Some students enter MIT eligible for, or having already been awarded, a scholarship, grant, or other funds from a government entity or private organization to use toward their education. They come from a variety of sources: grants from your home state, a local business, non-profit organizations, employer tuition remissions/benefits, or the government (such as VA Benefits or the Pell Grant). The intent of these additional funds is that they be applied to your MIT education.
We collectively call these funds “outside scholarships” to distinguish them from our institutional grants. Outside scholarships always reduce what you pay to attend MIT, but how they do so depends on whether or not you are receiving a need-based institutional grant.
Outside scholarships and need-based aid
All of MIT’s financial aid is need-based. This means that we offer aid entirely based on your family’s demonstrated financial need. In order to be equitable, we need to be consistent in what we ask all families to pay. An outside scholarship adds to what a family has available to pay, which affects a family’s calculated need. We do not offer families more financial aid than their calculated need.
If you are receiving an MIT Scholarship
The first $5,400 of your outside scholarships can be used to pay your student contribution (the amount we expect you to contribute from summer and term-time work). You can still work; we just don’t expect you to give more money to us.
After that first $5,400, we reduce your need-based MIT Scholarship by the amount remaining in your outside scholarships. We do this because the funds in your outside scholarships, by definition, are available to your family to help you pay for MIT, and we only give aid to cover the amount your family needs.
Once your MIT Scholarship has been reduced to zero, any remaining outside scholarship funds can be used by you and your family to pay for MIT (effectively, to help meet their parent contribution).
If you are not receiving an MIT Scholarship
If you are not receiving MIT financial aid, then any outside scholarship funds you have can be used by your family to pay for MIT.
Why outside scholarships don’t reduce the parent contribution
We do this because we set your MIT Scholarship to be equal to the difference between what MIT costs and what we determine your family can afford to pay, and getting an outside scholarship—by definition—increases the resources available to your family to pay for MIT.
To equitably distribute our resources where the need is the greatest among our students, we allocate these new resources to reduce the amount of grant aid we give you, until it matches your calculated need.
However, there may be ways that you can apply outside scholarships to other costs before they reduce your MIT Scholarship, such as toward a new computer or covering your health insurance. We encourage you to contact your financial aid counselor for advice on how to do this.
What to do if you receive an outside scholarship
If you receive outside scholarships or grants, you are required to report it on the Outside Award Reply Form so we can apply it to your bill and adjust your aid accordingly.
MIT’s policy is to distribute your anticipated scholarship award(s) in equal payments over your expected enrollment period. For example, if you are reporting an award of $1,000, we will record this anticipated scholarship as $500 in the fall semester and $500 in the spring semester unless instructions are included with the scholarship payment that direct us to act otherwise.
Outside scholarships and where to find them
Federal grants
You’ll automatically be considered for federal grant programs like the Federal Pell Grant and Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant when you apply for financial aid each year. If you’re eligible, we’ll include the grants in your financial aid offer.
State grants
Some states have their own financial aid programs, including need-based grants and merit-based scholarships. If you’re a U.S. citizen or permanent resident, you may qualify for financial aid from your home state.
If you receive a state grant, we’ll include it in your financial aid as soon as we receive it from your state.
Other outside scholarships
There are many private scholarships that you can apply for on your own. You can ask your financial aid counselor for advice, but in general, we suggest the following resources as a starting point:
You can also reach out to any groups or organizations that you (or your parents) have been involved with to see if they offer private scholarships. We strongly recommend against paying for a scholarship search service.