College Financing Disconnect

[disneysteve]

You have to do your homework. I am going to guess and DisneySteve can correct me that his daughter did not qualify for any need based financial aid? Any aid she got was merit based?

So sometimes going to a school below your "tier" means you get more merit based money.

Correct. No need-based aid here, but she is getting a $19,000/year academic scholarship. She could have gone to a much "cheaper" state school where she would have gotten nothing making the actual cost very similar.