Appeals & Negotiations

You already know that college is expensive, but what you may not know is that your financial package may not be all the aid that the college can offer. Using our proven strategies, you may be able to get more grants and scholarship money by appealing and negotiating with private colleges (and some out-of-state state colleges).

Before you begin, make sure you understand the reasoning behind the process.

Why can you appeal?

Private colleges are driven by numbers; that is, they have enrollment goals that they must meet in order to be fiscally viable. Essentially, they need to fill seats. Your student is a potential student at their college or university, and they don’t want to lose you. If you present a compelling reason why the college should give your student additional financial aid (FREE money!), there is a good chance that they will. Students who earn good grades, play a sport or instrument, or have other unique traits are particularly valuable to colleges.

Most colleges have what is referred to as “endowment,” or money that has been donated to the school from donors and alumni and placed into an endowment fund. This money is awarded to students in the form of grants and scholarships. Not all of this money will be used each year because there is often more than needed, and not all of the students given these awards will end up attending the institutions. You have a chance to ask for some of this money in an appeal letter.

A little-known phenomenon in the world of college admissions is referred to as the “summer melt.” More frequently seen in lower-income areas, summer melt happens when students commit to a particular college but do not actually attend. When students forgo their financial aid package at their initial choice, it frees up the money for other committed students.

Summer melt makes college administrators nervous because they don’t know how many incoming students will melt away before the school year begins. This encourages them to offer more gifts, grants, or scholarships when asked so they will not lose additional students. You can use the “summer melt” to your advantage.

Knowing that colleges need to fill seats and are in danger of losing students during the summer, you can send an appeal letter to request additional financial aid.

The Importance of Leverage

The majority of our successful appeal letters use the strategy of leveraging one college’s financial aid package against another. If a college believes that they are in danger of losing your student to a competitive college, they may be able to find additional money for you.

Comparing “apples to apples” is important, so make sure you leverage similar colleges against each other. You won’t be successful if you compare an Ivy League university to a state school. Compare moderately selective schools to other moderately selective schools, for example, and very selective schools to very selective schools. To learn more about college selectivity, view the lesson on College Selectivity or ask your college admissions officer which colleges are comparable to theirs. Make sure you apply to those colleges as well as your first choice, so you can put them against each other during the appeal process.

TuitionFit is an excellent resource for leverage to successfully negotiate with a college. TuitionFit gives you access to real-time, actual financial aid award letters that students have received from colleges and universities all over the country. TuitionFit is secure, protects your private information, and will anonymize everything you share before adding it to their database. Share at least one of your award letters with TuitionFit and you will gain access to this massive resource. Using TuitionFit, you can often find tens (sometimes hundreds) of financial aid awards and prices from comparable schools sent to students with a similar need and merit profile.

Take a minute to watch Emily and Sarah's stories with TuitionFit.

If your first-choice college has not given you an offer that is as competitive as one of your other choices, you can use a better offer as leverage to ask for more money from your first choice. If you don’t have a better offer, a nearby state college tuition price will work for leverage if you articulate that your student will attend that college to save money.

The Appeal Strategy

To present a successful appeal, you must write a letter and request additional help in the form of gifts, grants, or scholarships (not loans, which need to be repaid).

For incoming freshmen, the best times to send an appeal letter are as follows:

March or April, after the financial aid awards are received. This is a key point when college admission offices start to get nervous as they start to see students drop out of their pool of candidates.
Late June or early July, when students who were uncertain have committed to other schools, freeing up additional financial aid.

We recommend that you not contact the school’s financial aid office the week after students are making their final decisions (May 1, in many cases) because your letter will have less of an impact.

Students who are already matriculated should send an appeal letter either at the end of the fall semester or in June or July. Appeals will have the most impact at this time because college administrators will be keeping an eye on enrollment numbers for the following semester. Colleges have a high attrition rate, with students dropping out to pursue other careers or transferring to other schools. This is why appealing while in college is so effective. Simply applying to a competing private or state college and using their offer as leverage in an appeal letter works very well.

In order to present a successful appeal, your student should:

Be a senior in high school or already attending a private college
Have financial aid packages from 2-3 competitive colleges OR have a special circumstance in your family that justifies asking for additional money
Understand that our strategy works best with minimally, moderately, and very selective private colleges

Please note that this strategy will not apply to students planning to attend a community college, trade school, military academy, or Ivy League university. If the student is an out-of-state student planning to attend a state university, there is an opportunity to appeal for additional scholarships, but state institutions are much more difficult about awarding additional money.

