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So, you’re an international student excited about studying in the US, but the cost of college is a determining factor.
How can you develop a cost-conscious school list? How can you predict how much aid you might receive from a given school, instead of just counting on receiving that one full scholarship (spoiler alert: they’re extremely competitive)?
Financial aid at US institutions can be tricky to understand. So much lingo—need-blind, merit-based aid, estimated family contribution, CSS profile, demonstrated need. Luckily, A Step-by-Step Financial Aid Guide for International Students can walk you through the nuances of both calculating the costs of college and applying for financial aid.
One of the first steps to developing a cost-conscious college list is to figure out exactly how much your family can afford. Sit down with your parents or guardians and talk frankly about how much they can pay. Is that for college tuition or does it include living expenses as well? What about costs like visas and flights to and from your home country? Unfortunately, there are also a number of costs just to apply to college. Don’t forget to consider application costs, financial application costs, and, if you intend to take them, standardized testing fees. Too often we see international students not considering all the costs of college beyond tuition itself.
Fast forward: you have a clear sense of your family’s budget and have identified what you’re looking for in a college. (If you’re having trouble with developing a college list, take a look at How to Choose a College: A Step-By-Step Guide for great tips). You have a list of colleges you’re excited about, but you know that the costs of attendance are beyond what your family can afford. Maybe your list is even full of schools that are need-blind or need-aware for international students. That’s great, but it’s only part of the story!
How can you really figure out how much financial aid these colleges are likely to offer you? And how can you find additional colleges that might be better financial fits?
Fortunately, you don’t have to do it blindly. You don’t have to cross your fingers that you’ll receive enough aid to be able to afford a particular school. There are tons of data out there to help you understand how much financial aid a given college offers.
Enter Auxilia. Auxilia is a collaboration between a high school student from India named Vikhyat and the College Essay Guy. The goal: making financial aid data more accessible to international students.
This guide will walk you through:
Financial aid terminology
When to use Auxilia
The data Auxilia provides
How you can use that data most effectively
Mini case studies of colleges and the financial aid they offer
What if the school I’m interested in isn’t on Auxilia?
Broadening your mind
Final thoughts
Financial Aid Terminology
One of the hardest parts of understanding financial aid is all the unfamiliar terms you may run into. Here are a few of the terms you’ll see throughout this article and more generally while researching financial aid.
Cost of Attendance (COA)
This is an estimate of your educational expenses, usually for a year. It includes direct costs (tuition and fees) and indirect costs (room & board and books & supplies).
College Scholarship Service (CSS) Profile
This is an online service provided by College Board, which allows international students to apply for financial aid. It requires you to submit a detailed account of your family’s assets, income sources and financial circumstances.
Demonstrated Need
This is the remainder when you subtract your EFC from the COA. It’s essentially how much aid a given school would need to give you for you to be able to attend.
Estimated Family Contribution (EFC)
This is a number that financial aid staff have determined your family could pay, based off of your CSS profile. It is used to decide how much financial aid you would receive if you were to attend their school. Note that since this is calculated by assessing your family’s financial documents, it may differ from what your family is “willing to pay.”
Need-Aware
This means that a student’s ability to pay is factored into the admissions process.
Need-Blind
This means that a student’s ability to pay is NOT factored into the admissions process. Instead, students are evaluated solely on their merits.
Merit-based financial aid
This financial aid is offered based on a student’s achievements, not financial need. This could be their academic or athletic achievements or something else entirely.
Need-based financial aid
This is a type of college funding available to low-income students and based on their family’s income and other financial factors.
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Check out A Step-by-Step Financial Aid Guide for International Students for even more helpful terminology and guidance. And now, drum roll please… Auxilia.
When to Use Auxilia
Auxilia can be helpful at numerous points in the college application process. You can use it as a tool to learn about colleges you haven’t heard of that might be financial fits or to find out if a college that already interests you is a potential financial fit for your family. So let’s dig in.
What do all those columns mean?
You probably noticed that Auxilia has numerous different columns. Here’s a quick guide to the columns, highlighting the ones that will be most helpful to you.
But one quick note first: all of the data in Auxilia is historical data. As helpful as it is, we can’t assume this coming year’s data will be identical to that of the previous year. Auxilia can’t account for all the factors that impact how universities allocate financial aid, such as COVID-19, increases in overall admissions competitiveness, and increases in international applicants.
