Negotiating scholarships when you already have outside funding Forum

[Troianii]

There is at least one school that I'm looking at where full tuition would be covered by my outside funding, and so I'm curious.... when it comes to negotiating scholarships, would it be any harder to negotiate a transfer to a stipend? I mean, really, I assume that as far as a law school is concerned, if they offer you say 20k, and you say, "hey, how about you take that scholarship back and give me a 10k/yr stipend instead", or something probably far more professional but to the same general jist, the law school would probably be happy to hear that, right? I mean, saves them 30k over three years with which to entice some other poor sod.

But... Idk, I know people negotiate scholarships, but I don't know if stipends fall in the same area. Are stipends part of the negotiable package?

[totesTheGoat]

Just a quick check... your outside funding can't be used for anything but tuition, right?

[emkay625]

There is at least one school that I'm looking at where full tuition would be covered by my outside funding, and so I'm curious.... when it comes to negotiating scholarships, would it be any harder to negotiate a transfer to a stipend? I mean, really, I assume that as far as a law school is concerned, if they offer you say 20k, and you say, "hey, how about you take that scholarship back and give me a 10k/yr stipend instead", or something probably far more professional but to the same general jist, the law school would probably be happy to hear that, right? I mean, saves them 30k over three years with which to entice some other poor sod.

But... Idk, I know people negotiate scholarships, but I don't know if stipends fall in the same area. Are stipends part of the negotiable package?

Figure out how the school treats scholarships—some will just auto-apply it to your tuition, but some just send you a check. I just got a check.

[Troianii]

Just a quick check... your outside funding can't be used for anything but tuition, right?

Yep

[Troianii]

There is at least one school that I'm looking at where full tuition would be covered by my outside funding, and so I'm curious.... when it comes to negotiating scholarships, would it be any harder to negotiate a transfer to a stipend? I mean, really, I assume that as far as a law school is concerned, if they offer you say 20k, and you say, "hey, how about you take that scholarship back and give me a 10k/yr stipend instead", or something probably far more professional but to the same general jist, the law school would probably be happy to hear that, right? I mean, saves them 30k over three years with which to entice some other poor sod.

But... Idk, I know people negotiate scholarships, but I don't know if stipends fall in the same area. Are stipends part of the negotiable package?

Figure out how the school treats scholarships—some will just auto-apply it to your tuition, but some just send you a check. I just got a check.

Really? I didn't know that. May I ask out of curiosity what school that is?

[emkay625]

U. Texas. (Correction: not technically a check, but direct deposit).

Edited to add: But if you use that money for living expenses and not tuition, you have to pay taxes on it.

[Troianii]

U. Texas. (Correction: not technically a check, but direct deposit).

Edited to add: But if you use that money for living expenses and not tuition, you have to pay taxes on it.

OK. I somehow figured there'd be a public v. private divide - somewhere I thought I heard that public universities couldn't cut checks like that (direct deposit, same difference).

Again, I've never gone through this process before, so if I understand you right - the amount you were awarded for a scholarship was sent to you, and then the idea is that, supposedly, you'd pay it to the school, but if you have other funding you can maneuver your funds however best suits you? That sounds a bit unusual. At any rate, I'll be contacting the schools to see what their policies are. Does anyone know what is the norm?

EDIT: also don't want to forget to add in a major thank you. I appreciate the advice you've given, emkay625.

[psu2016]

I'm just thinking out loud here, so feel free to correct me, but I would imagine that a stipend is far more costly to the school than a tuition waiver.

Let's say the cost of educating a student is $20,000. A school will increase that number by X% to create the sticker price, which accounts for other students on scholarship and/or giving money back to the university to support other programs. Thus, if the sticker price is, say, $25,000, the cost of that scholarship to the university is only $20,000, even though the value of that scholarship from the student's perspective appears to be $25,000.

Now, let's compare that with a stipend for the sticker amount. Ignoring the tax implication, the cost to the university is the full $25,000 in real, dollar-for-dollar money.

Bottom-Line: it isn't really fair to compare a stipend's value to a that of tuition waiver.

