122: Which Schools Are the Most Generous With Financial Aid? (International Version)

Ethan Sawyer  0:00  
Music.


Hi all. This is Ethan Sawyer, aka College Essay Guy, and my goal is to bring more ease, joy and purpose into the college application process. How do I do that? Through this podcast where I interview lots of brilliant people in the college admissions world, ask them lots of probing questions and then try and break down their tidbits and gems and wisdom into practical, actionable steps that you can take, whether you're applying to college or helping someone else apply. So this is part two of three in my series with Jeff Levy and Jenny Kent. And in our last episode, we covered which schools are most generous with financial aid for domestic students, which is to say students who are applying from within the US. This episode, the one you're about to hear is with Jenny Kent. It covers which schools are most generous with financial aid for international students, so students applying from outside the US. Jenny and Jeff have painstakingly pored over many, many college websites and talked on the phone with many, many colleges to put together a spreadsheet that get this lists over 400 colleges, and not only what their total cost of attendance is, because that's pretty easy to find, but what percentage of financial need they meet for students and get this what percentage of students, that is, international students, receive merit aid from the school, and what the average merit Aid Award is. So just to be clear on that, looking at this chart will tell you how much money the school gives to international students and to how many students they give per year. Cool. I think it's kind of cool. It's really geeky for the college admissions world, but it's really important information if you're applying and you need some money. On this episode, I talk with Jenny about why she created the chart in the first place. You can probably guess why, but I'll let her explain it. She explains why you this is if you're applying or your student doesn't have to be incredible in order to get merit aid. So what she says, there might surprise you, how much students ability to pay actually matters when it comes to admissions, how to use her chart, including how Jenny actually walks students through a consultation, and why students might actually decline to ask for merit based aid. So all this and more on this episode. Hope you enjoy it. Hi friends. Welcome to the College sa guy podcast. This is episode two of three with my heroes, Jeff Levy and Jenny Kent. Jenny, thanks for being on the podcast today. Thanks for having me. Yeah. So I'm gonna do a quick bio, and this is, I don't know if this is awkward for you while you're sitting here, but I'm gonna, I'm gonna say some stuff about you, even though you're sitting right here. Here are some fun facts about Jenny. She was raised in Rhode Island by the original hipsters. She studied liberal arts at Skidmore. She's got four kids. She fell into a writing career, and she's written over 30 books for kids, teens and young adults, some of which have been adapted for TV and short film or used in national campaigns. And folks who know Jenny, who may not know that would be like what? So I'm gonna ask you about that in a minute. Her, one of her goals is to positively impact students as an IEC the same way that she was by hers. And she believes each student is on their own path. She's a member like Jeff, of places that some of you will have heard of, but place you know, organizations that some of you won't like I ECA, NACA, tabs and sBsA. These are all super legit. You guys can Google them and find out all about what those are. And she's got also, like Jeff, she's got a CEP designation, which, if you listen to the Steve Anton off podcast, you know, that's not easy to get. It's kind of like the bar for independent consultants, if, like, if you went the you know, to get a CEP, your CEP, your if you're a certified educational planner, you are legit. She's been an expat for over half her life, and she's based out of Bogota, Colombia. And we're going to do this in Spanish, right? Jenny,


Jennie Kent  3:54  
yeah, the whole thing, we're


Ethan Sawyer  3:57  
actually probably going to do a Spanish version of this, but that will not be this one. This will be the English version. Jenny, the first thing I want to know about is so talk to me about writing kids books. And talk to me about how writing kids books, what was the circuitous path that got from that to working with students and thinking about, you know, applying to college and financial aid.


