these statistics are not officially released. They must be gleaned from existing data that is mostly self-reported by students. These numbers are based on weighted GPAs on a 4.0 scale. See our article Is Weighted or Unweighted GPA More Important?AVERAGE GPA OF ADMITTED STUDENTSOverall acceptance rate / Average GPA of admitted:Brown University: 9% / 4.05Columbia University: 6% / 4.13Cornell University: 14% / 4.01Dartmouth College: 10.5% / 4.1Harvard University: 5.2% / 4.04University of Pennsylvania: 9.4% / 3.9Princeton University: 6.5% / 3.9Yale University: 6.3% / 4.19Average GPAs are not directly correlated with the acceptance rate. Instead, many different factors affect the decisions made by admissions committees.For more information about the Ivy League:Colleges that are Great Beyond the Famous Eight: How Success and Achievement Exist outside the Ivy League, TooThe Demographics of the Ivy LeagueWhich Ivy League is Right for You?Dealing with Ivy DayLatest PostsUS News Best National Universities1.Princeton University2.Harvard University3.University of Chicago3.Yale University5.Columbia University5.Stanford University7.Massachusetts Institute of Technology8.Duke University8.University of Pennsylvania10.Johns Hopkins University11.Dartmouth College12.California Institute of Technology12.Northwestern University14.Brown University15.Cornell University15.Rice University15.University of Notre Dame15.Vanderbilt University19.Washington University in St. Louis20.Emory University20. Georgetown University20. University of California--BerkeleyIvy League Financial Aid Policies (2013–2014)* Unless otherwise specified, estimated costs are for the 2012-2013 academic year. The percentage of students receiving financial aid is for the 2013-2014 academic year. Costs typically include tuition, room and board, health and other school fees, and personal expenses. Financial aid includes scholarships, grants, loans, and work-study awards.** A need-blind admissions policy means that admissions decisions are based solely on an applicant's academic and personal merit, without regard for their ability to pay tuition and other educational costs. Unless otherwise noted, need-blind admissions policies typically apply only to U.S. citizens and permanent residents.

From all the evidence online, the quick and dirty answer is most likely the SSAT.Here are some statistics on how many students are taking the exam:According to the 2011–2012 Interpretive Guide to the SSAT, there were:13,005 SSAT Test Takers in the 5th Grade14,603 SSAT Test Takers in the 6th Grade17,342 SSAT Test Takers in the 7th Grade99,080 SSAT Test Takers in the 8th Grade23,481 SSAT Test Takers in the 9th Grade10,232 SSAT Test Takers in the 10th Gradeand2,546 SSAT Test Takers in the 11th GradeSo, the total number of SSAT test takers between August 1, 2008 and July 30, 2011 was 177,743.According to this press release: Ameson and SSATB partner up to expand access to SSAT in China, they mention there are 70,000 test takers for the SSAT which we might be able to estimate is the number in 2013 that annually take the exam. Using the stats above from the Interpretive Guide (which is no longer found online), you can see there were approximately 50–60,000 annually as late as 2011 and with the growth we might be able to guess is happening simply by the world population growing, the number being around 70,000 annually makes sense.This post by the SSATB explains the growth between 2011–2012 was a few thousand students: 5 Characteristics of SSAT Test Takers - Admission.orgThe number of testers in 2011-12 was greater than the number of testers in 2006-07 by 3,446 students.And since they like to remove things from online sources (or move the url somewhere else), I’ll post the rest below.2. If you peruse through all the admissions pages of the boarding schools, you’ll see they prefer the SSAT.Here’s possibly the 3rd best US boarding school St. Paul’s saying the SSAT (not the ISEE):The next best, Deerfield, is saying take the SSAT and as a backup, they’ll take the ISEE:Another top boarding school, Hotchkiss, doesn’t place the ISEE in the first position:3. Also, there are no statistics available on how many students take the ISEEAnd finally, if you do some backward engineering, the 70,000 or so SSAT takers yearly should be more than enough to fill most of the spots of most boarding schools. Unless the boarding school numbers are more than 140,000 annually, we can safely assume that the SSAT dominates.And this fellow Quora poster estimates the number to be about 100,000 (How many total students attend elite boarding schools in the US each year?). So, we can safely say that the SSAT probably has more test takers.Appendix:From the SSATB (full) 5 Characteristics of SSAT Test Takers - Admission.org:5 Characteristics of SSAT Test TakersFrom Memberanda, Spring 2013As Michael Gary, SSATB Trustee and Dean of Admission at Phillips Exeter Academy, describes: "If students take the test, they are serious shoppers" (Memberanda, Fall 2011). In these charts, we’ve examined over five years of SSAT-related data to share the characteristics and habits of this large independent-school applicant pool.#1 They are increasingly international.Unique test-taker volume over time does indicate that a growing number of individual students are taking the SSAT, thus joining the overall pool. As you can see, the number of individual students taking the SSAT has been slowly rebounding since the 2006-07 peak and subsequent economic recession. The number of testers in 2011-12 was greater than the number of testers in 2006-07 by 3,446 students. However, the majority of these testers are international students, particularly in Asia.#2 More are taking the SSAT a second time.The vast majority of students take the SSAT just one time (82%). Yet the number of students who take the SSAT more than once slowly increased between 2003 and 2012. In the 2003-04 testing year, 87% of students took the test once, as compared to 82% in 2011-12. Conversely, the percentage of students taking the test two times saw a slow but steady increase from 11% in 2004 to 15% in 2012. This change in test-taking behavior is likely attributable to the rise of test prep services and increased parental anxiety surrounding the independent school admission process. SSATB does not limit the number of times a student might take the standard test.#3 They are casting a wider net.With the decline of the economy since 2008, domestic students may have been seeking more options for financial aid in the last few years, thus sending more score reports to more schools. Since 2007- 2008, there has been a steady decline in the number of students sending 1-2 score reports, and an increase in the number sending 3-5 and 6-8 score reports. The number of domestic students sending 3-5 score reports is up 6% for 2012-2013.In comparison, the number of international students sending 1-2 score reports is down 4% in 2011-2012, while the number of international students sending 3-5, 6-8, and 9-10 reports has remained relatively consistent. However, the international student base continues to cast the widest net, with the number of students sending more than 10 reports up 5% over last year.#4 Their financial pressures persist.The number of SSAT Fee Waivers used by applicants to member schools peaked in 2009 at 7,279. A steep decline of 15% occurred between 2010 and 2011 but promptly picked up again for 2012. There were 1,091 more fee waivers used in 2012 than in 2008. With the 2012-13 test season still underway, 2013’s number is sure to increase.#5 They want a standardized application process.SSATB developed the Standard Application Online (SAO) to simplify the admission process for families. The SAO allows families to use one standardized form to apply to the over 500 schools which accept it. Use is up 447% in the last five years. More than 18,000 applications were submitted through February 2013. The total number of unique applicants has climbed rapidly – up 77% since 2008. The average individual applicant sends 3.2 applications in 2013, as opposed to 1.6 applications in 2008.