Higher Ed Institution: The name of the college/university
Bookmark: This allows you to bookmark colleges that interest you to find them more easily
State: The state where the college is located
Type: Whether the college is public or private. Public universities tend to have lower costs of attendance for both international and domestic students, while private universities are more generous with financial aid to internationals, but this is not universally true.
Total UGs: The total number of undergraduate students at the institution
2019-2020 Intl UGs: The number of enrolled international undergraduate students, as of Fall 2019. You can also see these numbers from past academic years.
Intl UG Trend (increase per year): The average yearly increase or decrease in number of international students, across 5 years. A negative number indicates that the number of international students has dropped, a positive number that it’s risen.
Financial Aid Offering Type: This is one of the most important categories! Here you can see a given college’s financial aid policy for international students – essentially whether they offer need-based aid, merit-based aid, or both. Remember that need-based aid is aid given because of a family’s demonstrated need, while merit-based aid is aid offered because of a student’s academic ability, athletic ability, or other merits.
% of Total International UGs Awarded Aid: Another very important category! This refers to the percentage of international students at the college who received financial aid. Note that some schools may offer very large amounts of aid to small percentages of students, while others may offer small amounts of aid to a higher percentage of students. If you see a college that offers aid to 100% of students, you can count on receiving some aid, even if it’s not a lot!
Number of International UGs Awarded Financial Aid: This important category refers to the number of international students of all class years (not just first-year students!) who received aid. Careful though– this can be a bit misleading because it doesn’t reflect the total student body nor the amount of aid international students received.
Total Financial Aid Award to International UGs: Here we can see the total amount of aid given to international students. Again, it’s possible this amount was dispersed amongst many students or given to just a select few. While this doesn’t give you much information about how much aid you personally might receive, it can give you an idea about how generous the school is with international financial aid in general.
Avg Award for Intl UGs receiving aid: This number is the average dollar amount of aid that international students received. Remember that even if this is a comparatively high number, it’s important to look at it in the context of the next category, the total cost of attendance for international students. A school with a COA (cost of attendance) of $40,000 that offers $15,000 in aid on average will still be much less expensive than a school with a COA of $75,000 that offers an average of $30,000 in aid. Keep in mind that this single number is not representative of the whole range of financial aid packages a school may offer. It is only the average and doesn’t account for outliers. Additionally, some schools have a ‘minimum EFC’ expected of international students, meaning they will only accept international students who are able to meet that minimum EFC.
Out-of-State COA: Out-of-state COA refers to the cost of attendance for international students or, in the case of public institutions, anyone from another state (including international students). This cost of attendance is approximate. It includes tuition, room and board, and books and supplies; however, it doesn’t include the cost of flights, visas, or college applications themselves. While Auxilia is updated frequently, remember that the college website will always be the most up-to-date place for information about tuition and cost of attendance.
Estimated COA after Avg Award: Another very helpful column! This column shows you the remaining cost of attendance if you were to receive the institution’s average international financial aid award. Of course, there’s no guarantee you’ll receive the average award. You might receive less. Or you might receive more aid! But this can give you a good sense of if the college might be a financial fit. If the Estimated COA after Avg Award is much higher than your family’s budget, it’s probably not a good fit.
% Avg Award Covers of COA: Given that the cost of attendance can vary dramatically from one institution to another, this column shows you what percentage of the COA the average award covers. Does it cover half the COA? 85%?
Applications: Number of students applying to the institution
Enrolls: Number of students who enrolled in the institution
% Enrollment Rate: Percentage of accepted students who enrolled
% Acceptance Rate: While not directly related to financial aid data, a college’s acceptance rate is extremely important information. It can be really exciting to find a school whose Estimated COA after Avg Award is low, but make sure you have a chance of being accepted there in the first place. Unfortunately, many of the colleges that offer the most aid (particularly need-based aid) have very low acceptance rates.
It’s also important to note that selectivity can vary dramatically for different groups of applicants, such as international students or students with a low EFC. For example, at a need-aware school, the acceptance rate for applicants seeking financial aid may be significantly lower than the acceptance rate for those who can pay the full COA. Or the acceptance rate for international students from a given country may be lower than the overall acceptance rate.
Putting it into practice
Well, it’s great to understand what the different labels mean, but how can you actually use Auxilia?
Read on to see how to use Auxilia, or check out this helpful video guide made by Auxilia creator Vikhyat here!
Ready to dive in?
When you visit the Auxilia page, you’ll see that a number of the most helpful columns are already toggled on. You can toggle the columns on or off by clicking on the check boxes at the top.
