Complexities and Controversies Regarding Financial Aid at Harvard

Admission to Harvard College requires immense work and rigor. Still, it does not necessarily mean a student will attend: the cost of attendance can become a barrier between a student and their dream school.

The cost of attendance at the College has increased significantly in the past three years: the Harvard Griffin Office of Financial Aid reports that the present billed cost of attendance is $91,634, while last academic year it was $86,926. In the 2024-2025 school year, it cost $82,866. Since many undergraduate households are unable to afford this hefty price tag, the College provides need-based financial aid to a large portion of each class. An estimated 25% of families recieve a full ride and pay nothing for their students’ education, while 55% receive partial scholarships.

For many Harvard undergraduates, financial aid plays a crucial role in college decisions. The aid is distributed by income tier. For families with annual incomes below $100,000, Harvard covers tuition, room and board, and all other billed expenses, so the expected parent contribution is zero. For families earning between $100,000 and $200,000, aid is considered on a case-by-case basis, though the Financial Aid office will cover part of their tuition.

“Financial aid as an overarching system in higher education is a crucial part of our society,” Eliza Teo ’30 said to the “Independent.” “I think it very much makes higher education accessible, along with overall, the concept of education accessible…to the most vulnerable parts of society that would benefit the most from education.”

Financial aid-related decisions start before the student even steps foot on campus, as financial aid iss one of the factors students considerwhene choosing a campus. For Brady Merrill ’30, who is on financial aid, he explained that his college decision was based solely on cost. “I had promised myself and my family that I would go wherever was cheapest, even if it wasn’t the best school or where I wanted… just because student loans and the cost of paying for college would be more than my family could afford now or at any point in the foreseeable future,” he said.

Another important consideration is the loans many students have to take out to pay for college. According to the Educational Data Initiative, 20% of students who graduate from undergraduate institutions in the United States have student debt. Only 28% of these borrowers have loans under $100,000.

“You hear about it all the time where student loans kind of loom over a person for their entire young adult life. And once they’ve paid off their student loans, they have a mortgage and car payments and insurance payments as well to make,” Merrill, who himself is receiving full financial aid, said. “I think student loans are a big, large financial burden on a lot of young people.”

However, the Griffin Financial Aid Office promises that 100% of students “can” graduate Harvard debt-free, as it offers need-based financial aid that covers 100% of demonstrated need.

This aid program is not new; the University has historically provided monetary support to enrollees since its early days as just an undergraduate institution. Back then, the school provided only meager sums, largely funded by small donations. Harvard financial aid took its modern form in 1934, when Harvard President James B. Conant ’14 created the institution’s first large financial aid initiative, initially called the National Scholarship Plan. It was meant not only to allow students to attend Harvard but also to make higher education more accessible beyond Harvard.

Since then, financial aid has been sponsored by Harvard donors, most of whom are alums. Notably, Kenneth C. Griffin donated $150 million to Harvard in 2015 for financial aid. After this contribution, the office was renamed the “Griffin Financial Aid Office.” The program’s fiscal foundation also comes from the Harvard endowment, which manages approximately 15,000 individual investments and distributed $2.6 billion in funds this year; in 2026, $777,246 of these funds were allocated toward financial aid, and in 2025, $783,674 were allocated.

“Financial aid for that reason has not only made college easier for me to afford, but has also kind of given me a head start on the rest of my life as well, as I won’t need to worry about these cumbersome student loans,” Merril said.

For those attending Harvard on a full ride, aid covers winter clothing expenses, research and study abroad opportunities, and other essentials and experiences.

Although the Financial Aid office says many middle-class families earning above $200k receive financial aid, exceptions still exist. For example, if a family has atypical assets, like inherited property, they may not qualify for financial aid. This is even though tuition would cost the family a significant portion of their liquid income.

“So there are some people that have to pay a considerable amount of funds because, for example, one that I heard was that their assets were large,” Merril said. “They had a large home that they’d inherited from their grandparents, but they were a single-income family and made just over $100,000… they’re paying more than another person that lives in something like a smaller home,” Merrill said.

Merrill believes middle-class families often struggle most to pay for college, as they are expected to pay full tuition even though the financial burden is heavy for these groups. “I’m not claiming that if a family makes $1 million a year or something like that, that they should be receiving financial aid,” he said. “But I’m also saying that just because a family makes, in Harvard’s case, just over $100,000 or just over $200,000, they shouldn’t pay for the full cost of living or full tuition.”

Navigating the University’s financial aid rules has been difficult for some students. “[I] come from a unique background where my mom is an immigrant and a single mother,” Teo explained. While students whose families make less than $100,000 a year are supposed to receive a full ride at the College, Teo has paid part of her tuition despite her mother having no income. “That’s been like a frustrating part of financial aid,” she said. “I have a parent contribution fund and also a student contribution fund. And I’ve been paying both of them.”

The Financial Aid office notes that even though it considers assets in financial aid distributions, retirement funds should not be counted. “My mom’s income is zero, and the only income that she has is from investments that she holds as an immigrant who’s not getting welfare benefits,” Teo explained. “So that’s the only retirement funds that she has, especially with physical disabilities that prevent her from working and a lack of job experience because of her dependency on my dad, which is separate, more situation-wise than what is factually true in preventing her from getting a job.”

In nuanced situations like this, the Griffin Financial Aid Office’s email-dominated communication leaves undergraduates with no viable options.

“Making more financial aid resources accessible is one thing: I think one thing that kind of prevented me or discouraged me from reaching out to them more was that it’s mostly email-based,” Teo said. “Especially during preorientation, I was told by the financial aid officers that they didn’t have in-person appointments yet. Now they do because I checked online and I met with my residential dean … I feel like providing that kind of support is important to communities in need.”

Anna Gunko ’30 (agunko@college.harvard.edu) is comping the “Harvard Independent.”