Financial aid help Part 1 - Need-blind colleges

I suppose that most of you relies on the financial aid when considering a U.S. study. Since the scholarships for undergraduates are said to be more rare then those for graduates, to compete for those scholarships you'll need to have excellent competences. That includes a high GPA score, high TOEFL and SAT score, good extracuricullars, etc.
In most cases, your financial situation could also be taken into account. So the applicant with better financial situation has an advatage over a less-wealthy applicant. Nevertheless, this isn't the end of the tunnel.

The solution are need-blind colleges which do not consider an applicant's financial situation when deciding admission. Those colleges are backed finacially by great endowment or source of funding. Need-blind admissions systems are rare in the private sector where institutional funds often make up the bulk of financial aid awarded but virtually all public institutions are need blind. Most private universities cannot afford to offer financial aid to all admitted students and many will admit all students but cannot offer them sufficient aid to meet need. . Many schools who admit all U.S. citizens or resident aliens without regard to need do not extend this policy to internationals or to transfer students. Therefore schools, especially private ones, which are need-blind and full-need for all applicants, including internationals, tend to be much more selective as they have relatively more applicants than other similar schools.

Need-blind admission does not necessarily mean a "full-need" financial aid policy--where the school agrees to meet the full demonstrated financial need of all its admitted students. Indeed, the two policies can be in tension because need-blind admissions and full-need financial aid together commit the school to spend an undetermined amount of money regardless of other budgetary constraints. Thus, some need-blind schools will admit students who will nonetheless not be able to attend because of deficient financial aid awards.

U.S. INSTITUTIONS THAT ARE NEED-BLIND AND FULL-NEED FOR ALL APPLICANTS

There are currently only six U.S. institutions of higher learning offering such admission policies for all applicants, including international students.

1. Amherst College - liberal arts college
2. Dartmouth College
3. Harvard University
4. MIT
5. Princeton University
6. Yale University

For U.S. applicants there is a much boader range of whether need-blind or full-need institutions.

Some of them are:

1. Boston College
2. Duke University
3. Georgetown University
4. University of Notre Dame