The school just had a policy that none of its grants/scholarship/FA could ‘leave’ the campus. That’s why insurance was never covered because it was paid to an outside insurer. Bright Futures even allows the school to decide how to use BF money, and this school decided it could only be used for tuition. The resident grant could also only be used for tuition (that’s by the state law that set up the resident grant). There were 5 items on her bill - tuition, 2 student fees, the meal plan, and insurance - and I kid you not, there were dozens of postings on the bill as to which grant or scholarship was used to pay for those 5 things. And then there was this game they played with posting, backing it off, reposting the same amount from the same grant. Rinse and repeat. I never understood that at all.
One year there was a FA officer that really did the best for my daughter and applied everything in the order that was most beneficial to daughter - BF and Resident grant first for tuition (and believe me, there was a lot more tuition that needed to be paid!), then used the school scholarships, the athletic grants for fees and meals…and that year she got the most refunded to her from a Pell grant and SEOG and another FL grant. The next year there was a new FA person who applied the SEOG first, so daughter didn’t get as much of the grants to take home (and pay for rent). I argued but the FA person said no, “that’s how is always is.” Maybe, but that’s NOT how it was the year before.
The school wouldn’t have given her the money for the meal plan to eat off campus. We even offered to take a less inclusive and less expensive plan ($600 rather than $1800!) but no, her meal plan grant was for $1800 and that’s the plan she had to take. Oh well, she spent $1800 on her friends, cleaning supplies, groceries, take out meals…