Jennie Kent  4:16  
Well, yeah, so writing kids books was truly a career that I just fell into. You know, a friend contacted me one day, and her family owned a publishing house, and she said, hey, I want to start a children's department, and I'd love it if you joined me. And so the two of us co founded a children's department at a publishing house down here in Columbia, and basically started producing books, and they were books that I wanted to have when I was growing up. Both of us, my friend Maria and I, Maria Villegas, had moms who told us pretty much nothing, and we were, you know, we had voracious appetites for information, and so we started out first writing. A book for girls that was called COVID News, and a book for boys that's called Buber man. And they're kind of like, you know, pre teen non fiction books that have the answers to all the questions we had at that age. And it just kind of spiraled from there. We have a collection of cookbooks. We have a book about yoga for kids, which actually we have a television show based on that book. We also developed a national campaign for basically about teaching kids about ecology and kind of social awareness. So I, you know, I have a master's in education. I was a teacher. So for me, it's really hard not to teach things to people that might be something that people think is a drag about me. So there's a really strong educational base base in my books, and the way that I kind of got into educational consulting and financial aid for international families is that I used an educational consultant myself in the 80s, because I was the youngest of five, and I I kind of didn't realize how different my upbringing was until I was no longer in my parents home. But I come from a very creative, artistic family who, you know, could be a little out there with some things, and an educational consultant suggested that I go to boarding school, and it was the greatest thing ever for me. It absolutely changed my life. I love my school. I often joke like I would go back tomorrow if they had an adult dorm and let me. And I really wanted to kind of impact other students that way. And I started out by promoting my boarding school down here years ago in Bogota and and they actually were the ones that said, you know, you really should think about going into educational consulting, you know, you you know, you'd probably be great at it. And I thought, yeah, you know, that's a good idea. It doesn't take me a terribly long amount of time to write a book, certainly not full time. So I still do both. I, you know, I publish my books with planeta, which is the kind of the largest Spanish, Spanish publishing house, and and I'm an IEC. And once I became a consultant, I realized what a need there was for information about financial aid for international students. It was kind of like this big mystery, you know, and and so for me, that was that was really important to help, you know, not only just the families I work with, because I'm a big believer in, like, let's put as much free information out there as we can. So, you know, that's that's basically how, how I get into it. That's great. I don't know that they're that linked, but


Ethan Sawyer  7:53  
no, I mean, here, can I, can I, can I share a link that I'm saying? So sure, this is me playing College Essay Guy for a second, but the theme that I'm noticing Jenny is, is in terms of the books and in terms of the resource that we're going to talk about today, is recognizing when a thing isn't doesn't exist, that needs to exist, that will help people have a better life.


Jennie Kent  8:14  
That's that's actually probably true. That's a good that's a good way to sum it


Ethan Sawyer  8:18  
up, you know, because it's like, it seems like, and I'm, you know, this is part of what, like, why you and Jeff are my heroes, is like, here's the thing that needs to do it, and no one's doing it. Well, someone should do it. Okay, I'll do it. Now. You guys have done it with numbers and data, and you know, you've mentioned to me before that you're kind of a geek for for charts and stuff, but so just, let's just get into it. Like, what is this resource? But maybe you can set it up for us and tell us, like, say a little bit more about what the need was that this, that this came out of,


Jennie Kent  8:48  
okay, so I think the need that I saw is that the college admission process, in and of itself, can be really confusing for international students the majority of other countries have a really straightforward admission process. You know, it's usually take an exam, you know, like here in Colombia, I'll say the students take an exam. It's called the saber on say, and for the majority of universities, depending on your score, you're either in or you're not. So no one is looking at your transcript. No one is asking you. You know, what's motivating you? What are your goals? So the holistic admission process in the United States can be, can be pretty confusing. So that's the first thing for international students and and you know, international students are drawn to the US because the US has a reputation for having excellent higher education, but I just kept finding families who were saying like, well, we know there's no financial aid for international students, which just isn't true, you know. And then a lot of time, even people who know that aid exists don't realize how much aid. Exists, or that need based aid exists. They think it's all kind of, kind of merit based aid. So I think, you know, that's the reason why, why Jeff and I decided to to create this resource, this, you know, I call it the chart. The chart it and what, and basically what, the, what the chart does is it lists, you know, 400 colleges. And, you know, it basically has, you know, the name of the college, how many undergraduates, how many international undergraduates? Because I think that's really important one, because, you know, for an international student, you can, you can be a pretty big unicorn at some schools, you know. So a lot of students want to know, well, you know, are there going to be three international students, or they're going to be, like, 3000 because some of my kids don't mind being unicorns, but they do need a herd to run with,


Ethan Sawyer  10:52  
you know. So I love the image of a unicorn herd. There's probably a name for that. It's probably like, you know, not like pride, but it's, there's probably, it's like a sleuth, or, I don't know what


Jennie Kent  11:01  
exactly, yeah, well, or, as I even say, sometimes even they don't need other unicorns to run with, necessarily. They can, you know, hang with a griffin or something like that. But, you know, they need to be able to kind of find their group of people.


