Yale, like other elite colleges, is expanding its financial aid program
However, like other elite colleges, it’s still a lot more difficult to get into than in previous years.
Yesterday, Yale University announced that it would be expanding its current financial aid program to waive tuition fees for new students from families earning below $200,000 and cover all costs for those from sub-$100,000-earning households, opening access to its hallowed halls for a broader spectrum of prospective grads.
The college joins fellow elite institutions like Harvard, which made identical changes last year, and MIT and the University of Pennsylvania, where aid programs were expanded even earlier, in late 2024. Lower-income students starting at the Ivy League university, which was founded in 1701, in the next academic year would be the first to benefit from the wider financial parameters... if they can fend off the increasing academic competition.
Though the total number of applicants dropped by more than 7,000 last year, as international applications plummeted 26% from the year before, it was still the third-biggest pool of hopefuls that the 325-year-old university had ever seen. Indeed, if you were gifted (and/or fortunate) enough to get in ahead of the 2025-26 academic year, you were part of a considerably more exclusive cohort than those who applied 30 years earlier — with roughly 1 in 20 applicants admitted in 2025, compared to one in five in 1995, per admissions data from the university.
While the aforementioned international student applicant slump, and the slew of data that suggests the decline isn’t just hitting America’s most prestigious educational facilities, will displease deans across the country, it might come as some small relief to aspiring Yalies — particularly those whose parents earned $199,999 last year.
