<p>I don’t have any advice, but I just wanted to let you know that you’re not alone. The FAFSA is so stupid, and their EFCs are way off. My parents were looking at our EFC and going, “Okay, we make this much, we have this much in expenses, where are they getting that we can pay this much for college?!?”</p>
<p>Fortunately, we’ve been able to scrape together enough that I can go here, but I’m going to have some loans to pay off after I graduate. We, too, tried appealing the FA, and the amount we got was not at all proportional to the discrepancy we demonstrated between the EFC and what we could pay.</p>
<p>I hate that policy where the scholarships don’t help you at all. It’s gotten to the point where I don’t even apply for scholarships that say the check will be made out to the college. It’s just a waste of time. Fortunately, some of the local scholarships were willing to make checks out to me, so those actually did help.</p>
<p>It’s also ridiculous that being a CA can actually hurt your FA package. I was seriously considering applying to be a CA, but the decrease in FA is kind of a deal-breaker…</p>
<p>/End rant</p>
<p>Anyway, the best of luck to you! I hope everything works out!</p>