Ethan Sawyer  11:13  
By the way, I just Googled it, a group of unicorns is called a blessing, yeah?


Jennie Kent  11:19  
Oh, okay, nice to know. I'm gonna use that from now on, they


Ethan Sawyer  11:23  
need a blessing. They're looking for your blessing or their blessing. Anyway, I'll shut up exactly.


Jennie Kent  11:27  
They need their blessing. So I we also so the chart has not only the number of undergraduate students, but what percentage are they of the total undergraduate population, and then the financial aid policy is on the chart, and this is really important because some schools offer need based aid, some schools offer merit based aid, some offer none, and some offer a combination. So a really typical example that I use as to why this is important is Boston College is a very popular school down here in Columbia. So a lot of times I'll have families that come to me and they'll say, Well, you know, it's really expensive to educate my child in the US, but my daughter is amazing. And, you know, I think if she applies to Boston College, she's going to get a scholarship, and then she can go, well, Boston College doesn't give any aid need or merit. So if that's very important to know, because otherwise you're spending, you know, time and resources applying to a school that's never going to give you what you need. You know, Carnegie Mellon is another example. There's, there's no eight they have an enormous undergraduate international population, but, but they don't give financial aid to international students. So, so that's why that financial aid policy is so important to kind of like, you know, make your application time efficient and your list smarter. And then the chart also lists the total number of international undergraduates who receive aid, the average award that they receive, and the percent of students who receive it, which is also really important, because, you know, sometimes, you know, students will say, like, well, look like, you know, you know, this school gives an enormous amount of financial aid, but if they're giving it to three students, you know, what are the chances that you're going To get it? It's probably a specific scholarship. So, so that's kind of, you know, the outline of of the chart. And I think it's incredibly, incredibly useful for families, because depending on you know what your financial situation is, you can figure out how to make your college list smarter. So, you know, for example, there are some really incredible schools that give need based aid to international students. I would say, you know, Williams gives about $61,000 to 60% other international students. So let's say you're a very high achieving. You know, international undergraduate with a with a large amount of financial need, Williams could be a great place for you to apply to. Amherst, also, $60,000 pretty much to 90% of their international students. Colgate, 56,000 to 58% so there's a lot of, you know, really, really great schools that if you're a needy international student and you can get in, you know, they'll give you a very good package, in the same sense that there are some that aren't good, you know. I mean, Georgetown gives $58,000 on average, but to 3% so you know what? What are the chances of you being the 3% and that's one of the things that you have to figure out when you're applying.


Ethan Sawyer  14:52  
One of the things I joked about with Jeff is that, and this was true for me when I was applying to colleges in the late 90s, when I was applying to North. Western I like, you find out where you're getting in, and then there's like, a second round of acceptances, where you're finding out how much money you're going to get, right? Because I was an EFC, which means, you know, my estimated family contribution based on the money that my dad made, was that my, you know, they weren't going to expect my dad to pay anything. So I had my fingers crossed. But had I had a chart like this, I would have had some sense of what my odds were, not sort of just been, you know, completely in the dark. Go ahead,


Jennie Kent  15:26  
exactly well, and, and, and, like I said, you know, you'd know where to apply to in the first place, right? You know, which I which I think is, is really important. I have a lot of families who do not have financial need, but they also are not planning on spending 67 $68,000 a year to educate their child. So those are families who are looking for merit, right, you know, and there are a lot of lot of schools who are, are very generous with merit aid for international students. You know, there are at least, you know, 30 on our chart that offer an average award of $20,000 a year. You know, which is, which is very generous. You know, 16 offers 50% or plus of foreign students, and a lot of those are in the media medium selectivity range. You know, these are not schools that are impossible to get into. You know, there are some schools that are going to be, you know, need blind and meet full need for international students, but there's six of them, and it's, it's pretty hard to get into MIT, you know. So it's nice to know that there are some schools that are not as hard to get into as a school like that, and also have really, you know, really generous merit. I mean, you know, Furman, for example, is a merit only school, and they give about $33,000 to 98% of their international students. So if you're looking for merit, and you're a strong international student, or, you know, when it comes to merit, you know, one of the things that I find is a lot of families think, well, like my child, has to be incredible to get married. And that's not really true. All, all the student has to have is, you know, something that the university wants to have on their campus. So it could be, you know, that you're coming from a particular location of the world where they're interested in having more students. It could be that you play bassoon, you know, you just it kind of depends on what the institutional need is.


