<p>I dont understand why the Gov makes up rediculous rules that you have to be 24 until you dont have to claim your parents! I moved out of my house when I was 18 after I graduated college I thought that was how it was supposed to be not that I am supposed to bum off my parents until I am 24! I have not had any help from my parents since I moved and since then I have moved across the United States so why do I need to keep using them for information that is supposed to be about me!?? I have moved 4 different times since I graduated and everytime it was to a different state where I had to pay for my own place to live, food,gas, health insurance, and everything else! I am now 22 and want to go to school and went to go fill out the Fafsa, I had to use my parents income which has nothing to do with me because none of that goes towards me! When I got the results back my school told me I dont qualify for any grants only some loans! They told me not only was it my parents that made to much money but I did! I made 25,000 last year and but that doesnt mean that much when you live somewhere with a higher living standards. I made that much but still couldnt save money and I split my rent! I find it so unfair that there are kids out there that dont even need help going to college because their parents do support them and yet I thought that I was actually doing a good job by moving out of my house not depending on my parents, not having kids which is one of the rules that if I did have a kid they would help me with school!!! That doesnt even make sense! I am responsible, I have made my own life with out depending on my parents, I know what I have to do to survive in life I had to work 60-70 hrs a week to support myself i didnt do that for fun!! I did that because thats how you learn the facts of LIFE! Then to hear that I didnt qualify I just think that is crazy! I think that they should look at the childs tax papers more than they focus on the parents. If they see that there is a 22 year old that doesnt even have taxes its pretty obvious that this person has never had to work thereore their parents obviously have the money to support them! It is that parents fault for not pushing their kid out the door and telling them to atleast get a job im not saying they have to kick them out of the house! I just think that it should be different they need to look at the kids that are actually trying to make something of their lives not always depending on someone else, and for those people that are showing how responsible they are they get pushed away just like I did and its not fair.</p>
<p>That is the way the system works. THere is a lot of unfairness in that system. It basically ties the kid to the parents until age 24 in terms of college choices. I agree that it is very unfair.</p>
<p>Do note that being independent does not mean a nirvana in terms of financial aid either. The formulas for an independent student does not mean a windfall in terms of aid. You are expected to put a lot of your income towards your college. It makes it very difficult for kids who want to put themselves through school on a full time basis.</p>
<p>If you can get a job with a college, that often can get you tuition benefits. Otherwise, most people who are independent have to go to school part time. When I finished my undergraduate studies, I felt I needed some business and other specialty courses for my job. I had to take them on a part time basis because I did not qualify for financial aid on my salary, but I was not making so much that I could afford to pay for school on my own. It did put me in a financial quandary. I was fortunate to find a job that had tuition reimbursement and ended up taking loans to pay for the first part time course and then using the reimbursements for future courses. My son is currently doing the same thing right now. Many are for advanced part time degrees who need their jobs. This is not a situation that is new.</p>
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<p>I’m assuming this is a typo. The financial aid guidelines are what they are…and they haven’t changed in a long time. The guideline for independent vs dependent student for financial aid purposes is the same for everyone applying for financial aid…unless you can show some kind of severed relationship with your parents. It is…well…what it is. And it shouldn’t have come as a surprise at all.</p>
<p>As noted…being independent for finaid purposes doesn’t always translate into a windfall. There is no asset protection at all for student’s assets. If you worked full time, your income WILL be counted in the formula as well. </p>
<p>You could continue to work full time for two more years, when you will be 24 and you WILL be independent for finaid purposes.</p>
<p>That shouldnt have to be the case though! I shouldnt have to put off school to continue work! And I believe that it does come as a surprise to people that are in my situation considering I know people that have got plenty of grant money and I know that they are better off than me!!! So I was very surprised and upset at the fact that obviously they are getting away with lying to the system but once again since I was raised the way I was I am not going to be the one that is selfish enough to lie when they are taking the money away from the people that actually need it!</p>
<p>Softball1310 -</p>