If you have financial aid packages from other comparable colleges, use these offers to write a letter to your first-choice college. Look at the average amount of aid that all of the colleges typically give out, and compare that with the number they gave you. Regardless of how much you were offered, we recommend that you ask for an additional $2,000 to $6,000 per semester.

If you do not have financial aid packages to leverage but do have some special circumstances in your family, you can still request additional aid. Some examples of special circumstances include a family-owned business, divorce, medical hardship, learning disabilities, significant financial hardship not reflected on the FAFSA, additional children in college, and more. To ensure success, we recommend mentioning your special circumstances and leveraging one offer against another in your letter.

Writing the Appeal Letter

We have several sample appeal letters that you can use as templates for your letter. Regardless of whether you write your own or customize one of our templates, we recommend that you read several of the examples. All of these letters have resulted in families receiving more aid from colleges. The better you understand the process, the more effective your letter will be.

Here are some tips and the general layout of an appeal letter.

Keep your letter short and to the point. Long, drawn-out letters could hurt you because college administrators rarely have time to read them.
Remember that you are writing to a college, so ensure that you don’t have any grammatical, spelling, or punctuation errors.
Don’t sound angry or harsh, even if you disagree with the college or feel hurt by their initial offer. Be polite and respectful. It’s a good idea to re-read your letter several times when you are finished to make sure you come across the way you intend.

Paragraph #1: Start the conversation by thanking the college for the generous financial aid package they offered you and accepting your student.

Paragraph #2: Draw the reader into the letter by mentioning your enthusiasm for the college. Make sure to point out how your student is or will be an asset to the campus.

Always discuss how the student will be an asset to the school because colleges do give out grants and scholarships based on talent or leadership qualities. If a student has special talents or gifts, colleges may be willing to invest in getting them to be a part of the campus community. Colleges like to have exceptional students because it helps build the community and attract more students.
Some unique characteristics that could be helpful to describe are as follows:
1. Is your student a top mathematician, writer, or artist? What special skills might set them apart from other students?
2. Have they won a competition for their unique skills?
3. Have they competed in sports or been on an Olympic team?
4. Are they part of a particular ethnic group? Colleges like to promote diversity and may even have a quota of specific ethnicities they are obligated to fulfill.
5. Do they have a disability (IEP or 504), are adopted, or homeless? Colleges like to help others and extra financial consideration could be available.

Paragraph #3: Inform the college that attending their school will be a financial challenge. Be professional and clear.

State your case and situation simply. Don’t go into excessive detail, but describe why it will be a challenge, focusing on two to three key situations that apply to you. If you have a special circumstance, you should mention it here.
Elaborate on the reasons with a short explanation and any relevant facts. Don’t bore the reader with a long story; get to the point quickly.
Be accurate and don't exaggerate the truth; you want to be able to provide documents to support any claim.

Paragraph #4: Summarize your points and ask the college to take action. Ask politely if there is any financial aid that can be distributed to your student’s financial aid package. Be specific in your request (we recommend asking for $2,000-$6,000 per semester), but don’t be greedy or the college may ignore your appeal. This is where it is wise to know how much money the college gives in gift aid on average (you can look it up on College Navigator). You should also include your contact information, including an email address and a phone number in case the administrator has questions about your appeal.

When you finish, proofread your letter to check for grammatical errors and tone. Include copies of any financial aid offers from competing schools or a copy of your student’s college ID if they are already enrolled in the college.

Make sure you mail your letter to the correct administrator at the college. Getting your letter where it will have the most impact is important. Visit the college’s website to find the following administrators, or contact your admissions counselor at the college to find their names. We suggest that you send letters to at least two of the individuals:

V.P. of Enrollment
Director of Financial Aid
Director of Admissions

* Students already enrolled in college should send letters only to the V.P. of Enrollment and Director of Financial Aid.

We have been more successful with mailing hard copies of your letter, but you may also be successful using an email appeal.

You should expect an answer within 5-7 business days, so if you haven’t heard back from the college after a week, follow up with a phone call or an email.

Appeal Letter Templates

All of these letters have resulted in families receiving more aid from colleges. We recommend that you read through several to familiarize yourself with the concept before writing your own letter or customizing one of the templates. The better you understand the process, the more effective your letter will be.

* The Appeals & Negotiations lessons and letter templates are proprietary to SimpliCollege, and you agree not to reproduce, duplicate, copy, sell, resell, or exploit for any purpose this information or any portion of this information, including, without limitation, content, and marks unless otherwise authorized in writing by SimpliCollege. This website is provided for your personal, non-commercial use only.

The following 14 letters have been recently used by families to save a total of $178,500 (an average of $12,750 per family)!

Appeals & Negotiations