Ethan Sawyer  17:23  
Just a quick side note for if someone's listening and they're for the first time, we're hearing these phrases like need based and merit based aid. Just give a quick bullet point about what each of those are and how they can find out what you know, what they're eligible for.


Jennie Kent  17:38  
Yeah, absolutely. So need based aid actually means that your family that they're going to look at your income and your assets, and they're going to say, okay, based on the income that your family has, based on the assets that your family has, reasonably we expect that you're going to be able to pay, let's say, I'm going to say $10,000 in this case. Okay, so that would be your estimated family contributions. That would be EFC, 10,000 they're not expecting you to have, you know, oodles of money that that they know you have no way of of producing. So, so they're basically all the colleges will look, and we'll figure out so, and they will then say you're, you know, depending on what your EFC is, you either qualify for need based aid or or you don't. And I think, you know, a lot of families don't understand. They think, you know, like, oh, well, I wait. I probably make way too much money to qualify for need based aid. Something I see a lot with my international families too, is that, you know, culturally, a lot of cultures don't expect to get something that they can't afford, you know. So they just assume, well, I can't afford it, so my child can't go. And that just kind of isn't the American way of doing things. You know, our way of doing things is, hey, if you're, you know, talented, you know, we'd love to have you on our campus. Let's figure out how we can make this work. Merit based. Date, as I said earlier, is really, that's usually institutional monies, and it's, it's more of a discount really. It's, you know, it's not, it's not real money. As I would say, they're going to discount the tuition for you every year a certain amount, and that is not based on your income or assets at all. This is just because the student has something that the institution is interested in attracting to their campus.


Ethan Sawyer  19:34  
What you know, with one thing that I imagine, that parents and students are wondering about, is how much I'm going to say this in the sort of the lay person, and then I'll say it in the counselor term. How much do schools care about who can pay and who can't pay? In other words, if they if MIT looks at a student, and I'm just going to throw out this hypothetical situation, who can pay full freight, and a student who, who can't, who needs a full scholarship, is. Do they care?


Jennie Kent  20:02  
Well, so MIT, in particular, does not care, actually. And


Ethan Sawyer  20:06  
what I'm asking the phrase we use in counseling is need blind. Is need blind a real thing? Or, who is need blind?


Jennie Kent  20:12  
Yes, so, so need blind is a real thing. But for international students, the majority of universities are, what are called, need aware. So that means, you know, all things being equal, you know they're going to say, we'd love to admit this student, but when push comes to shove, they are going to look and see, okay. Well, this student needs, you know, $10,000 of extra funding, and this needs 50 so it really depends. One of the things that I think is interesting, Ethan, I've had a lot of conversations with college admission officers and I, and I see this a lot with international families. I think that when there's a smaller amount of need, let's say a student needs, you know, under $10,000 you know, they're, they'd like, that's pretty low. That would be considered pretty low, you know, the college says, Well, we know they've got at least, you know, 50,000 55,000 they just need a small amount. For the most part, those international students tend to choose prestigious institutions over scholarship. And anecdotally, that's what I see. You know, I see students who are very high achieving and will get some really generous scholarship offers, and then maybe we'll get into, say, an Ivy League university where they will be offered admission with zero scholarship. They will usually call up every relative they have and find a way to get that missing $10,000 together and choose that so do not be afraid if you are an international student with high need to apply, because there are a lot of schools that would love to have you, and there are a lot of schools who would be willing to give you scholarship money. And if you just use this chart, which you know, it's a free resource. It's there for everybody to use and spread the word among your friends. You'll be able to find these


Ethan Sawyer  22:06  
schools. I was so proud of a student, too. So I've seen the same thing to be true of the students that I work with. And I saw I was so proud of a student two years ago, who his dream school was, you know, was Harvard and and I thought, I mean, he had the most, one of the most impressive applications I've ever seen, like, one of those, like, few students in your career kind of application, you know, perfect test scores. And then he got, he got rejected from Harvard, he got into Dartmouth and no money. And then he got a, like, a seven year scholarship to Northeastern. So there was, like this, you know, program, and he was debating, and I hope he chose northeast. He got two calls from two deans at Northeastern, saying, will you please come here? And ultimately, ended up in Northeastern, and he's been super happy there. And it's, it's great. So I was really proud of him.


