How this Mass. school simplified estimating financial aid
Up until a few years ago, families who logged onto the financial calculator created by Wellesley College were greeted with a warning message. They were told to set aside at least 20 minutes to answer the long list of questions and have their family’s recent income tax forms available. Unsurprisingly, not many people used it.
Two years ago, Phillip Levine, a Wellesley economist, designed a new, less intimidating calculator that’s been so successful it’s spreading to other colleges, according to a report from The New York Times.
About 42,000 people have used the new calculator to estimate their Wellesley tuition in the past two years, compared to 5,000 who used the original calculator. On Monday, the University of Virginia and Williams College in Williamstown, Mass. began using the calculator to estimate their own financial aid contributions.
A 2008 law required colleges to create net price calculators to make financial aid contributions more transparent. Research shows that many low-income students feel uninformed about how much financial aid is available to them, which means they might not apply to the same schools as students of similar skill levels who come from wealthier families.
Levine made the process less complicated by starting over with a new calculator that’s more user friendly. The current tool asks only six questions, which cover financial basics such as family income, home value, investments and whether the applicant has siblings who will be enrolled in college at the same time. But, unlike the old calculator, it doesn’t require users to log in to their College Board accounts, which means anyone can use it—as long as they’re interested in estimating their aid at Wellesley.
Levine told The Times he hopes more colleges will use the calculator to simplify the process of estimating aid. He said several current Wellesley students who used the calculator were surprised at how much aid they would receive, which helped them decide to apply.
Read the full New York Times report here.
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