Calreader

I'm scratching my head here. What can this person be thinking? Of course those of us who pay taxes do pay more (collectively) for government services as a result of tax policies that lighten the loads of people who pay little or nothing in taxes. Of course we do.

People hire college counselors for all sorts of reasons: to handle tasks that they don't enjoy or aren't good at, to teach them something they don't already know in a one-on-one format, to help them with organization and to-do lists if they're not very good at that, and to bring in an outside party to help the family talk things through when family members are feeling some tension around the issues that college brings up. All of these can apply to financial aid counseling as well as admissions counseling.

thumper1

I agree that this is something that you will need to deal with as a possible special circumstances situation. Special circumstances considerations are done case by case at each college. The college is NOT required to consider any request for special circumstances...some do and some do not. Some do for some students and not for others. That is the way it is.

Regardless...you can prepare a special circumstances consideration request. You will have to provide ALL documentation for medical expenses incurred, and the debt that resulted. You will probably need to provide documentation of your income/assets for the years that have happened since the medical expenses occurred. I would think the colleges would want to see ALL related documentation so they could verify that this is a situation that is a hardship type of situation.

Start gathering your documentation NOW. I would think you will need quite a bit of it as you are asking for them to consider debt that was incurred a while ago for medical reasons...but that you are paying for now. Just be prepared to give the school whatever they ask for in the area of documentation.

And most of all...have some financial safety types of schools in the hopper just in case the school does not make an adjustment.

Good luck to you, and I hope the medical situation is now something of the past for you and your family.

kelsmom

While I suppose there are some families that may feel they can benefit from hiring a "professional" to help them find ways to legally reduce their EFCs, the OP's situation is NOT such a situation. There is absolutely nothing anyone BUT the individual school's financial aid office can do. This is a professional judgment issue. The EFC formula has a medical expense allowance built in (currently 11% of the Income Protection Allowance - you can google the formula & do this by hand to figure out what this would be for you). Document all of your expenses - explain, explain, explain. For the amount in excess of the 11%, the school *may* (note: not WILL, as this is PJ & therefore not something in the regulations) make certain adjustments. Two schools may very well make two different decisions on this type of situation. My advice is document, explain ... help the aid officer see the whole picture.

As some CC folks have found in the past, there are schools that will not do much with medical expenses & others that are more lenient in making adjustments. As always ... hedge your bets & have affordable options. Make your appeal early, so you know where you stand.

Best of luck.

CountingDown

Kels, you just made the point I was going to about the formaula already taking into account a certian level of medical expenses and that any professional judgment would be made on the excess.

We have heavy ongoing medical expenses and what happened with us was that the PROFILE gave us a lower EFC figure than the FAFSA. Not low enough, but we have a pretty simple financial picture otherwise, so we assume the medical expenses did make some (small) difference.

This is a school-by-school conversation.

mythmom

But Learned Hand is not necessarily a character I would want to endorse. Yes, he did hand down an excellent decision in a lynching case, but he was from a slave owning family originally and some of his positions are not supportable by me.

And I patently don't agree with him. It's not a legal duty but to me a moral right to use some of our substance to help those more in need than we.

I had a wealthy friend who bought her kids clothes and toys at Good Will. I thought she should be donating to good will. She said, "it's open to the public." But I always thought of the kid who was cold that winter because she got in their first, bought the best coat for her kid while her husband banked 1 Mil a year for retirement. I kid you not. Not illegal? Yup. That's right. But immoral.

The CSSProfile schools my kids applied to suggested we write a letter explaining the special circumstances of our debt. We did. H's business lost much more money thanit was worth after 9/11 and never really recovered. He did not want to go bankrupt because it would have meant stranding many customers without a product that no one else could provide them with at the time.

So, he paid so much in debt servicing every month to vendors and personal debt he accrued in the process that his entire (not sizable but healthy) earnings went into that and we could only live on my salary. This is reflected in the business and farm supplement form, of course, but the schools were interested in these special circumstances and why H continued to show loss each year. You can only be credited with loss three years in a row, I think. After that a sensible person is supposed to get a job I think, or close the business. But he had good reasons to continue to "work for nothing" and I was proud of him, even though my rather lackluster but okay salary has been our only means of support.

The schools were wonderful, and we did get substantial FA packages.

That said, if and when I have the means, I'd like to make donations back to the schools for the help given.

