Originally Posted by JonLaw
Originally Posted by Bostonian
The obvious answer is that the most selective universities, including the Ivies, Stanford, and MIT, only offer "need-based" scholarships.

My brother-in-law got a significant scholarship to Duke, so Duke provides merit scholarships. It's fairly selective.

Then you're talking scholarship to Duke vs. Penn, for example.

Now that I think about it some more, he got into Harvard, so it was a question of 3/4 schoarship to Duke vs. no $$$ for Harvard.


Most selective private colleges will not offer merit scholarships, but most public universities do. That was my experience years ago.

In the last few years in Texas this has led to the majority of National Merit and Class Valedictorians going to UT rather than the privates. I know I chose public college over private because of the cost - and after digging into the curriculum, I could see no difference.

The privates will offer "assistance" but much of it still leaves the student with large student loans. Which is nuts unless they will be 1/3 or less of your starting salary.

Last edited by Austin; 08/25/11 08:16 AM.