U. expands financial aid allotment

As the cost of a college education rises, many schools are trying to increase their financial aid budgets.

Penn's financial aid budget, currently $65.7 million, will be increased by 7.5 percent in grants and scholarships, Acting Executive Director of Budget and Management Analysis Bonnie Gibson told the University Board of Trustees on Thursday -- and its Ivy League peers are following suit.

With tuition and room and board increasing 4.8 percent next year, University President Judith Rodin said that a strong financial aid program is important for attracting a diverse class.

Our high financial aid budget "is a critical component to the overall mission of the University, which is to be accessible to students of absolute quality, some of whom also have need," Rodin said.

Penn's financial aid program is technically second to Harvard University, whose financial aid budget is $68 million.

And though Harvard's aid budget surpasses Penn's, 60 percent of Penn students receive aid, compared to only 47 percent of Harvard's student body.

Princeton University has changed its financial aid program recently, abolishing student loans and replacing them all with grants.

In the coming year, Princeton will increase its aid budget, while the proportion of students on aid will stay constant at 52 percent.

Brown University also plans on increasing financial aid -- the university's spokesman Mark Nickel said that its budget target for financial aid is $44 million.

"The term is 'budget target,' because the university budget will not be officially approved until May," he said.

To compensate for a tuition increase, Yale University's financial aid budget for next year is $40 million, up from $34 million.

Penn offers less money to students in grants than Princeton and Yale do, but Rodin emphasized that Penn's financial aid budget is still greater than that of the other six Ivies.

"The idea that sometimes floats around is that because we give somewhat less in grants than Princeton and Yale makes people think that we don't offer a lot of financial aid," she said. "But we do."

Universities have only just started to develop distinct financial aid packages. Originally, all the Ivy League schools applied the same formula to all students when determining financial aid packages.

However, about 12 years ago, a student sued several universities -- and due to antitrust laws, it was decided that schools may not discuss financial aid packages with one another.

"We are under consent decree not to share comparative data," Rodin said.

Rodin added that the antitrust decision has led to post-admission negotiations in which universities decide whether they want to improve upon other schools' aid packages on an individual basis.

But, according to Rodin, the differences in the schools' original offers are very small.

"Basically, it's at the margin, within the same narrow band," she said. "Differences in original offers are only one or two hundred dollars."

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