<p>You have the right to present your individual case to the financial aid officers at the colleges/universities that you are applying to, and they are allowed to use their professional judgment to determine if for that specific college/university you can be considered independent. Each school sets its own policies so none of us can advise you about how to approach the schools you are interested in. You will have to start by contacting each school directly so that you can set up an appointment with the individual who handles this kind of decision-making.</p>
<p>Wishing you all the best.</p>
<p>Aid officers cannot give a dependency override for situations like this. This is considered a “parent doesn’t want to pay” (or perhaps “student doesn’t want parent to have to pay”). The feds give aid officers leeway for professional judgment, but situations like this are not acceptable for overrides.</p>
<p>P.S. “not always depending on someone else” - do you think grants grow on trees? Taxpayers pay for them! You might not be depending on your parents - but you WOULD be depending on “someone else.”</p>
<p>kelsmom -</p>
<p>Thanks for correcting me! In a case like this, with sufficient documentation, might there be a possibility of making a more flexible determination of the EFC even if a dependency override is not possible? Something that would allow the applicant to have access to a somewhat better financial aid package even though the parents’ money would have to be reported on the FAFSA?</p>
<p>Softball1310, if U.S. citizens were willing to pay taxes at, e.g., Canadian or European rates, we might also provide a college education with no additional tuition fees. But with our system, we collectively expect parents to contribute from zero to full list price, using standard measures to determine their ability to pay.</p>
<p>The student is always welcome to try (even to try for the dependency override). However, the intent of the law is supposed to be upheld in all professional judgment decisions. A dependency override in this case “could” happen - but it really does not fit with the guidelines for PJ. This is from finaid.org:</p>
<p>Financial aid administrators are not allowed to use professional judgment to circumvent the intent of the law or regulations or to change the formula or tables used in the Federal need analysis methodology or to change the EFC directly. Only the inputs to the formula may be changed, and then only to the extent dictated by the special circumstances. Adjustments are not permitted to correct a real or perceived problem in the tables or methodology, such as a lack of regional adjustments in the Income Protection Allowance, a lack of fairness in the state tax allowances (e.g., a failure of the state tax allowances to consider differences in local income taxes), or an error in the asset protection allowance tables.</p>
<p>Moreover, when a specific situtation is not addressed by the letter of the law or the regulations, financial aid administrators should avoiding rendering professional judgment decisions that are inconsistent with the spirit of existing law, regulations and guidance.</p>
<p>This is from a Dear Colleague letter from the feds re: dependency overrides: </p>
<p>(aid officers have) the ability to make a documented determination of independence based upon “other unusual circumstances.”</p>
<p>…</p>
<p>(There is a) body of practice within the financial aid profession for making dependency overrides that focuses on truly exceptional circumstances and consideration of individual cases, rather than contradicting the fundamental principles of financial aid need analysis or making de facto changes to the statutory dependency criteria as they are applied at individual schools. These practices include, for example, making dependency overrides in situations when a student’s parent cannot be located, or where an otherwise dependent student has been a victim of domestic violence and is no longer residing with his or her parents.</p>
<p>Pages 28 and 29 of the Department’s 2002-2003 Application and Verification Guide (AVG) emphasize the need to make dependency overrides only for students with unusual circumstances on a case-by-case basis and to document the unusual circumstances that the financial aid administrator relied upon in making the override. In recent years, the AVG has identified four conditions that, individually or in combination with one another, do not qualify as “unusual circumstances” or that do not merit a dependency override. Those circumstances are:</p>
<ol>
<li>Parents refusing to contribute to the student’s education;</li>
<li>Parents unwilling to provide information on the application or for verification;</li>
<li>Parents not claiming the students as a dependent for income tax purposes;</li>
<li>Student demonstrating total self-sufficiency.</li>
</ol>
<p>Yeah, your story is about the same as mine was, although I only moved to one state, and it caused me to wait until I was 30 to finally start classes towards my BA. My problem, though, was that my dad wouldn’t give me his tax returns to show that he hadn’t claimed me on them in two years, so I couldn’t qualify for in-state tuition until I was 24, which was 5 years after I moved there. By then I was already working my way up to a decent career for a 20-something in a good firm, so I didn’t think I needed college. Anyway…</p>
<p>Possible solution, especially if you are in California and qualify as a resident: take one or two classes at your local community college just to get started and pay for them yourself. If you are in CA and a CA resident, it shouldn’t cost more than a couple of hundred dollars, including books, for two classes each semester. After a couple of years, you’ll have some credits on your transcript and can then apply for financial aid as an independent student. No, your FA won’t be terrific the first year of aid, but it should get better since your income will go down when you are in school full time. And you might be able appeal your expected student contribution for the first year.</p>
