Why getting into harvard isn an honor

You will be contacted if you are missing required documents, and you will be given the opportunity to re-submit them without penalty. You may request a review of your financial aid decision at any time to accommodate significant changes in your family's financial situation. You must apply for financial aid each year. We will meet your demonstrated need for all four years. We feel strongly that your parents have an obligation to help finance your college education.

Our aid is available only to students whose families would not otherwise be able to send them to Harvard. To be fair to all our students, we can base our financial aid decisions only on ability and not willingness to pay, and a decision to attend Harvard must be made by you and your parents. Please contact the Financial Aid Office to discuss this further if you have questions or concerns. There is no requirement to work. However, all students, international or American, who demonstrate financial need will have a student term-time work expectation as part of their financial aid package, which they can typically meet with a job requiring about hours per week.

Jobs are plentiful and are often interesting and relevant to academic interests. Jobs are plentiful at Harvard. Employment opportunities range from dining hall duties to work in the University's libraries, laboratories, and offices. Students have also earned money on campus as bartenders, teaching assistants, sportswriters, computer programmers, lifeguards and research assistants, to cite a few examples. Working eight to twelve hours on average per week, most students find that they can work, excel academically, and participate in a range of extracurricular activities.

Read more at our Student Employment Office website. The Federal Work-Study Program subsidizes the wages of eligible students, making them particularly attractive to employers.

If you are eligible, you will be able to work in FWSP-designated jobs at the University and sometimes off campus as well. FWSP funds are available for both term-time and summer employment. The term-time work expectation listed on your award letter is the amount of earnings during the academic year that we expect you to contribute toward your college costs. Your financial aid letter will designate whether you can work in a job funded by FWSP or need to focus your job search on positions not funded by the program.

Please note: You may request a student loan to replace or supplement part or all of a job expectation term-time or FWSP. To request a loan, use the Loan Request Form. Many of our families find parent loans to be a useful tool for spreading the cost of education over a number of years.

Parents may borrow up to the full cost of education, less any other financial aid. Parent loans are not based on financial need, and there are no income restrictions or penalties for early repayment. Department of Education through the Federal Direct Lending Program, without the need for banks and for-profit lenders. However, your financing options are not limited to the parent PLUS loan; you and your family may borrow from any lender you choose.

Most students do choose to work. If you will have heavy extracurricular demands on your time such as playing football in the fall or acting in a spring drama production , you could choose to meet the job expectation partially or completely through student loans. A large percentage of each entering first-year class receives one or more outside awards from national or local organizations. If the total of outside awards exceeds your work expectation, that excess amount is deducted from the Harvard Scholarship.

Since outside awards are additional resources that help to meet need, they may not be used to replace your parents' contribution or other expected family resource. We will adjust the financial aid package to reflect the receipt of additional resources. Please send your checks to:. Cambridge, MA If an outside organization is requiring you to have a Cost of Attendance or Verification of Enrollment form signed by an official at Harvard, please use the following:. Please visit the website of the Office of the Registrar.

Tuition benefits that you receive from your parents' employers meant for your educational costs would be considered outside awards and would be factored into your financial aid package following our outside award policy.

Funds from outside awards are incorporated into your financial aid package in two steps:. Since outside awards are additional resources that reduce your financial need, they cannot be used to replace your parent contribution. Funds from outside organizations meant for your educational costs would be considered outside awards and would be factored into your financial aid package following our outside award policy.

Any funds that you receive from an organization outside your family that are intended for your educational expenses would be considered outside awards. If the funds are meant to pay for your educational expenses, they are outside awards and will be incorporated into your financial aid package according to our outside award policy.

You Harvard scholarship funding is not an outside award. Student wages, thesis grants, summer research grants, and other similar grants are not outside awards, since they are not directly meant to pay your standard cost of attendance. You may request a refund here. All requested documents, should be uploaded to IDOC.

The CSS Profile is available to students from nearly every country and nationality. The College Board is unable to process payments from a small number of countries, and so students from these countries may not be able to submit the CSS Profile.

If this is the case for you, please follow this alternate set of instructions to apply for financial aid. Those two forms are interchangeable. If you are able do the CSS Profile, it is the preferred form. We understand that the tax numbers on the Profile may be estimates and will update them with your actual taxes when those arrive through IDOC. You and your parents should use the income information on your W-2 forms or paycheck stubs to estimate the figures that will appear on your tax returns.

Such estimates are perfectly acceptable for all students. If your parents are divorced or separated, each household must fill out their own CSS Profile.

You should direct your second parent to complete the CSS Profile online. If you are an international student and chose to file the paper Financial Statement for Students from Foreign Countries, please have your noncustodial parent to complete and submit a separate form along with their most recent tax return or wage statement.

If you are unable to ask a parent to send in their financial information, please fill out a Parent Information Sheet including a letter from a third party and any additional documentation as appropriate. Given that every family situation is unique, we review parent and household information on a case-by-case basis to determine what documentation and paperwork is appropriate for that student to provide to us in an effort to be as generous as possible with our financial aid assessment.