Start with the column Estimated COA after Avg Award. In the column entitled Estimated COA after Avg Award, enter the upper limit of what your family can afford as the maximum. This will allow you to see all the schools that, for the average international student, ended up costing less than your family’s limit for cost of attendance.
Now sort the table by Number of Intl UGs Awarded Financial Aid, with the highest number at the top. This won’t account for the size of the school, but it will give you a sense of how welcoming the college is towards aid-seeking international students. You can also set a minimum number to filter out schools with very few aid-receiving international students.
You can also set the minimum % of Total International UGs Awarded Financial Aid. For example, if you set it to 75%, you’ll only see the colleges that offer aid to the vast majority of international students. If you set it to 50%, you’ll see the colleges that offer aid to at least half of international students. This can give you an idea of how likely it is that you receive aid, although it doesn’t speak to the actual amount of aid you’ll receive. If a school offers aid to a high percentage of students and the Estimated COA after Avg Award is within your family’s budget, it’s likely you’d be offered enough aid to attend.
Unfortunately, many of the colleges that offer the largest amount of aid to the highest percentage of international students may be highly competitive to get into. Try setting the minimum % Acceptance Rate to 30%. This will eliminate some of the most competitive options.
You can also increase the minimum acceptance rate to a higher value, like 70%, to search for less competitive colleges. Remember that if your GPA and test scores are higher than a college’s average (you can find this information on the Admissions website or a resource like Princeton Review), you have a strong chance of receiving merit aid.
Check that you have the Financial Aid Offering Type set to Both. Now you’ll be able to see colleges where you have a high chance of being accepted and, if you’re a particularly strong applicant, a high chance of receiving Merit Aid.
If your family could cover the cost of attendance of most colleges but you’re looking for scholarships, set the Financial Aid Offering Type to Both or Merit Aid. Now, you’ll see the colleges that offer either both merit and need aid or solely merit aid.
If you find a school that seems like a great fit for you, you can Bookmark it, which allows you to easily come back to it. You can also click on the university’s name to see its profile, which includes basic information, financial aid data, and enrollment statistics. Even if you reset the page, you’ll still be able to see the colleges you bookmarked by clicking on the Bookmark filter.
And if you want to clear your filters, just click on Reset Filters and you can start again!
To see this all in action, check out Vikhyat’s video guide here.
Mini Case Studies
College of the Atlantic
College of the Atlantic, located in Maine, offers both merit and need aid, and gives aid to 100% of international students. Their average financial aid package brings down the COA to under $9,000. Even better– they have a fairly high acceptance rate of 72%! This is a college that demonstrates a great commitment to making itself financially accessible to international students.
St. Olaf College
St. Olaf College (Minnesota) offers both merit and need aid, and also provides 100% of international students with aid. Their average financial aid package brings the COA down to under $19,000. This is a college where you’d be likely guaranteed some financial aid, and quite possibly a very large amount. It has an acceptance rate of 48% – competitive but not insanely so.
California Institute of the Arts
California Institute of the Arts offers aid to 100% of international students. But note that the actual amount of aid given is very low. The average COA after aid is still nearly $68,000. This probably wouldn’t be a good option unless you needed a very small amount of financial aid.
Barnard College
Barnard College, an all-women’s college in New York, offers a large amount of need based aid–nearly $69,000–but only to 6% of international students. It’s not a college you could count on for financial aid by any means.
Check out this podcast to learn more about which schools are most generous with financial aid for international students!
What if a school I’m interested in isn’t in Auxilia?
You can find much of the information that Auxilia provides independently (albeit in a format that may be more difficult to navigate) via the Common Data Set. Try Googling a “Common Data Set” followed by the name of a school you’re interested in. You should be able to find a long document with a huge amount of data about that school, including financial aid data. See A Step-by-Step Financial Aid Guide for International Students (specifically the section entitled “How to Use the Common Data Set for Understanding College Fit”) for more guidance on how to use the Common Data Set.
Broadening your mind
Maybe your dream school is a perfect financial fit. Or maybe, it’s not financially feasible after all. Don’t forget that there are thousands of wonderful colleges out there that could be a great fit for you.
In addition to using Auxilia to research colleges in the United States, what about looking beyond the US? There are tons of international universities that can provide a phenomenal English-language education at a fraction of the cost of American colleges. Check out Schools That Are Actually Cheap: Affordable Options Under 10,000 USD/Year and How to Develop a Great University List When Applying Outside the U.S. for more info!
Final Thoughts
We hope that Auxilia is helpful to you and that it allows you to discover new colleges and better understand which colleges will be financial fits for you and your family. Best of luck!
