The College Solutions Blog

August 14, 2013

Winning private college scholarships can certainly help make college more affordable, but you need to know the realities of competing for this college cash. Before you start hunting for private college scholarships, here are nine facts about these awards that you need to know: 1. Private scholarships aren’t the biggest source of college cash. I suspect most families believe that...

July 1, 2013

I received this email over the weekend from an anxious father that I wanted to share with you. The dad is having second thoughts about the school that he pressured his daughter to attend. He is already contemplating his daughter transferring next year to a different school. I think his story could generate some interesting discussions about rankings, price, graduate...

March 27, 2013

Many colleges do a horrible job of presenting their financial aid awards in an easy-to-understand way.  As I’ve been explaining in my last two posts, I believe this is largely intentional: What’s Wrong With This Financial Aid Letter Evaluating a Financial Aid Award Recognizing this shameful behavior, the federal government has created a financial aid template called the Shopping Sheet....

March 25, 2013

This is the second day that I’m devoting to evaluating financial aid letters. If you missed it, here is the first post that I wrote on this important subject: What’s Wrong with This Financial Aid Letter? Today I’m sharing another financial aid award that I obtained from Paula Bishop, a CPA from Bellevue, WA, who received this letter from a...

March 22, 2013

Many financial aid letters  — heck almost all of them —  are confusing. I’ve always wondered why award letters are so difficult to understand. Perhaps the staffers generating these letters in the bowels of universities have been conversing in financial-aid speak for so long that they have lost their ability to communicate in standard English. Of course, the cynical explanation...

March 19, 2013

What does the financial aid look like for a school that is generous? In my last post, I illustrated what a stingy university looks like using statistics that you can find on the College Board. If you missed the post, here it is: Is This University Stingy? Today I’m going to use the same tools to illustrate what a school...

March 15, 2013

If you require need-based financial, you should hunt for schools that are generous with their aid packages. This is the advice that I shared in my last college blog post: Where Is the Financial Aid Cash? If you didn’t read it, I’d suggest that you do before continuing on with this post. If money is an issue, students should be...

March 1, 2013

I’ve got to confess that it’s rare that I find a book about college strategies that I like. Today I wanted to share with you a book that I actually believe is helpful. The name of the book is Right College, Right Price: A New System for Discovering the Best College Fit at the Best Price.  Frank Palmasani, who is...

January 29, 2013

I wanted to share this note that I got today from a mother, who wonders about the fairness of merit aid scholarship policies. In my next post, I’ll comment on Rebecca’s note. I’d urge you to share your thoughts on this subject in the comment box below. — Lynn O’Shaughnessy Hi Lynn, I would love it if you would write...

January 25, 2013

I’m devoting my college blog to athletic scholarships again today. If you missed my last post on sports scholarships, here it is: Can This Teen Win a Sports Scholarship? When parents dream of sports scholarships, they are typically hoping for full-ride scholarships. There are, however, precious few of them. There are only six NCAA sports where athletes have a good...