Jennie Kent  22:49  
I would be proud of him too, and I think that that's really inspirational. And you know, I always say to students, I mean, you're talking about a free education, yeah. You know, it's very difficult today to be a student starting out at your first job without debt. I think, you know, the majority of students in the world start out with some debt. Imagine what it would feel like to start out with none, right?


Ethan Sawyer  23:14  
And he did the math. I think he was pretty good to me, right? You know, pencil on a napkin was like, Okay, 670, 1000 times seven years, you know? And was like, Yeah, you know, I could, I could do that. So I was really, yeah, really glad. Okay, so I love these examples that use. Are there any other examples of how you've used the chart with particular students that you found, you know, particularly, you know? So folks can get a sense of how to


Jennie Kent  23:40  
use this chart. Yeah, I think, you know, the other, the other kind of combination that we see is the schools that offer both merit and need and and those are great, because, you know, basically any international student should be applying to those schools, right? And there are 135 in our chart of 400 that offer both merit and need, and 50 of them have average awards of $30,000.11 have average awards of $50,000 so you know, we're talking pretty big discounts here. One is get more my alma mater, which gives about 30% of their international students just under $61,000 discount. So that's a pretty big one Trinity College in Connecticut. Again, $61,000 to 80% you know, Duke, $69,000 to 27% Wesleyan, about the same, $59,000 to 27% so again, you know, these are not


Ethan Sawyer  24:42  
of like, sorry to make happy. I'm having images of just like these schools, like people in these school shirts, just like making it rain, like, you know, like taking the bills and just like being like, here you go, international students, and it's rowing it up in the air. Sorry to cut you off. That's, I'll just keep doing these cheesy asides because. That,


Jennie Kent  25:01  
yeah, no. I mean, I think that there are lots and lots of of schools, you know. And you can see there, there's a wide range. I mean, Providence College, $50,000 to 100% of their international students. It doesn't get better than 100% you know. And and you know, you've got, you've got, you know, everything from, from, from Stanford, that's offering $56,000 to about 26% you know, the Colorado College. I mean, there's, there's a wide range of of admissibility rates, let's say, and again, one of the things I love about the charts, and this, this may, you know, be less kind of me, but I kind of, you know, I want everybody to know what everyone is doing. I want this to be as transparent as possible. And Jeff and I talk about that a lot, you know, we're believers in, you know, if you have a policy, you should feel comfortable with it and defend it. So I think the charts great too, because it talks about, you know, the outliers, the schools that that that aren't generous, you know, I, you know, and I often, I often joke with my with my students, you know, you could look at a school like scripts that gives, you know, a little over $3,000 to 18% of internationals. And, I mean, you might be lucky enough to get one of those, and it's sort of like, well, thanks for the ticket, because that's, you know, that's like one year of airline tickets, depending on where you're coming from in the world, you know. And you know this just kind of depends on, you know, what the institutional policy is. I think there's lots of lots of universities that love to have international students on their campuses and are really dedicated to growing the population, and there are others who just aren't, you know, obviously the public schools, we know for the public, it's, it's tough. I mean, even if you're an out of state student, sometimes it can be tough to to get any sort of scholarship there. So the publics don't surprise me, but you know, some of the privates, I'd love it if they sent more dollars to my international families.


