<p>So after having my financial aid package altered after the verification I will now have to pay $21,000 a year instead of the $8,000 I thought I originally had to pay(long story and I'm still confused). And this all happened a few days ago so it's either Umass or gap year. My family's EFC is 12,220 but they only gave us $1,900 in aid(grant). The other $1,700 came from my John and Abigail Scholarship. We are also taking out a $3,500 loan which I included in the payment. I'm pretty annoyed/frustrated right now because I thought going to Umass would make it easy on my parents and me but apparently not. We are going to be able to pay for 5-6 years of Umass but it's going to deplete our savings. I don't know. I just thought I would get more aid and now I'm not sure if this is even right for me anymore. Should I just take a gap year to work and see if I can get better packages from other colleges next year? </p>
<p>P.S Is $21,000 a year even a lot? I mean it seems a lot to be but do people generally have to pay this much for a public state school? Oh and my gpa is 3.75 and SATS are 1970.</p>
<p>$21,000 a year for tuition, fees and living expenses is, sadly, about normal for many state public universities today. In fact, for a flagship school, that’s downright cheap - the UC system is a lot more expensive.</p>
<p>Are your stats such that you could reasonably expect to get more aid at a comparable school? Were you accepted anywhere else this go-round with an affordable aid package that you could ask to reactivate and/or defer until next year?</p>
<p>It seems to me that your package is not one that you should jump on taking. Are there any schools nearby where you can work part time and commute, get your base credits and then consider transfering to UMass later? That way with just two years there to finish up your degree, the overall cost would be considerably less. </p>
<p>I live in NY, and though the SUNY tutions are very reasonable, the room and board brings the total cost up the level that you are quoting. I know some kids who did a year or two of college nearby, commuting from home and then transferred to Buffalo or ALbany, lived off campus and incurred little debt going that route. Four years at $20K a year adds up very quickly to an unmanageable amount.</p>
<p>Yes, that is a lot of if will deplete your family’s savings (why 5-6 years of schooling??)</p>
<p>You have a few choices…</p>
<p>1) Take a gap year and apply to affordable schools that might give you merit or better aid.</p>
<p>2) Commute to a local CC for two years, then transfer.</p>
<p>3) Apply to a local public 4 year and go there.</p>
<p>4) Attend this school, but figure out how YOU can earn more money to cut down on the family’s cost…part-time jobs during the school year, and full time work during the summer.
ALSO…you can borrow another $2000, since you only borrowed $3500.</p>
<p>It sounds like you thought your EFC was $8k and then after verification it became $12k. Either way, since UMass doesn’t “meet need” there should not have been an expectation that you’d only have to pay your EFC.</p>
<p>Well, that’s the dilemma I have: I don’t know if I will get more aid from other public/state schools because the only other school I applied to was a private one which was even more expensive than this. Is $21,000 a year really what it costs to go to state public schools nowadays? I know polar said it was cheap but I’m still looking for more opinions.</p>
<p>Commuting is not an option(I would rather take a gap year). I guess it’s not TOO bad. If I took out max loans($5,500), it would only be $15,500 a year. Thoughts?</p>
<p>Oh and can If I decide to take a gap year now will Umass allow me to come back next year since college does start in 2 days…</p>
<p>No, I think my EFC is about right. My dad makes about $90,000 a year. It was 0 in the first place and I still have no idea why but I’m guessing there was a mistake in the FAFSA. I looked at it indifferently at the time because I had no idea what EFC meant until 2 days ago when they dropped the hammer on me and took away all my aid. But I’m all over that now.</p>
<p>Tomorrow: I’m in California and my daughter is entering UC Davis; this “public” school will cost us just over $32K. We’re relying on 529 accounts as well as the generosity of family, her part-time jobs and Mom’s part time jobs to pay her tuition. California families have seen these public universities increase fees every year because our state is out of money. </p>
<p>Most Californian’s have their children go to CC’s first, but even those are impacted because classes have been cut and because they are full of kids who can’t really afford the 4-year public universities. The Cal State’s tuitions run about $7100 but that is just tuition, the costs of housing (living in California) is triple that tuition amount. So you’re looking at ~$26K living on campus as a in-state student. (FYI: San Diego State University had over 62K applications and admitted 7800.) </p>
<p>Unfortuately, that sounds about right, based on what I’m paying for my son (with the J & A Adams Scholarship, but without the grant). An option would be to go to CC for 2 years, get your gen eds out of the way , and then transfer to UMass. See this program:
[UMass</a> Amherst: Community College Connection](<a href=“MassTransfer : UMass Amherst”>MassTransfer : UMass Amherst)</p>
<p>While UMass skews their numbers toward fees instead of tuition, it is still about right for a public. UConn is in the same ballpark.</p>
<p>Your best best will be to enroll in a community college, or consider enrolling in the spring in a cheaper state college (It is most likely too late to get in somewhere else for the fall, if you didn’t already apply. Our second tier state schools close enrollment in April.</p>
<p>As for how this happened, it looks like there was a significant error on your FAFSA. There’s no way you should have come up with $0 EFC with your father’s income. Even $12,000 sounds low. Just as a basic calculation, you get an exclusion of around $50,000, and then your family would be expected to pay about 45% of what’s left ($40,000 in your case), and that’s not including assets. I would have expected an EFC of around $20,000 - and that would be why any other offers you got were so much higher.</p>
<p>Whatever you do this year, make sure you verify everything you submit for your FAFSA for next year - you can’t afford another surprise like this!</p>
<p>If you take a gap year, you may be able to defer enrollment, or you can apply as a freshman to other schools (and get your applications and FAFSA in early enough to qualify for merit aid). If you attend community college you would be applying to other schools as a transfer, and the options for merit aid might be reduced.</p>
<p>Just poking my head in here briefly to say I think a 12k EFC is right, my family’s income is around that of Tomorrow’s dad and our estimated EFC is 11.7k.</p>
<p>I hope everything works out for you, OP, i’m applying to UMass but the lack of aid is enough to scare anyone away…</p>