I have given to their capital drives each year, even while receiving FA.

averagetim

I need some advice, Our daughter is a senior at a University in Ireland she received a Pell Grant on her FAFSA but could not accept it as she is a full time student overseas, not an exchange student. Second daughter did not receive a Pell, is there a way to take advantage of the Pell grant for the second daughter? No one seems to be able to help

kelsmom

Individual circumstances vary, and they vary from year to year. If D2 isn't eligible, there must be something different than the info used for D1. If the FAFSA was completed correctly, and if she isn't eligible, that's all there is to it.

If you were asking if D2 could use D1's Pell, no.

swimcatsmom

Does D2 have a lot more income and/or assets than D1? If so then that could be why she is not eligible for the Pell. If not then there may be some input error on her FAFSA (or on D1s FAFSA).

TigerDude

I would think that the reality is that if a family for whatever reasons has a high debt load, they won't be able to afford the "standard" family contribution. At that point, the school can either work with the family or not.

perilous

Let me ask a rhetorical question? Family A and B have the same income...Family A "does the right thing" and pays down the mortgage when they can, sacrifices and saves for their kid's education whereas Family B is irresponsible, never saves a dime and repeatedly borrows equity from their home and spends it on fancy cars and vacations. They both show up in the college financial aid system with Family A at EFC of $40K in PROFILE/IM methodology and Family B at $15K. Family A could have a $15K EFC if they lived like Family B.

Is it "fair" that Family B gets their need met at private institution X whereas Family A doesn't get aid and decides they cannot afford the $40K sticker price?

How about this scenario? Child is an orphan and their aunt/uncle is her guardian. Child is bright student, has overcome the tragic death of her parents as a child and most schools would love to have her. Guardians have no means of paying for college and as a result the only approach they know (via high school counselor) is to apply to public schools in their state (sticker price $25K). Even though EFC is $0 (Child is independent for FA purposes), the only money she could reasonably get is government free money, max Pell Grant perhaps and a comparable state need grant. That leaves a remaining bill of $15K+ per year which the guardians cannot afford (or don't think they can). As a result, the Child either tries to goes the "hard way" with daunting odds or does not go at all as 30-35% of our kids that graduate from HS do!

Wouldn't a "financial aid" counselor be helpful to these 2 families?

mamabear1234

OK, this is completely off-topic, but immoral to shop at Goodwill? Amazing! I don't shop there because I have no patience for sifting through cast-offs of others, but I have friends who do. My one friend buys a lot of books there. Is that OK, or is she depriving a poor child of reading material? I believe the Goodwill stores exist to raise money and provide jobs for needy people, not to supply them with clothes cheap. There are Goodwill stores in affluent areas also.

dt123

It's immoral to have a dollar to buy a book at Goodwill. You should have given it away.

scottaa

For those so quick to criticize the "professionals"...

Stop doing your taxes, because with a little more research and extra time, you can certainly do your own books and taxes.

Stop going to the grocery store. All you need is to put in a garden and start canning. You can go shoot your meat every fall and butcher it yourself.

Stop using the garbage man. Just throw it in your trunk and drive it to the dump yourself.

Stop using the exterminator. Lowes has a whole section of pesticides. Go get yourself a bottle and start spraying.

Take your children our out of school. Don't you know you can homeschool? You don't need to be supporting some professional to teach your own kids when you could be doing it yourself.

Stay away from the doctor. All you need is a few good manuals and the internet. Shoot... bone up on your chemistry and you can make those drugs you need.

Stop using lawyers. All the law is published anyway, and all they do is just apply that law to your situation. Just start reading.

Don't hire a painter. You can paint your house or that room on your own. Heck that one doesn't even require much skill.

I think I'll stop there.

Now, would someone like to explain why all the above ideas would not work in their situation. As soon as you answer for one, you will know why some people like to use professionals.

For the OP... you do not have to go get a professional. Sounds like you have a good case for an appeal. Fill out the forms as you typically would. Explain your situation on the Profile (assuming you're filing a profile) where provided. Prepare a letter describing your family's medical problems and how it has affected you. Then contact each school directly.

dt123

Really? It is a stretch to compare giving financial aid advice with being a doctor or a lawyer. A painter, pretty close. Understanding the prep work options, tools and supplies available for painting a house or a room is pretty similar to understanding the FAFSA and Profile. Maybe you should have stopped before that one.

scottaa

I included that one specifically to show the range of services that people pay for.