<p>12layla12, the COA is the cost of attendance, which is an etimated budget of how much it costs to go to USC. Outside scholarships don’t change the COA, so you are probably referring to the EFC, or amount you and your family must pay.</p>
<p>For students receiving need-based financial aid, USC’s general policy is to apply any outside (non-USC) scholarships to subsidized loans and/or work/study awards. So, for example, if you were awarded a $3,500 Stafford subsidized loan and earned a $2,000 outside scholarship, you could use the $2,000 towards your tuition, room, board, and expenses and only take out $1,500 in loans. </p>
<p>If your outside scholarships exceed the amount of your subsidized loans and work/study, USC would then reduce the amount of your need-based grants before your EFC would be reduced. For your EFC to be reduced, your outside scholarships would have to add up to more than your need-based financial aid from USC.</p>
<p>Please note, in some (rare) cases USC uses their discretion to award more need-based aid to a student than the USC-determined EFC indicates (remember - USC uses the Profile to come up with USC-determined need), and in those cases outside scholarships would first reduce the need-based grants.</p>
<p>I know this all seems very confusing, but the best idea is to send an email to the financial aid office and ask how your outside scholarships will be applied in your unique case.</p>
<p>oh yes, that’s what i meant. sorry for the confusion :)</p>
<p>and thanks alamemom for the info. i have another question though. one of the bigger scholarships i won, i would rather deferr to pay for med school. if i was to do that,
A) would i have to report it to USC still? B) would there possibly be some repercussions for not using the award to lower aid from the university, and C)</p>
<p>Your BEST bet is to contact the scholarship sponsor as soon as possible to request that it be deferred to graduate school (which is a GREAT idea). If they agree, be sure to get everything in writing. </p>
<p>Assuming the scholarship sponsor agrees that the scholarship is specifically meant to pay for graduate school (and you have that in writing), there is no need to report the scholarship to USC (or whichever grad school you choose) until you are applying for aid for graduate school.</p>
<p>Financial aid in grad school tends to be in the form of loans - even MORE so than for undergraduate - so it really is a great idea to try to put scholarships in reserve for that purpose. Good thinking!!!</p>
<p>OK, so they expect me to pay $1800/year and $5500/year in loans, BUT this is if I’m commuting. I called today and told them that I’m living on campus. Does anybody with experience with this sort of stuff have any idea how financial aid would be different?</p>
<p>Since they calculated that I can afford $1800/year, it can’t change if the cost of attendance is higher, right?</p>
<p>yeah cc is lame im in the same boat as you. i still havent turned in my tax forms and have a very low EFC, except that i couldnt turn in my taxes bc it wasnt finalized until today. Does anyone know if we would get lower money since we are turning in our tax forms really late??</p>
<p>I don’t know if the lower money thing applies to turning in tax forms late because you just have to submit it 30 days within when they want them? A friend of mine asked the financial aid office and that’s what they said. You might want to call them to double check though.</p>
<p>I just called the fin aid office today because they recently requested House Info from me, so they said it might be ready by Tuesday?! I HOPE SO!</p>