<p>If you don’t yet qualify as a resident of your chosen state, start taking steps NOW to become one by the time you are 24 and independent.</p>
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<p>Don’t make assumptions about the money other folks receive for financial aid. YOU don’t know every piece of others’ financial documents and information, nor should you. </p>
<p>You don’t say whether your parents “could” assist you with college costs or not. The implication is that they have some income and assets but that those are not available to you. </p>
<p>The financial aid formula does not consider whether parents WANT to pay…it only considers whether they can. An amount will be computed to determine what their expected family contribution might be. Have you run these numbers through an EFC calculator? Do you know for sure that this number is high? Have you talked to your parents about your desire to return to school? Have you discussed finances with them? </p>
<p>The calculation guidelines are not going to change…and they are well documented. My advice is to expend your energy figuring out a way to attend school…not complaining about something that isn’t going to change right now.</p>
<p>Softball,</p>
<p>I feel for you. There is something not right about a system that tells a self-supporting adult who wants to go to college that their education is less important–less worthy of help–than an adult of the same age who has poor parents. To either adult, the reality is that the money does not come from the parents. If you are a self-supporting adult, the system should allow you to be the responsible adult you are. Insulting, really.</p>
<p>However, the system is what it is. If you have the maturity and skills to be self-supporting since 18, you can figure out something. Can you change anything in your lifestyle to lower your current living expenses? Pick a school in a less expensive city? Share a house/apartment with more people? Walk/bike/bus and get rid of the car/ins./gas. Get rid of cable TV. Work on campus jobs so that you are within walking distance of your classes. Take out the maximum Stafford loan (which will be unsubsidized @6.8%) (First Year-$5,500, Second Year-$6,500, Third Year and Beyond-$7,500).</p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>"*Insulting, really.</p>
<p>However, the system is what it is.*"</p>
<p>If we didn’t have this system, parents who can afford to pay for their child’s education could avoid doing so by faking the child’s independence. That’s not the case here, but the problem is that it’s hard to detect such deception, which would result in no money available to help those who truly cannot afford college.</p>
<p>Thatgirl has a good idea. Start with CC whereever you are located. In all my moves the local community college has been affordable and understanding of people who have to work their way through school. Once you’re 24 you can apply for financial aid on your own.</p>
<p>You should qualify for independent in one year, not two, unless you just turned 22 since Jan. 1. Students turning 24 in 2009 qualify for independent next fall, so if you are turning 24 in 2010, you should qualify for independent in Fall 2010.</p>
<p>The other problem is when it is the student earning income. I have been trying to help a student whose mom has been in jail and Dad is very low income. This girl worked 2-3 jobs through high school, bought her own school computer, bought her own used car, pays her own orthodontia, insurance, etc. She is making enough income that it prevents her from obtaining the financial aid I feel she deserves AND TO WHICH SHE WOULD BE ENTITLED IF HER INCOME WAS HER DAD’s income.</p>
<p>So, a low income family with a child who gos out and does the work is penalised. I spoke to many finaid officers and though they had sympathy for the girl, they had no options to offer- this was FAFSA, maybe a private could do something creative.</p>
<p>I would like to see an allowance wherein the kids income could be added to the parents on FAFSA so it does not count against them so much- or am I wrong? Does a kids income count for a higher portion of the formula than the parents as it is with assets?</p>
<p>Kids income is a much higher % than parents until the parents income hits a certain level. 50% of kids income over the protected amount goes to the EFC.</p>
<p>But if dad is very low income would she not qualify for the automatic 0 EFC? If his income is below $30k (2009-2010 - it was $20k last year) then, as long as he files a 1040a or 1040ez or meets one of the other criteria, she should qualify for the automatic 0 EFC. If she does then her income will not be taken into account at all.</p>
<p>Lunar_eclipse made an excellent point - you can automatically get a Stafford Loan for around $6,000/year. Combine that with a part-time job on campus and you’re looking at $10,000/year income. And throw in full-time job during the summer months and you’re looking at $13,000/year.</p>
<p>Depending on what state you live in, $13,000/year could probably pay for tuition, room and board, etc. at one of the campuses of your big state university. It won’t pay for Harvard. But it should pay for something more than community college.</p>
<p>It requires working a lot of hours, living frugally, and saving every penny. But it can be done in many states where the state universities aren’t all ridiculously expensive yet.</p>