(1) There are only a handful a top universities with huge endowments that offer financial aid / tuition discount if your family income is below $150 - 200K. If your family earns just above that, particularly in a high-cost of living area, very hard to afford. Great schools and great fit if your kid can get in and you qualify for a discount (especially if you are from a low cost of living area).

(2) How are schools allowed to package "merit" aid with athletic scholarships? I realize that a large number of colleges now charge a very high "retail" tuition that only a tiny percentage of students actually pay, using "merit scholarships" as essentially tuition discounts for kids with better grades and scores. So that kind of packaging is not necessarily unfair (or else the athletic scholarship would essentially be worthless), but I would think it would be hard to police schools from essentially using large merit packages as a way around the restriction on athletic scholarships.