[Troianii]

I'm just thinking out loud here, so feel free to correct me, but I would imagine that a stipend is far more costly to the school than a tuition waiver.

Let's say the cost of educating a student is $20,000. A school will increase that number by X% to create the sticker price, which accounts for other students on scholarship and/or giving money back to the university to support other programs. Thus, if the sticker price is, say, $25,000, the cost of that scholarship to the university is only $20,000, even though the value of that scholarship from the student's perspective appears to be $25,000.

Now, let's compare that with a stipend for the sticker amount. Ignoring the tax implication, the cost to the university is the full $25,000 in real, dollar-for-dollar money.

Bottom-Line: it isn't really fair to compare a stipend's value to a that of tuition waiver.

That makes sense to me, and I'm aware that a tuition discount isn't the same as hard cash, and represents some inflated value. But I figure the difference in stipend I might ask for would be a real dollar difference. The reason is because my outside funding covers tuition only, but will (in some cases, at least) cover the tuition in full - hard cash for the school. So if sticker price is 25k, they're getting 25k, and my trading a scholarship they offered for some stipend (say 10k) really does net them $. I get full tuition scholarship, switch that for a 10k stipend, and then use outside funding to pay full tuition - that's a win for the school, right?

Again, I'm not even sure that this is how scholarship negotiation works - ever. Because I've never negotiated scholarships, but it seems to me on paper that what I'm spit balling with here would be a win for the school and for me.

[psu2016]

but it seems to me on paper that what I'm spit balling with here would be a win for the school and for me.

Is it really a win for them, though? I'm not even trying to argue with you, since I'm not an economist and have taken exactly one econ class that was required in college, but I am actually really intrigued by this concept (and, more to the point, I don't want to study for my exams). Here's some more things that may be worth considering:

It seems to me that law schools rely, by and large, on economies of scale once they get past a critical mass of enrolled students. What's one more student sitting in a lecture? One more exam to grade? One more appointment at Career Services? One more set of paperwork to process, etc. Giving you a stipend, however, would appear to dilute this effect, since instead of your enrollment at the school lowering the cost of educating everybody, it costs the school more out of pocket money.

Giving you a stipend may also create an administrative burden on the school. Assuming the school doesn't give stipends at all, someone is going to have to research the tax consequences of doing so, contact the appropriate people at the university, and find a way to make the money appear in your checking account. Again assuming no such protocol is already in place, what happens if you drop out or are expelled? Do you have to give the money back? Pro-rated? Is the university going to want to take you to court over this?

Finally, that stipend may have to be reported to the ABA for their 509 report as "more than full-tuition". If there is one student falling into this category (you), the school may get (justifiable) questions from your highly-credentialed classmates asking why THEY did not get a scholarship. Future students may be similarly hard-nosed when they only get full-tuition, despite the fact that your personal situation explains everything. The school can't just explain to everybody what they did for you, and why they can't do it for them, as well.

Let me know how this ends up - I'm really interested now.

[Troianii]

but it seems to me on paper that what I'm spit balling with here would be a win for the school and for me.

Is it really a win for them, though? I'm not even trying to argue with you, since I'm not an economist and have taken exactly one econ class that was required in college, but I am actually really intrigued by this concept (and, more to the point, I don't want to study for my exams). Here's some more things that may be worth considering:

It seems to me that law schools rely, by and large, on economies of scale once they get past a critical mass of enrolled students. What's one more student sitting in a lecture? One more exam to grade? One more appointment at Career Services? One more set of paperwork to process, etc. Giving you a stipend, however, would appear to dilute this effect, since instead of your enrollment at the school lowering the cost of educating everybody, it costs the school more out of pocket money.

Giving you a stipend may also create an administrative burden on the school. Assuming the school doesn't give stipends at all, someone is going to have to research the tax consequences of doing so, contact the appropriate people at the university, and find a way to make the money appear in your checking account. Again assuming no such protocol is already in place, what happens if you drop out or are expelled? Do you have to give the money back? Pro-rated? Is the university going to want to take you to court over this?

