Rising Sophomores, Juniors and Seniors -- Your Award Letters are in the Mail
Well as one year ends, another begins...
Today we are sending out nearly 1200 upperclass student award letters. This is the first round of award letters for upperclass domestic students for 2005-2006 (we started sending international upperclass student award letters several weeks agi). This mailing (with some small exceptions) will include everyone who completed by our priority deadline of April 15, 2005 (and will include many of you who completed through April 29, 2005).
Enclosed with this mailing will be one or both of the following forms (depending on your eligibility for them):
- The Self Help and Outside Award Reply Form (upperclass student version) -- On this form you identify to us how you want us to break out your self help into work and/or loans. Additionally, on this form you identify any outside scholarships of which we may not be aware. Please note that if you received an outside scholarship last year and told us it was a renewable scholarship, it will be included in your financial aid award letter and will have already been subtracted from your Self Help. If our information is in error please note that on your form when you return it to us.
- The Student Information Review Form (upperclass student version) -- This form assists us in matching your MIT Scholarship with a “named” donor fund. Your completion of this form is crucial as it ensures that we are able to offer need-based scholarship funding while meeting expressed donor preferences.
Both forms are due back to our office no later than July 1, 2005, although you are encouraged to send them sooner. Remember that the first bill for the Fall semester will be produced on July 10, 2005 and only by submitting these forms and having us process them will your aid be present on the bill.
For those of you who are not in this first round of award letters because you completed after our priority deadline, we will continue to read and send award letters on a weekly schedule for the next several weeks (at least until the first bill is produced and mailed). At this point, we have another approximately 500 files completed pending a financial aid officer's review. This includes all of you who completed your applications through today.
For those of you who are stll not complete, you need to immediately take any necessary steps to complete your file. We would like to get all upperclass awarding done in the next month so that we can turn our attention to helping you with the next part of this process, and that is:
Processing of your Self-Help and Information Review forms -- Beginning in the next several weeks, we will begin to process submitted self help forms, removing the “Self Help Award” from your award letter, determining (based on your expressed preferences and your eligibility) from which loan and work programs you may receive funding, and providing detailed instructions on how to do what is necessary to receive this funding. These letters should start to be sent in the next two to three weeks (Freshmen and Upperclass). Keep an eye on the blog for an update!
If you want a sneak peek at your financial aid award, take a look at WEBSIS as of Monday morning. By then, our update program will have run providing you an online view of your 2005-06 award letter.
In the meantime, here is a closing shot of our upperclass student project leader, Jason Shumaker, expressing his joy at the fact that the letters are on their way out the door!