Since we do not review financial information until a positive admissions decision has been made, we cannot make a judgment call on the documentation required until that point in the process. Please rest assured that our financial aid application deadlines are flexible and that we will be in direct touch with the student, should a positive admissions decision be made and the financial aid application is incomplete.

Please allow one week for processing an online signature, and three weeks for processing a paper signature page. IDOC is a service provided by the College Board which families use to securely submit financial aid application documentation.

You can learn more here. Sign in here. Please allow five or more business days for processing. If you have read through our application instructions and submitted what we ask for, then you should not worry about whether IDOC has been able to correctly identify and track your documents. Our staff will review the IDOC materials for all admitted students and current undergraduates to make sure your submissions fulfill our requirements and will reach out if there is anything more we need.

Harvard does not charge a financial aid application fee. However, the financial aid application does include submission of the CSS Profile, an application independent of Harvard but that will normally require the payment of a fee. The College Board is wholly responsible for the CSS Profile and will grant a waiver of their fees if they deem it appropriate.

You can read more about the College Board's fee waiver criteria here. International students who cannot afford the CSS Profile fee may follow our alternate application instructions.

Please follow our alternate instructions for applying through our paper process. Please follow these alternate instructions for applying through our paper process. Note that we will not be able to finalize your financial aid award until we receive your actual federal tax returns with all schedules - these should also be sent to IDOC as soon as they become available.

If you are an international student and a national tax return is not filed, your parents should ask each employer to submit a wage statement detailing their annual compensation. You can find the form on our website under Financial Aid Forms. You can download the form here. It should be submitted through your IDOC portal. If you are not required to file a federal or national tax return, you should complete and submit a tax non-filer statement. You can find a tax non-filer statement either on our website US students would use the federal tax non-filer statement; international students would use the international tax non-filer statement or through your IDOC Portal.

We are not able to track financial aid application materials for prospective students until they have been admitted. If a student is admitted and indicated they wished to apply for aid, we will let them know at that point what has been received or is missing.

Until that point, the documents showing on your my. Please complete your CSS Profile online. Remember, it is important to provide your Social Security Number, if you have one, when you register for CSS Profile; Harvard will use this unique number to identify your data before loading any electronic records.

If your parents are not required to file a federal or national tax return, they should send a signed statement listing all sources and annual amounts of income for their household. Each non-filer must print and complete a tax non-filer statement and submit it to IDOC with the rest of your application materials. IDOC also has a built-in tax non-filer statement that you are welcome to use to indicate that you or a parent did not file a tax return. For prospective students, we will be happy to accept your completed application for financial aid whenever it arrives.

We do ask, however, that you send your tax returns to IDOC as soon as possible after they become available. You should not submit documents unless you are specifically asked for them. If you receive a positive admissions decision and still have not been able to send your tax returns, please be in touch with us after you receive your admissions decision.

Please note that we will be unable to calculate your financial aid award until we receive the actual tax return. Those students were unable to file a CSS Profile and who requested alternate instructions may send their foreign tax returns directly to us by mail or fax as directed by our alternate instructions. Please be sure that anything you send directly to us includes your full applicant name, applicant year, and some other unique identifier school, birth date, etc.

You should send any documentation they do have. Many families will send a year-end wage statement, or a letter from each employer stating annual compensation. Harvard University is proud to help veterans continue their education by participating in the Yellow Ribbon Program. The aid provided by the government will be treated like all outside awards , and students will receive a matching amount from the College.

Students interested in ROTC opportunities, please visit the following service websites:. If you are a prospective student and completed your application by the deadline, then you will receive an award decision in your acceptance mailing. If you missed the application deadline, an award decision will be completed as soon as possible and in the order it is received.

If you are a current student, award decisions will be posted to your my. If you missed the application deadline, an award decision will be completed during the remainder of the summer and in the order it is received. Your financial circumstances are never an impediment to admission. Foreign students have the same access to financial aid funding as do U. February 1st, for Regular Decision candidates. March 1st, for Transfer candidates. Current Students: May 1st. Once you are admitted to Harvard, we work closely with your family to ensure you can afford to come here.

See how affordable Harvard can be with our Net Price Calculator. Submit a letter of special circumstance to IDOC along with the rest of your financial aid application materials. All students, American and international, who are on financial aid have a travel allowance included in their financial aid award to help cover the cost of travel to and from Cambridge.

Overseas students are advised to seek information from the nearest U. Cultural Affairs Office about travel grants and other financial assistance available to qualified students from various foundations and from the U. If you do not intend to apply for need-based grant aid from Harvard but do want to apply for a Federal student or parent loan, please notify us of your intentions and submit only the FAFSA.