Finally, that stipend may have to be reported to the ABA for their 509 report as "more than full-tuition". If there is one student falling into this category (you), the school may get (justifiable) questions from your highly-credentialed classmates asking why THEY did not get a scholarship. Future students may be similarly hard-nosed when they only get full-tuition, despite the fact that your personal situation explains everything. The school can't just explain to everybody what they did for you, and why they can't do it for them, as well.

Let me know how this ends up - I'm really interested now.

I'm not sure about the 509 report - if a student gets awarded a 10k stipend and no scholarship, is that really "more than full tuition"? It might be - I'm not intimately familiar with that, but my guess is no.

I think there may be some misunderstanding here about what I'm saying. Suppose I get a full or near full ride at a school - that's a scholarship of some 25k, let's say (varies, but im running with just one example for clarity sake). Okay, suppose I accept that scholarship - I pay the school nothing st all. So the starting point is I'm going for free, the school isn't getting any money by bringing me in.

The alternate scenario is I bring in outside funding, which covers the 25k - regardless of the true cost, the school is getting 25k. Then the school, instead of a scholarship, gives a stipend - 10k - and so it brings in 25k more than it did before, paying out 10k, and nets a 15k gain over the previous scenario. Isn't that a financial win for the school? I imagine an extra 15k for three years, or 45k, could pay for some decent renovations, fund (partially ) a student clinic, etc.

Now I gather that may be an administrative burden, with hoops for the school to possibly jump through, but for 45k? I mean, 45k in real cash? I imagine that's worthwhile.

If you'd like, I'll pm you if this goes anywhere, but it'll likely be a few months. I'm waiting to hear more scholarship information from schools before trying this.

[dumdeedum]

I think I've heard that some organizations get discounted tuition, too, so it might depend on who is paying you through and how steep the discount is. Good luck, in any case!

[Troianii]

I think I've heard that some organizations get discounted tuition, too, so it might depend on who is paying you through and how steep the discount is. Good luck, in any case!

Thanks! And Happy Thanksgiving!

[emkay625]

U. Texas. (Correction: not technically a check, but direct deposit).

Edited to add: But if you use that money for living expenses and not tuition, you have to pay taxes on it.

OK. I somehow figured there'd be a public v. private divide - somewhere I thought I heard that public universities couldn't cut checks like that (direct deposit, same difference).

Again, I've never gone through this process before, so if I understand you right - the amount you were awarded for a scholarship was sent to you, and then the idea is that, supposedly, you'd pay it to the school, but if you have other funding you can maneuver your funds however best suits you? That sounds a bit unusual. At any rate, I'll be contacting the schools to see what their policies are. Does anyone know what is the norm?

EDIT: also don't want to forget to add in a major thank you. I appreciate the advice you've given, emkay625.

Yup. This is exactly what happened. Edited to add: no idea if UT is the norm or an anomaly.

[Troianii]

U. Texas. (Correction: not technically a check, but direct deposit).

Edited to add: But if you use that money for living expenses and not tuition, you have to pay taxes on it.

OK. I somehow figured there'd be a public v. private divide - somewhere I thought I heard that public universities couldn't cut checks like that (direct deposit, same difference).

Again, I've never gone through this process before, so if I understand you right - the amount you were awarded for a scholarship was sent to you, and then the idea is that, supposedly, you'd pay it to the school, but if you have other funding you can maneuver your funds however best suits you? That sounds a bit unusual. At any rate, I'll be contacting the schools to see what their policies are. Does anyone know what is the norm?

EDIT: also don't want to forget to add in a major thank you. I appreciate the advice you've given, emkay625.

Yup. This is exactly what happened. Edited to add: no idea if UT is the norm or an anomaly.

Thanks just the same. Best of luck! I'd love to be a Longhorn, and my younger brother would kill to be one (he's in New England, and I flew him out to California for a Rose Bowl when I was active duty - he's a lifelong Colt McCoy fan, and practically wet hid pants when he saw we were sitting next to McCoy's dad). But I'd have like a 2% or worse chance of acceptance, and not sure it's worth the full app fee. :/