Puts two or more award letters into the same shape: gift aid versus loans, the real cost for one year at each school, what renews, and the questions to ask each financial aid office.
Three award letters, three different formats, and one of them subtracts the loans before printing the number in bold. A family asks which one is cheaper and the honest answer takes forty minutes with a calculator.
This prompt puts every offer in the same shape. It separates gift aid from loans and work study, adds back anything a letter netted out, uses the cost of attendance the college published rather than the tuition line alone, and produces the out-of-pocket figure for one year at each school.
It stops at the arithmetic. It does not recommend a school, does not advise on borrowing, and does not project future earnings. Where a letter is vague about renewal conditions or what happens if a scholarship is not renewed, it writes the question for that college's financial aid office instead of assuming an answer.
You get the side-by-side comparison, the gift aid and loan split, a four-year projection wherever renewal terms are actually stated and a flag wherever they are not, the questions to ask each school, and a one-page plain-language version for the conversation at the kitchen table.
For counselors in April, college access advisors, and anyone sitting with a family and three PDFs.
You normalize financial aid award letters so a family can compare them. You separate gift aid from money that has to be repaid or earned, you use each college's published cost of attendance rather than the tuition line, and you never tell a family which school to choose or whether to borrow.
COMPARISON, ONE YEAR (student S.A., first year, on campus) School A, public in state Cost of attendance published: $27,400 Gift aid: $9,000 (state grant $4,000, institutional $5,000) Loans offered: $5,500 subsidized and unsubsidized Work study: $2,000 Cost after gift aid: $18,400. After gift aid and loans: $12,900, plus work study to be earned. School B, private Cost of attendance published: $61,200 Gift aid: $38,000 (merit $30,000, need-based $8,000) Loans offered: $5,500. Parent loan of $14,000 added back, since the letter netted it out. Cost after gift aid: $23,200. After gift aid and student loans: $17,700. RENEWAL School A institutional grant: renewal terms not stated. Question below. School B merit award: stated as renewable for four years at a 3.0 GPA. Four-year projection possible. School B need-based portion: recalculated annually. No projection. QUESTIONS FOR SCHOOL A 1. Is the $5,000 institutional grant renewable, and under what conditions? 2. Does the state grant require full-time enrollment each term? QUESTIONS FOR SCHOOL B 1. If the need-based portion changes, does the merit award change with it? 2. Is the parent loan an offer or an estimate of remaining cost?
Use initials, not names, and remove student ID numbers before pasting. Award letters carry more identifying detail than most documents on a counselor's desk.
Have ready: every award letter in full, including the fine print and any enclosed loan disclosure, and each college's published cost of attendance for the correct year and housing status. On campus and at home are different numbers, and using the wrong one changes the answer.
The comparison is arithmetic, not advice. It will not tell a family which school to choose, weigh loans against future income, or judge whether a school is worth it. Those conversations belong to the family and the counselor sitting with them.
Where it fails: letters that bundle aid into a single figure with no breakdown, and anything involving an appeal already in progress. Both come back as questions for the aid office.
Before a family acts on this, verify each number against the letter itself, and confirm with each college that the cost of attendance you used is the current one. A worksheet built on last year's cost is confidently wrong.