Daniel Barkowitz | November 15, 2004

"Armchair traveling"

I love to travel. I love the experience of anticipation, not knowing what you'll see around the corner or around the bend -- to borrow an easy Hobbit reference, “The Road goes ever on and on, down from the door where it began. Now far ahead the Road has gone, and I must follow if I can.“

Unfortunately, I don't get the chance to travel as much as I like these days. So I use every chance I get to see the world in a virtual way -- reading travel books, travel magazines, watching “The Amazing Race”, anything I can.

Of course, one way I get to travel the world is by reviewing the financial aid applications of our international students here at MIT. We have applicants from all over the world, and when a Financial Aid Officer reviews the application, we get a little peek into (at least the financial aspects of) your life. With international applicants, we also request income documentation from the home country and ask that such documentation be translated into English, so we have the distinct pleasure of looking at tax returns and documents in many different foreign languages. And in the final analysis, we get to look at stamps from all over the world since our mail arrives here from you with your local stamps on the envelope.

So, maybe not the exciting nature of actually coming to see you in your country, but I'll take what I can.

If you are an international applicant, how do you apply for financial aid to MIT? Here is the process:

1. Fill out and return the International Student Financial Aid Application. This document should be completed in US currency with some indication of the exchange rate you used. The document should be based on the income and assets for the last completed tax year in your country that ends before April 1, 2005 (if your country operates its tax system on a January through December calendar, the last completed tax year will be 2004; if it operates April through March, the last tax year will end March 31, 2005; if it operates July 1 through June 30, the last tax year will be the one ending June 30, 2004).

2. You should send in a copy of the most recent tax return you and your parents filed in your home country. Make sure to translate it to English and provide both the original and the translation. If your country does not have a national tax system, provide a letter from your parents' employer(s) certifying the amount of their earnings for calendar year 2004. Again, make sure this information is translated to English.

Once we have your forms (and again we shouldn't have them any sooner than mid-January), we will begin reviewing your application for aid. In a later blog I will detail more information about how we analyze applications, but for now I will attempt just to answer some of the questions you all have raised.

Eujin asked a question about summer contributions and whether we expect international students to remain on campus during the summer to earn enough to provide a summer contribution. Here at MIT we assume that students will return home during the summer and, if your home is international, that you will return there. Therefore if you live internationally (whether you are or are not a US Citizen) we do two things: 1) we exempt you from a requirement for a summer contribution; and 2) we do not include travel as a component of your financial aid budget. We, therefore, expect that you will earn whatever money is necessary to provide your transportation home and back and we do not expect you to contribute any of these earnings toward your MIT expense. This is different for students living in the US. For US residents, we do expect a minimum summer contribution from your earnings, but we also allow a travel cost (based on your residence) as a component in your budget.

Meder asked whether all students would be required to contribute something, even if they have no income and no ability to contribute. It is conceivable that an international student, following the above rules, would have no contribution to make for her/his MIT education, and that neither would his/her parents. It would in whole depend upon the income level of the family and other pieces that would form part of our analysis.

There is an important caveat to this though. All students at MIT are required to have health insurance and to buy the MIT-offered health insurance if they do not have comparable coverage from another source. There is a fee associated with the medical insurance coverage and we do not provide financial aid coverage for this expense. We encourage international students looking at coming to MIT to plan for this expense as well, and to attempt to earn money during the summer to offset this expense.

So hope I have addressed some of your questions about the process for international students. We look forward to seeing your applications in the near future, and feel free to drop a postcard in with your application materials so I can virtually visit your hometown (if you want to put an interesting stamp on it, I won't object either)!