ALready submitted the fafsa.......now what?

wait, twiddle your thumbs, and make sacrifices daily to the $$ god.

 

EFC = Estimated Family Contribution.

If your EFC = 0, they are saying that you have no outside source of funding and are a high priority for financial aid.

 

you know there are other websites on the internet besides sdn. nudge, nudge, wink, wink.

 

1. Go buy some candles and matches.

2. Set up an altar. It must include at least one picture of the medical school and, if possible, the picture from the person in charge of the Financial Aid Office.

3. Light a match.

4. Use the match to light the candle.

5. Kneel down and pray for some need-based aid and anything you don't have to pay back.


That is all.

 

just wondering...

if u have a very low EFC...

would it play a factor in the adcom's decision regarding an acceptance...?

 

I don't think it would, I doubt they would look at your FAFSA information while making admission decisions.

 

no. most of the best schools are need-blind when it comes to admissions, and merit-blind when it comes to aid.

 

Not true. Medical schools use their own calculations to estimate need. That's why most require parental tax returns.

Huge misconception: Even when entering parental data, FAFSA EFC does NOT take parent's income into account.

 

I think most medical schools have merit scholarships available... Of course they vary in amount and number by school

 

That is very, very different from what the fin aid person at BU told us.

 

moving to financial aid ...

And yes, FAFSA doesn't take into consideration your parents income. Graduate students in medicine are considered independant. HOWEVER, many schools require you to submit your parents information for need-based scholarships.

 

I hope mine is the same Because I'm 24 now I am finally considered independant in the federal government's eyes in terms of financial aid. I believe that people who are 23 and younger still need to input their parents finances. And I know that I don't make very much money, so the EFC has got to be low

 

I think that the people at BU are probably wrong. There would be no way that my EFC was 0. But hey who knows.

 

yeah, I really like the idea of them being wrong.

 

Your EFC is 0 because you didn't make enough money for them to assume you could contribute to your education.

They do take your parents income into account in the sense of need-based scholarships.

Look at it this way: Most traditional applicants applying straight out of college have a very low EFC because you're full time students. Since everyone looks poor on paper, when they look to award whatever need based scholarships/grants a school may have, they use parental income. Thinking being, if your parents are butt poor, you are probably more deserving of something need-based than the kid with rich parents.

Not perfect, but I shudder at the thought of the upper middle class kid getting a need-based scholarship rather than someone who truly grew up poor.

 

Yeah I know. I am just saying that the FAFSA EFC doesn't take into account parental information. If it did my EFC would have been higher than 0. Anyway, I made over 5k mostly in the summer, but I guess they saw my empty savings account and figured that I won't have any money next year either.

I probably won't be eligible for a lot of need based/campus based aid because my parents are reasonably well off even though they are in huge debt. My mom is retired from teaching and is now running a small business. She makes a good bit of money but has a lot of expenses too. Crazy situation but we'll see how it turns out.

 

Yeah, this question pops up on SDN all the time. You're right, parental income is not included when calculating your EFC, even if you opted to fill out the parental section of the FAFSA. I'm thinking the BU thing above means that BU calculates their own EFC based on both student and parental income/assets. The FAFSA EFC is really just for federal aid and consequently means very little since the amount of need-based federal aid is very small (basically $8500 in subsidized staffords and maybe perkins).

The people who really get the shaft with the EFC thing are nontrads who worked before going back to school. My EFC last year was huge but largely based on income that I would be foregoing when I started school again.