likely it is to do so. Harvard and Princeton, for example, offer generous need-based
packages, but many families who don’t meet need eligibility(资格)have been willing
to pay whatever they must for a big-name school.
For small regional colleges that struggle just to fill seats, merit aid can be an
important revenue-builder because many recipients still pay enough tuition dollars
over and above the scholarship amount to keep the institution running.
But for rankings-conscious schools in between, merit aid has served primarily as
a tool to recruit top students and to improve their academic profits. “They’re trying to
buy students,” says Skidmore College economist Sandy Baum.
Studies show merit aid also tends to benefit disproportionately students who
could afford to enroll without it.
“As we look to the future, we see a more pressing need to invest in need-based
aid,” says Monica Inzer, dean of admission and financial aid at Hamilton, which has
offered merit scholarships for 10 years. During that time, it rose in US News & World
Report’s ranking of the best liberal arts colleges, from 25 to 17.
Merit aid, which benefited about 75 students a year, or about 4% of its student
body, at a cost of about $ 1 million a year, “served us well,” Inzer says, but “to be
discounting the price for families that don’t need financial aid doesn’t feel right any
more.”
Need-based aid remains by far the largest share of all student aid, which includes
state, federal and institutional grants. But merit aid, offered primarily by schools and
states, is growing faster, both overall and at the institutional level.
Between 1995-96 and 2003-04, institutional merit aid alone increased 212%,
compared with 47% for need-based grants. At least 15 states also offer merit aid,
typically in a bid to enroll top students in the state’s public institutions.
But in recent years, a growing chorus(异口同声)of critics has begun pressuring
schools to drop the practice. Recent decisions by Hamilton and others may be “a sign
that people are starting to realize that there’s this destructive competition going on,”
says Baum, co-author of a recent College Report that raises concerns about the role of
institutional aid not based on need.
David Laird, president of the Minnesota Private College Council, says many of
his schools would like to reduce their merit aid but fear that in doing so, they would
lose top students to their competitors.
“No one can take one-sided action,” says Laird, who is exploring whether to
seek an exemption(豁免)from federal anti-trust laws so member colleges can discuss