<p>I am currently at a small, liberal arts school with NO financial aid for internationals. I transferred here with 50% in scholarships because I had to keep asking for more money until they eventually gave me some more. With that said, I’m the only international at my school and I am in many significant leadership roles. Now, a semester away from graduation, my lenders won’t give me money to graduate, I’ve applied for scholarships left, right and center, and my school is not prepared to help me. They recently held a scholarships drive from alumnae and received 80 new named scholarships, but not one of them is for an international, which upsets me because I continually asked financial aid to ask alums for money so that more internationals could go here. </p>
<p>Should I just cut my losses and go home? Is there any point in me transferring? </p>
<p>I’d love to hear input from students who have been in similar situations, or heard of a student in a similar situation.</p>
<p>Going home would be a pity. Really. I really hope something works out.</p>
<p>I’m just curious to know, if you do get some money to graduate would be going to grad school after that? (Consider this a free bump as I’m interested in knowing about what happens in this kind of an emergency)</p>
<p>Thanks, ugwedteu. Honestly, I don’t think it would be worth it. I haven’t found a Masters I like here yet and, due to my field of study, I would much prefer to start working and pay off some of my loans before I commit to a graduate program.</p>
<p>“Now, a semester away from graduation, my lenders won’t give me money to graduate, I’ve applied for scholarships left, right and center, and my school is not prepared to help me.”</p>
<p>You need to take this issue to:
The financial aid office.
then, if it is still NO
The Dean of Students
then if it is still NO
The President of the College
then if it is still NO
The Board of Trustees and the Alumni Association</p>
<p>Ask about money, ask about earning credits elsewhere and transferring them to cover the remaining required courses for your degree, ask about taking a year off to raise the money and then coming back to finish, etc.</p>
<p>Then if all of the answers are still NO and you cannot graduate , if (and only if) you don’t care about never earning a degree from this institution, go to the local press.</p>
<p>this may sound silly, but are loans an option for you ? taking a loan for just one semester of study shouldn’t cost that much. it sure as hell beats not getting a degree (and having wasted all those years) at all…</p>
<p>you can always pay back the loan after you graduate</p>
<p>happymomof1, you seem to know something about this situation! I’ve been told to keep quiet about it for now and that people are working on it, but they need to understand that if someone hires me with no BFA, then there’s little point in me leaving the job to finish my degree. </p>
<p>The only thing that disappoints me is that the President came up to me at an event and said she would help me out of the situation. When I had my meeting with Financial Aid a few days later, they said that it directly came from her that if I can’t afford to go here any more, I need to leave. </p>
<p>As for the local press, I don’t want the school painted in a bad light, because it is a wonderful school. It just sucks that no one has taken the initiative to get more named scholarships for internationals. </p>
<p>Also, thanks for the advice depr91, but there are no loans available to me unfortunately.</p>
<p>“The only thing that disappoints me is that the President came up to me at an event and said she would help me out of the situation. When I had my meeting with Financial Aid a few days later, they said that it directly came from her that if I can’t afford to go here any more, I need to leave.”</p>
<p>This point may need a bit more clarification. I’d take the question back to the president if she is approachable. You need more details. Are they asking you to take a term (or two) off? Are they flat out of money? Maybe the president would like to help you, but truly can’t right now. Maybe financial aid is confused. If you can coordinate some kind of sit-down meeting with everyone that would be ideal. If not, try to get a much in writing as you can so that you don’t have to rely on your own shaky memory of a conversation.</p>