History of financial aid

Financial Aid Reform refers to efforts to get Columbia to ante up during the financial aid arms race of 2005-2008, when major universities, spurred in part by Congressional pressure to spend more of their rapidly growing endowments or face a tax, took turns one-upping each other with promises of expanded financial aid packages for students from low-to-middle income families. Columbia was initially slow to respond to moves by other schools, before making a big commitment in March 2008, one week before the collapse of Bear Stearns, the first major incident of the Great Recession.

Timeline of Major Events

January 2001: Princeton announces that beginning the following fall, no undergraduate student would be required to take out a loan as part of their financial aid package, and that the loans would be replaced with grants.

March 2005: Yale announces that families earning under $45k will not be required to pay towards their childrens' educations, and those making up to $60k would see steeply reduced contribution requirements.

March 2006: Stanford announces a program that matches Yale's.

March 2006: Penn announces that it will replace student loans with grants for students whose parents earn under $50,000.

April 2006: Harvard, because it's Harvard, announces that parents who earn less than 60k a year are off the hook for their childrens' education, one-upping Yale and Stanford.

Spring 2006: Financial Aid "Reform" is a major issue among student government types at columbia. CCSC candidates campaign on it even though they have no control over it. There is a petition campaign for "FAiR".

September 2006: Columbia gets off the fence and announces that it, like Penn, will eliminate loans for students from families earning under $50k.

April 2007: John Kluge pledges $400 million for financial aid, the largest gift in school history. Columbia doesn't get the money until later, obviously. But they use the pledge to launch a matching contribution campaign to entice other alumni to donate for fin aid as well.

December 2007: Because it's a pimp, Harvard triples down, declares that in addition to its previous program, families earning up to $120k need only pay a percentage of their income on a scale sliding up to 10%, and capping contributions at 10% of income for families earning all the way up to $180k, eliminates student loans, and stops counting home equity in calculating family's ability to pay.

December 2007: Penn nudges up the cap on its no-loans-for-students program from families earning $50k up to $100k.

January 2008: Upset by being beaten to the punch this time around, Yale matches Harvard, raises the top end of its 10% cap to $200,000, eliminates student loans, and also adjusts its formula.

February 2008: Brown gets on board. Adopts the pay nothing if you earn under $60k plan, and eliminates student loans for students from families earning under $100k. Stanford also significantly beefs up its program.

March 2008: Columbia mans up, eliminating student loans for all, eliminating contributions from families earning under $60k, and reducing the expected contribution from families earning up to $100k.