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[Parents] What is a financial aid award letter?
[Parents] What is a financial aid award letter?

We’ve broken down the most important principles for evaluating college costs and financial aid offers.

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Written by Eleanna Garcia
Updated over a year ago

Your child's financial aid award letter will include information about how much their college is offering your child in grants, scholarships, work-study, and student loans. The letter may also include the estimated cost of one year of attendance (COA) at the college.

This money is not going to be given to your child. Instead, all grants/scholarships/loans that your child accepts would be applied as a credit towards the tuition/fees/etc. that are owed to the college.

Not only do financial award letters fail to be straightforward; they’re also frustratingly inconsistent. Yes, that makes it difficult to compare. But in all cases, you want to pay attention to two pieces of information:

  1. How much it costs to attend the college and

  2. How much financial aid you’ll get

Watch an introductory video about the two key parts of a college award letter in your Parent Account here and read our blog article on the topic:

Making Sense of Your Financial Aid Award Letter: What do the numbers mean?

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