We have chosen Clarity as our financial aid application provider in order to better serve both our current and prospective families. Clarity offers a streamlined, mobile friendly application that can be completed in as short a time as 20 minutes. Additionally, Clarity removes the need to upload your W2 and 1040 by transferring them directly from the IRS. This reduces the amount of information that you will need to enter manually and makes it possible to complete the application quickly and efficiently.

PKS takes the privacy and security of your personal information very seriously. Clarity is certified for both GDPR and SOC2 and uses enterprise-level security standards including end-to-end encryption of all personally identifiable information. For more information, please refer to Clarity’s Privacy Policy.

Don’t wait to submit an application! Admissions decisions and tuition adjustment determinations are made separately, but we send tuition information at the same time that admissions offers go out. Adjusted tuition applications are due prior to our decision dates for admissions. If you miss the deadline, we will consider applications but additional funds may be limited or unavailable.  

Along with an adjustment to tuition, families paying Adjusted Tuition qualify at the same adjusted rate for our auxiliary programs: extended care, after school enrichment classes (one class per session), music lessons (10 lessons per school year), tutoring (10 lessons per school year), league and uniform fees for PKS-organized athletics, and PKS-run school break and summer camps.

Eligibility is based on multiple variables, and each situation is unique, so it is difficult for us to answer with any specificity. PKS families have a wide range of incomes, assets, and individual circumstances (for example, supporting grandparents, multiple children enrolled in school, disability or job loss, etc.). The Clarity application takes the following factors into consideration, among others: number of people in the household; family income; assets such as savings, retirement accounts, stock market investments, and real estate; monthly expenses including rent or mortgage costs; and other debt obligations. 

In general, our approach assumes that the primary responsibility for financing a student’s education rests with the family. We expect that education takes priority over elective expenses such as secondary home ownership, and that all parents/legal guardians will contribute to tuition. Except when there are children younger than kindergarten age at home, the assumption is that both parents/guardians are employed; PKS will impute an annual income for a non-working parent.

We try to accommodate as many requests as possible, but because our budget is limited we cannot guarantee tuition adjustments to all eligible applicants. Currently enrolled PKS students and incoming siblings have priority over new students, and families who complete their applications by deadline have a higher chance of receiving a tuition adjustment than those who submit later.

The Clarity application will ask you to assess what you believe your family can afford to contribute. We recognize that tuition is not your only child-related expense, and encourage you to consider the full cost of child care and other supports (for example, extended care and coverage when school is not in session). We also recommend that you consider all your assets in determining your ability to contribute. This does not mean you must drain college savings accounts or IRAs! However, the Clarity application does take savings, retirement accounts, stock market investments, and real estate holdings into consideration, among other factors.

PKS requires complete financial information from all parents / legal guardians, custodial and non-custodial. Clarity is structured to allow all parents / legal guardians to submit information without the other parent seeing the details. PKS treats all information provided confidentially.

Yes, you will need to submit an application each year in order to qualify for Adjusted Tuition; however, Clarity retains your information from previous applications, so it will be straightforward to reapply .

While tuition adjustments are made for one year at a time, in general, if a family’s financial circumstances have not changed from year to year and the application is received in time, then the rate of tuition adjustment should remain consistent and approximately the same percentage of the total annual tuition for that year.

If you believe new or additional factors may impact your financial situation with regard to Adjusted Tuition, and you would like to appeal the rate of adjustment, please let us know. You may email your family’s circumstances and provide any additional documentation that may support your appeal to gillian@presidioknolls.org.