Middlebury offers an intensive, personalized education that can be matched by few other colleges or universities. It prepares students not only to be successful, but to live creatively, ethically, and responsibly in an increasingly global society. This kind of education nourishes those who are fortunate enough to experience it, but it also has a wider impact, preparing leaders who are fit to direct the institutions, shape the issues, and solve the problems of today and tomorrow.
Such a life-changing, world-shaping education is possible only when students from a variety of backgrounds are able to participate in it. It requires a diverse student body, including young men and women shaped by different social and economic circumstances, coming from every state and many other countries, reflecting a variety of cultures, traditions, and beliefs.
Living, studying, competing, and playing together, our students help to teach one another how to thrive in our diverse and complex world. They bring their eagerness, talents, curiosity, and drive. Middlebury must provide the financial support that makes it possible for them to come.
That is why building a strong, stable source of financial aid for the undergraduate College, the Language Schools, and Bread Loaf is the College's top priority for the Middlebury Initiative.
Middlebury is one of the few American colleges committed to educating all accepted students, regardless of their ability to pay. This need-blind admissions policy means that students are admitted on the basis of who they are and who they can become, not on how much their parents can afford. It allows the College to admit exceptional students from all backgrounds and all over the world, eager to share their wide-ranging life experiences, interests, and viewpoints.
Four out of 10 Middlebury undergraduates receive financial aid. Each student’s circumstances are evaluated: Does the family have other children in college? Are the parents nearing retirement age? These and many other factors could warrant financial aid for a student whose family at first glance might not seem to qualify. And even students who do not get a financial aid package are heavily subsidized. Tuition and fees cover only 63 percent of the real cost of a Middlebury education.
Graduate Financial Aid
|Through the Davis Fellowships
for Peace, Kathryn Davis has
helped hundreds of students
study critical languages.
Increased support for financial aid is also the primary need students in the Bread Loaf School of English, the Language Schools, and the Monterey Institute of International Studies. Currently, the College can provide aid to only a small percentage of students enrolling in these programs.
How You Can Help
This commitment to keeping Middlebury accessible is expensive, and that is why the College needs to increase its financial aid endowment by $180 million through the Middlebury Initiative. Right now, only about 25 percent of Middlebury undergraduate scholarships derive from endowed scholarship funds. That number is even lower for the graduate programs.