Ethan Sawyer  27:02  
So imagine that I'm a student who's just walked into your office. I'm an international student who has some need. I'm not sure how much I'm going to need, but how do I figure out which schools to apply to in terms of, you know what's going to be a financial fit? And how do I use this chart? So just walk me through it. What are the what are the, what are the steps that you would recommend a student listening to this, or a family listening to this, an international family trying to figure out, you know, how to, how to take financial, you know, financials into account when developing their college


Jennie Kent  27:33  
list. Well, I think, you know, I'm glad that you asked, because this is actually the very first thing that I, that I do with families at the first meeting, we kind of dig right into finances. Because I don't think it's a good idea to, you know, have a student fall in love with a school that is just absolutely, kind of, you know, unaffordable. And so I like to, you know, kind of cut to the chase right away and say, right, let's talk finances. So I think the first thing is, as a student, you need to determine which sort of aid you qualify for. You know, do I qualify for need based aid? Do I call, you know, do I want merit based aid? Do I want both? Or is this completely unimportant to me? And then after that, you really need to kind of identify the aid policies. You would use the chart, and you would look and see like, Okay, I need, need based dates. So which are the schools that offer need based aid? On my website, Ethan this chart, there's a PDF of the chart hanging but on Jeff's website, you can download the chart and you can sort it, and you know, like in an Excel file I think it is, or a Google Doc. I'm the least tech person. And


Ethan Sawyer  28:42  
for those folks who are listening, who are also not tech people, we're gonna have a little simple how to to show you the steps, the really easy steps that you need to take in order to sort this chart and just to step back one just one step further before you go on like. So how do folks find out if they are, if they are gonna need money? Is there a way to like? What are the resources that you recommend folks you know use in order to find their EFC for example,


Jennie Kent  29:05  
yeah, absolutely there. There are. So every, every school, must have an EFC calculator on their on their website. So if you already know the name of a school, you know, you can go in and use that, or you could go to the FAFSA forecaster. I think if you know the schools that you're interested in, it's best to use their their EFC calculator, because in theory, it will give you a more accurate number. But again, these are just estimates, and the rule of thumb is sort of like, the more questions they ask, the more accurate it will be, you know, if they don't ask a lot of questions and they just kind of spin a number out real fast, it might be, you know, not quite as it might be more ballpark than than than one that asks a lot of very specific questions, but you can go right to the colleges and and, you know, you feel, usually they'll have. You type in some financial data as well as you know, the schools that are offering merit, they'll be asking, like, you know, what's the student's grade point average? And have you already taken test scores? And if so, what are they? A lot of them for international students will want to know, if you're at an International Baccalaureate school, or, say, one of the European curriculums, like, you know, the abattoir, or the French black or, you know, a levels, so that they can kind of get an idea of the academic rigor of your program, because you kind of get points for all of that. So, you know, that's the that's the best way to do it is to first kind of find out, okay, this is, this is my estimated family contribution. And you know, obviously, you know, the the lower your estimated family contribution, that the higher your needs. So, you know, you can then go to the chart and say, okay, you know, which sorts of schools Am I looking for. You know, need merit. Both look at the policies. And then, obviously, if you're a competitive applicant and you have demonstrated financially need, you should consider the institutions that offer need based aid. And I think everyone should consider institutions who are generous with merit aid. I mean, that's, that's what I tell my families anyway. That's, you know, sometimes on the Common Application. I don't know if you've seen this Ethan, but they'll say, like, are you interested in merit based scholarships? Or, like, how are you planning on funding your and I've had students who checked No, and I'm like, what?


Ethan Sawyer  31:33  
That's free discount. And why do you think they do that?


Jennie Kent  31:37  
I think they don't understand it. I think they don't know. Question means it's, it's really confusing. And if you think about it, for an international student, I mean, for the most part, this is their second, third or fourth language that they're that they're applying in, you know. So if there's a term that they don't understand, you know? And again, there's a, there's a big assumption by a lot of families that there is no scholarship. There are no scholarships for international students, and it just isn't true. So be sure to check merit based scholarships. Always


Ethan Sawyer  32:13  
great. So a student comes in, I just want to go back. So a student comes in, they sure you said, Did you say you sit them down with the chart at the very start? Or do you have them? I mean, do most of them have a list, and then you send them to the website of the school first? Or tell me again, take me through. How does that work as you're walking through


