The University estimates that the total cost for students to attend Brown in the upcoming academic year is $99,984. Of the incoming class of 2030, about 73% of students intend to apply for financial aid, but some students may be unaware of how scholarship displacement could impact their financial aid awards.
Brown is committed to meeting 100% of demonstrated need through scholarship grants that do not have to be repaid, rather than loans. The University calculates financial need by subtracting the expected family contribution from the total cost of attendance, with expected family contribution comprising both parent and student contributions.
All financial aid packages are required to include a student contribution portion, regardless of a family’s demonstrated need, but University Scholarship can partially or fully cover the parent contribution.
According to Dean of Financial Aid Sean Ferns, scholarship displacement is the practice through which “private outside scholarships and employee tuition benefits” are used to reduce student contributions toward the cost of attendance, but those funds cannot cover a student’s parental contribution.
External scholarships are first applied to the student contribution. Any spillover is deducted from University Scholarship dollar-for-dollar, meaning that there is no change to the amount a student’s family pays.
Ferns wrote that this policy is “mandated by federal law” under the Higher Education Act of 1965, which “requires outside resources to be counted against financial need.”
According to Robert Farrington, founder of The College Investor, this displacement means “even though you got more money, the bill remains the same. It means the student did that extra work earning the scholarship for nothing.”
But the act only “requires schools to count ‘known’ outside scholarships as financial aid,” and no federal law requires students to report their outside scholarships, he wrote.
Instead, individual college policies require students to report their scholarships. According to its financial aid website, Brown expects students to report any outside awards.
Peer institutions such as Princeton, MIT and Harvard have similar scholarship displacement policies.
But several states have passed laws to combat scholarship displacement, primarily at public universities.
Farrington explained that “many of the laws are still pretty narrow in scope. For example, California’s law protects students who qualify for Pell or Cal Grants only,” while in Maryland, the “law blocks displacement unless the award exceeds the cost of attendance,” which is required under the Higher Education Act.
The Herald spoke to current Brown students to learn more about scholarship displacement and understand their knowledge of the policy prior to arriving at Brown.
Riya Singh ’28 has outside scholarships from two separate funding sources, which she plans to use throughout her four years. She said that while applying to college, she wasn’t aware that her scholarships could only go toward the student contribution part of her financial package.
While looking at schools, Singh said she was not thinking extensively about institutional financial aid because she assumed she would “be okay no matter which school” she attended due to her outside scholarships.
“I applied early decision to Brown, and at the time I was under the impression that I would be able to use outside scholarships to their full effect,” Singh explained, adding that no one had warned them about scholarship displacement.
“Had I known, I likely would have picked another top school that doesn’t practice scholarship displacement,” she added.
Ferns wrote that he is not aware of any universities that permit external scholarships to reduce the parent contribution. He added that most schools do not meet 100% of demonstrated financial need and use outside scholarships “to address unmet need before affecting institutional funding.”
He noted that the University provides information on its website explaining scholarship displacement, adding that Brown is also willing to work directly with students and families to help them understand their financial options.
Singh said that they learned about scholarship displacement through an email asking her to log her outside scholarships on the financial aid portal a few months after committing to Brown. They said they believe that the language used on the University’s website is confusing, since it does not explicitly mention “scholarship displacement” or a similar term.
Singh explained that most students from her high school don’t go to college, so she did not have college counselors telling her to research which schools practice scholarship displacement.
Darius McGregor ’29 told The Herald that he did not know about Brown’s policy of scholarship displacement until after he was awarded outside scholarships.
After having conversations with people at other universities, he realized many students shared his experience. He added that some of his friends who receive aid have been discouraged from applying to scholarships because their scholarship funds would detract from the institutional aid they receive.
McGregor said that if he had known about Brown’s scholarship displacement policy, then he “would not have been committed to Brown.”
Farrington explained that schools that practice scholarship displacement usually do this to “stretch limited financial aid budgets further to help more students.”
He added that “the counter argument, of course, is that students shouldn’t be punished financially if they successfully win an outside scholarship.”
Ali Schapiro is a senior staff writer for University News, covering admissions and financial aid. She is a freshman from New York City and plans to concentrate in English. In her free time, she enjoys vintage shopping, playing tennis, and doing New York Times crossword puzzles.