Once we receive your FAFSA information electronically from the Department of Education, our office will notify you of your loan eligibility. We determine your financial aid award based solely on your family's demonstrated financial need. Our program is designed to help families across the economic spectrum, from low to upper-middle incomes.

Aid is completely need-based and considers many factors, such as your family's income, assets, size, and unusual expenses. There are no merit-based awards, and we have no preferential packaging policies that give some students more attractive awards than others. The Griffin Financial Aid Office cannot accept any documents over email. Please submit all documents as described on our application instructions. No, we admit students based on their strengths and talents, but all Harvard-administered aid is based only on financial need, and we treat all admitted students equally in terms of their eligibility for that aid.

For prospective students, given the tremendous volume of material sent to our office , we are unable to confirm receipt. Rest assured that if we discover we are missing necessary financial aid application materials or have any questions we will be in contact with you by email or phone after the student is admitted.

Current and admitted students can always check the status of their application on my. Travel: An allowance toward the cost of traveling to and from Harvard has been included in your budget on your award letter and used in calculating your eligibility for financial aid.

You are responsible for booking and paying for your own travel. Many students will use the money they earn over the summer to meet the costs of travel to and from Harvard. Personal Expenses: The estimated cost for books, supplies, clothing, laundry, telephone, entertainment, local transportation, and other incidentals has been included in the personal expenses portion of your budget.

You are responsible for paying your own personal expenses. Many of the students will use money earned at their term-time jobs to cover personal expenses.

We require English translation for all financial aid documents. Documents do not, however, need to be translated by an official translator. Most students will save the cost of paying a translator and simply write the translation directly on the documents themselves. Please email us and inform us of your new address. You will also need to file a change of address with the Student Data Office in the Office of the Registrar.

If you are undocumented you are eligible for financial aid from Harvard. Harvard makes no distinction based on citizenship in the financial aid process or in the amount of aid for which students are eligible. Undocumented students do not need to file a FAFSA since they are not eligible to apply for federal aid. Financial aid application instructions for all students, regardless of citizenship status, can be found here. Please notify our office if you are returning from a leave of absence.

The same instructions and deadlines apply, regardless of whether you intend to return in the fall or spring semester. Make sure that you are current with loan repayments and that you file the necessary deferment or forbearance forms when you register.

You may want to check the status of your student loans by calling the Student Loan Office at In addition, your term bill from previous semesters must be paid in full. Yes, if you are a resident of CT, VT, or DC, you must submit the supplemental state grant application to the appropriate agency.

Students who are eligible for state grant funds but fail to follow the procedures and deadlines set by their state grant programs will not receive additional Harvard financial aid to cover lost funding. Yes, on exactly the same basis as for American students. We welcome you to write about distinctive aspects of your background, personal development or the intellectual interests you might bring to your Harvard classmates.

If you are academically qualified, there is no harm in filling out a Harvard application, but—as with all uber-elite colleges in —even the best and brightest teens need to have a rock-solid backup plan. Dave has over a decade of professional experience that includes work as a teacher, high school administrator, college professor, and independent educational consultant.

Every year, dozens of students and parents contact us for advice on how to get into Harvard. That said, there are a few general rules that all Harvard applicants should follow in order to maximize their chances of securing a spot at America's most prestigious institution. Outside the classroom, successful applicants have devoted substantial time to at least extracurricular activities , assuming leadership roles and typically earning awards at the state and national-level.

Each year, Harvard receives applications from many more qualified students than they are able to admit, which means that uncontrollable circumstances and arbitrary decisions lead to the rejection of students who would have earned admission the year before or the year after.

As such, instead of asking how to get into Harvard , students should be focused on identifying several additional colleges that are capable of offering an equally or more rewarding undergraduate experience. We also encourage you to visit our website to learn more about our background , services , and results , or to request a free consultation.

College Transitions is a team of college planning experts dedicated to helping students transition to and through higher education.

The intent of this article is to give those considering applying to Harvard University: 1 An understanding of what you are up against. Harvard Acceptance Rate — Class of Out of an all-time record 57, applicants, a mere 1, of Class of hopefuls were admitted.

Students from U. Asian students continued to be largest minority group amongst admitted students at Women comprise a majority of the admitted class at For ambitious high-school students today, the formula for getting into that reach school can seem just as simple. The conventional wisdom is that keeping your head down in the single-minded pursuit of qualifications is the path to success.

It makes every election for every tiny organization a heated battle and makes classes almost an afterthought. You can also get involved in other activities, activities in which you are actually interested. Then you won't have to scramble and settle later so you feel you have a more complete application. The report asks your GC to rate the rigor of your academic program compared to other students at your school page 2.

Are you now taking the most demanding courses offered a freshman at your HS? Next year, will your course rigor match or exceed those of other students at your HS? Those are questions only you and your GC can answer. In a big and highly competitive high school, a successful Harvard applicant may be one of the few outstanding scholars in the class; in a smaller or less competitive high school, a successful applicant may be the best student in the last several years.