Jennie Kent  32:27  
the process? Yeah, go ahead. Yeah. So I would say the majority of students who come into my office the first time do not have a list. Some do. Usually they'll have a couple names, and to be perfectly honest, a lot of the times they're unrealistic. We are talking about, you know, what Steve Antonoff calls the drool schools. You know, schools that are very, very difficult to get into. So they might have have two or three, but one of the things that I discussed with the family right away is, let's talk about financial aid. Will you need it? Will you not? So if they're not sure, I ask them to, you know, either use the FAFSA forecaster, which you know, you can just find that online, and that will give you an estimated family contribution, or you can also just, you know, let's say you're interested in Boston University. You know, you could go to their website, and you could use their their EFC calculator, their net price calculator, and you could type in your information, and they will spit out an estimated family contribution, and that EFC, remember, it is just estimated. That's why, that's why it's in the name. So, so that's what we do. And then from there, we move to


Ethan Sawyer  33:42  
the chart. Got it. What are there any other things that you feel like it's just really important for international You've mentioned a couple. So you've mentioned, for example, that, you know, there's this myth out there, or that international students and families often think that there isn't money, so they can't get it. Are there any other things that you can think of that you've said you find yourself saying to families all the time things that folks should keep in mind.


Jennie Kent  34:05  
Yeah, I think not only that there is financial aid, but that it's not just for academic superstars. You know, colleges and universities are looking for a lot of things, so I have worked with students who might be I would even call them below average academically. But have incredible leadership, you know, president of the student body. That's that's really valuable to colleges and universities. They want kids on their campus who are going to lead. They want, they want students who are, you know, going to be involved. They have a lot of programs, and they'd like to to fill them. So I think leadership is something that they look for, artistic talent, musical talent, athletic talent. You know, there's, there's lots of reasons, you know, lots of, lots of times there are schools who would just, you know, love to have students from certain countries. I work with students from Europe. Why? And there's an incredibly small number of students from Uruguay who study abroad for undergraduate education. They actually, they would be like the unicorns. So there's a very small blessing of Uruguayans who go abroad or for their undergraduate education. And so they're, they're very appealing. You know, it's sort of like, I think, you know, a lot of families who go to information sessions and college tours will see that the college reps always proudly say, you know, we have 48 states represented and, you know, 27 countries. You know, this is something that's important to them. So, you know, it's not just for academic superstars, although the academic superstars are going to usually get larger offers of merit based aid than the non academic superstars. But I do think that's important to know. And there is need based aid for international families, I think that's something that a lot of families just don't, don't realize they just think, you know, well, there's no way my student could get to get into these schools and and it's exactly the opposite. I'm not going to say that there's as much financial aid as there are for domestic students. There aren't because of the you know, obviously Federal dollars are not available to them, but certainly there, there is financial aid available. Great.


Ethan Sawyer  36:25  
This is all super clear, and for folks listening, you can find, you'll be able to find a link to the charts in the show notes page. So it'll be really easy and clear where that is. We're gonna get to show and tell in just a second, which is what I usually close the show with. But cool, I'm curious, Jenny, why do you do what you do?


Jennie Kent  36:45  
Wow, in terms of being a consultant, or all of these charts,


Ethan Sawyer  36:50  
you know, I'm gonna, I'm gonna let it be open because, yeah, because the both of those are interesting to me.


Jennie Kent  36:57  
So I think for one thing, I love working with kids of any age. I like talking to them. I, you know, I really connect with them, and always have. So that's one part of my job that I really love. I've I have lived as an expat for over half my life, I've lived in four different countries, and so, you know, I know what it's like to not understand a system and and want to be able to understand it. And so I kind of feel like anything I can do to help students is time well served. I love


Ethan Sawyer  37:39  
it. And so now tell me about the charts. So why do you do you do these charts? I know that that's connected, but why these charts?


Jennie Kent  37:47  
I I like things that are very clear. You know, I'm, I'm a very like, as we say in Spanish, al grano, you know, I like to go to the point, and I think it's very difficult to play a game if you don't know what the rules are. And I think that that college admissions can be so complex that sometimes it feels like a game for international families and even for domestic families. And so, you know, I just think it's, it's super important to, you know, to produce these resources for people and to and to circulate them and, and I know that, you know, Jeff feels the same way, and we just love to collaborate on things. We have a great time together. So, so I guess, for all those reasons, that's why I do what I do


Ethan Sawyer  38:37  
that's awesome. I'm excited to do for some reason, I just started thinking we should do the show and tell in Spanish. But then I'm like, Well, that might alienate folks, but y'all, I'll link in our show notes if we end up doing a Spanish version to that version as well. So show and tell time. So Jenny, what have you brought for show and tell today?


