By not applying for funding, will it increase your chances of admission?

[Cdcousin12345]

I am just curious about this. Many people seem to get into top schools when they do not apply for funding. I have a mediocre GPA 3.3-3.4 out of 4.0 and will most likely go to a school that will fund me and/or meet my needs the most. However, I am still going to apply to my dream school (which is like 3 places right now in the top 30 lol) and just seeing if anyone feels it has had an affect on their admission.

[33andathirdRPM]

Many of the applications I've filled out have a question along the lines of "What level of financial support can you provide for yourself?" So you may be able to apply for financial aid while indicating that you could/would be able to finance things out of pocket.

[TakeruK]

Many schools I applied to said directly that the financial information does not factor in the admissions decision. If you have an external fellowship, like NSF, NDSEG, etc. then it should help your admissions. Applying for funding from the school itself shouldn't hurt you since the school probably expects to have to pay for all its students. If you have an outside fellowship, then it's just a bonus. I think most schools expect students to pick one that meets their needs the most (whether it's funding, support for dependents, etc.) so they will try to make their offers as appealing as they can afford to.

[IalectoI]

I recently heard I was admitted to one of my "dream schools" and in my excitement, sent my notice that I would accept the offer of admission before seeing my financial aid package.

 

Did I make a big mistake?  

 

I've heard with undergrad, that accepting an offer prematurely can negatively impact your financial aid as it lets the school know they don't need to "compete" for you via aid.

 

However, is this the case with grad schools?

 

Just to be sure, I asked a financial aid officer at the school if accepting admission impacts the financial aid package, and she said it doesn't. However, I wonder if she was just stating the "company line," as I've also heard some friends have used admission offers at other schools to negotiate better deals. 

 

If this will indeed likely negatively impact my aid package, is there anything I can do at this point to get more aid?

[TakeruK]

I recently heard I was admitted to one of my "dream schools" and in my excitement, sent my notice that I would accept the offer of admission before seeing my financial aid package.

 

Did I make a big mistake?  

 

I've heard with undergrad, that accepting an offer prematurely can negatively impact your financial aid as it lets the school know they don't need to "compete" for you via aid.

 

However, is this the case with grad schools?

 

Just to be sure, I asked a financial aid officer at the school if accepting admission impacts the financial aid package, and she said it doesn't. However, I wonder if she was just stating the "company line," as I've also heard some friends have used admission offers at other schools to negotiate better deals. 

 

If this will indeed likely negatively impact my aid package, is there anything I can do at this point to get more aid?

 

I wouldn't say it's a "big" mistake, but it's probably a good idea in general to see the financial package before answering either way. Many schools will actually offer all their students basically the same aid package, so saying yes early isn't going negatively affect you! However, it's definitely true that at some schools, they do have to "compete" for aid, and bringing up your stipend offers from other schools could help a student get a better package, but only if that school really wants the student! This is because at grad school, stipends are basically your salary for your skillset and experience, while in undergrad, financial aid awards are there to recognize / attract the best students. 

 

In your case, I would probably wait until you see the offer before saying anything else about financial aid or admission. If it is way less than you expected or compared to other roughly equivalent schools, then you could probably still bring this up and negotiate a little bit. However, I wouldn't try to play this negotiation game unless the difference between packages was really large (more than $5000/year) or if the package is not enough to live comfortably (more than just survive!) on. But for example, if the difference between two offers is like $31k/year vs. $29k/year, I wouldn't do it!

 

Sometimes it might also be easier to negotiate for other things than direct stipend increase. You might be able to negotiate a research account/fund for yourself, to pay for conference travel etc. Or you might get your POI to promise X trips per year.