How should I compare WashU and Rice financial aid packages?

Compare WashU and Rice using a cash-cost worksheet, not the headline award total. For each school, start with that year’s billed charges—tuition, required fees, housing, and meal plan—then subtract only scholarships and grants that do not have to be repaid. Treat loans as borrowing, not aid that lowers the price, and treat work-study as potential earnings rather than money automatically applied to your bill.

For a student whose family needs the lowest amount due to the college each semester, the key number is: billed charges minus gift aid. Then add realistic non-billed expenses, including books, travel between home and campus, personal expenses, course-specific fees, and health insurance if you will not be covered through a family plan. Use your own expected travel costs: St. Louis and Houston can produce very different flight or driving expenses depending on where you live.

Make a second line for financing: federal student loans, parent loans, and work-study. Work-study requires finding and working a job, and earnings may arrive as paychecks rather than reducing the initial bill. Do not count work-study at its full amount unless you realistically plan to work those hours.

For a student deciding based on four-year predictability, compare each award’s renewal terms. Confirm whether WashU’s and Rice’s grants or merit scholarships are renewable, the academic or enrollment requirements, whether the amount is fixed or can change with financial need, and how each school handles annual increases in tuition, housing, and meals. Also ask both financial-aid offices whether any listed grant is a one-time award and whether outside scholarships would reduce grants, work-study, or loans.