Leverage fellowship at one place into better offer at other?

[TheOneAndOnly]

Hey all,

 

So I've heard from friends that they were offered scholarships for one place, then let their other potential schools know about it, after which the latter schools made better offers as well. Granted this was for undergraduates and I'm not super familiar with the US system. So I wanted to ask whether this is a thing that one can do for grad school as well? I don't want to come off (at my future grad school) as only wanting to go where I make the most money (since it isn't actually part of my decision), but if it's something that is regularly done, I'd like to try it as well. Thought I'd play this by you, before getting a weird reputation at my future school :)

 

Thanks for the help

[YaSvoboden]

I don't think it's worth it. Say it works and you get an extra 5k/year (a pretty high assumption). That's 25k that could make someone not want to work with you, or your cohort may be jealous, or something else. I think it is ok to softly ask if they have anything like that, but I wouldn't "leverage" the offer.