Jennie Kent  38:56  
Well, it's gonna surprise you, because it's not what I told you I was gonna bring great. Um, since this is the International chart for show and tell, I have brought Duolingo. And Duolingo is something I don't know if you use it Ethan, but I, like the majority of my students, use it. Duolingo is very cool. I use it online, and it's basically a program where you can learn a foreign language for free, and you basically tell them, like, how much time you want to spend each day. Like, if you're hardcore, like me, you're going to do 20 minutes a day. And so I like Duolingo and I have started taking Italian.


Ethan Sawyer  39:36  
Wow, that's cool.


Jennie Kent  39:39  
How's it going? Yeah, it's pretty cool. I It's pretty good. It's pretty good. You know, I think there's one of the reasons why I chose it is because I was hoping that there'd be sufficient overlap with Spanish. I also I love all things Italian. You know, I like Italian food. I love Italian. Fashion. I think they have great design. My husband would jokingly tell you that I like Italian men. I grew up in a town in Rhode Island that was very Italian American, so I just thought like that would be cool. I think the more languages you know, the better. The world is getting smaller every day, and I know that for me, being fluent in both English and Spanish makes me feel pretty confident. Oh, that's onto Italian. Now,


Ethan Sawyer  40:26  
yeah, I'm so I'm really excited as you're, as we're talking because my wife and I are planning to take a trip to South America to Peru, or, sorry, yeah, to Peru into Ecuador. And it's funny, because I so rarely speak Spanish anymore, like it's, it's, I mean, I do it a little bit for work, for voiceover stuff, but you know, it's, I'm so grateful I speak another language, and I'm so excited that, you know, my daughter's learning a little bit of Spanish, but great deal lingo. You reminded me of an app that I just downloaded, and it's called moment. Have you heard of this?


Jennie Kent  41:02  
Like, like Brian cobbleman The moment, like the podcast,


Ethan Sawyer  41:05  
no, I think, or no, it's a different thing. I think it's a different thing. It might, I don't know if it's connected or not, but So this app is basically so I've been trying to break a cell phone addiction, and you know, the one thing that really helped me was separating my work email from my personal email, which is like, maybe, like, Duh, but I can't actually access my work email on my phone. I haven't set that up, which feels edgy, but so far so good. And this app


Jennie Kent  41:32  
I did that on my iPad, it's really,


Ethan Sawyer  41:34  
yeah, it's totally, it feels like, Oh, finally, a boundary, you know? And but this app moment actually tells me how much screen time I'm spending, and it tells me not only how many, but it tells me how many times I picked up the phone and, like, opened it up.


Jennie Kent  41:52  
Wow. Do you think is there any way that I could program my shopping addiction into it and work on that? Please tell me how many times, how many times I go to Bucha open Andy, or how many times I go to black students?


Ethan Sawyer  42:06  
That's funny. There's a, there's an app for that, probably forthcoming,


Jennie Kent  42:12  
but I'm gonna find it. Yeah,


Ethan Sawyer  42:13  
you should or create it right at your next iteration. Jenny, thank you. I'm so grateful for for you and for Jeff, and excited to do Episode Three with you guys. So folks who are listening, here's the quick pitch for that we're going to be talking about. If you thought these two charts were cool, you'll love this third one. So more awesome data geekiness that is actually has practical uses for the college application process. So check it out. Y'all. Jenny, thank you again. You're awesome. Thanks. Hi friends. You'll find all the show notes, which is to say, links to everything we discussed, links to the chart, links to the FAFSA forecaster, links to Jenny's website, all at college. Sa guy.com/podcast make sure you listen to the next episode where we talk about whether or not you should apply for early decision or not, or early action or restricted early action, what the differences between all those are, and another amazing chart that Jeff and Jenny have created, and we get to talk to both of them next time that will help you decide. Hope you'll join us for that. Stay curious. You


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