Hello! I just received my financial aid package from UCI, but I need a bit of advice:
I got about 24k from Cal grant A, pell grant, and their UCI grant. Also, 2k of work study, so 26k of loan free money. Dorming and tuition will cost about 34k but just tuition will be 15k less, so around 19k for just attending.
So my questions are:
Is dorming worth it? Everyone encourages it, but I would have to borrow 8k in loans just to do so.
Let’s say I didn’t dorm the first year, but the following years I want to get an apartment on campus(which i can’t get as a freshmen) which is only 8k, if i don’t use my money this year, will my financial add package decrease the next year?
I qualify for the Cal Grant B as well, but if I get this instead of A will the missing first year of aid be covered by the blue and gold plan?
if i change from “on campus” to “with parents” how much will this affect my financial aid?
Back out the work study because you must first get a job and work those hours.
If you switch from on campus to living at home your financial aid package may decrease because your cost of attendance will go down (you will probably lose the UCI grant). You will keep the Pell because it is an entitlement.
Is dorming worth it to you? How long will it take for you to travel back and forth to school? Will you have additional obligations at home that you may not have living in the dorms? How hard will it be to balance your work study, classes with your commute? Finally, can you make it financially work to dorm? Only you/your family can answer those questions
What are your direct cost for tuition room and board?
For your 10k short fall, you can take out the $5500 loan and get a job now and work through the summer to make up the $2500. Perhaps your parents can assist you with the $2000 balance.
I think the $34,000 is probably the whole COA with estimates for books, travel, personal expenses included, possibly health insurance too, that you might be able to waive.
If tuition is $15,000 then how much is cheapest room and meal plan option, another $15,000?
You got $24k in grant money.
So remaining cost to you is about $6k
You could take out the direct loan for$5,500
Get a part time job now and work this summer to earn money for books and transportation, spending money.
Then find a work study job on campus where you can work a few hours a week and earn a bit of money for laundry, pizza, haircuts, toiletries, etc during the semester.
If you can live at home for free, and have access to good transport and the commute is doable, free is good. If your parents make your life easier in ways you don’t yet know (laundry, food, $$ etc) and you get on OK, don’t borrow money for a room and food plan. Look at the UCI numbers to see what % of kids do commute.
Personally I hated dorming. My grades have gone down since moving off campus, but not problematically so, and I’m way happier. Depends on the person I guess.
My kids weren’t thrilled with living in the dorms either…mostly because they preferred to cook their own food.
BUT…both also saw the down side of sharing off campus housing with others…some were real,slobs. Some didn’t pay their bills on time. Some preferred to party late while others didn’t.
Living off campus also isn’t cheaper in some housing markets…it wasn’t in Boston or Santa Clara.
And remember…off campus means you will need to sublet in the summer…and you may have to get all of,your own furnishings down to the can openers. That’s no bargain either.
Hated sharing a room. Hated the complete lack of privacy. Hated sharing a bathroom with 3+ other people, 100% of which were gross. Hated having to eat crappy food/not having a place to cook my own food. Hated having to turn the lights out at a certain time/hated my roommate turning them on early. Hated not being able to have people over. Hated my roommate always having people over.
The list goes on and on and on. Basically everything about dorming sucks imo.
Seems most of @CourtneyThurston 's problems would be solved by having a single room (within a suite or on a hall). And as @thumper1 points out, those issues can exist off campus in shared spaces too.
To @youngnbroke - I’d ask the FA office exactly how much grant money you’d lose if you lived off campus. If a lot, then it may not matter.
“Seems most of @CourtneyThurston 's problems would be solved by having a single room (within a suite or on a hall).”
Usually worlds more expensive and
Some universities, like mine, either don’t have singles or only offer them to juniors/seniors/student government and/or athletes and/or disabled students
Getting a single at my uni is basically impossible.
Kinda shocked so many people liked dorming, but I guess it varies by school. I 5000% hated it and would never recommend it to anyone. Just wanted to reinforce that point
“I’d ask the FA office exactly how much grant money you’d lose if you lived off campus. If a lot, then it may not matter.”
This is really the bigger problem. Some universities cut your FA by a lot if you move off-campus. Mine just handed the full cost of room and board on campus to me in cash, which went extremely far in my area of Florida, so moving off campus was the financially responsible choice.
My kids have liked the sense of community in dorms. But they come from a stack of siblings and have had very communal experiences anyway. One lucked up with a great roommate and they have remained friendly though not ‘buddies’, even after they’ve moved up and on. The other had a horrible roommate but still loved being on campus and hanging with other friends in the dorm. He went on to be an RA…
Which bring me to the point of the thread. He cut cost by being an RA sophomore-senior year. It gave him his room, board and a small stipend in return for being an RA. This is NOT a guarantee, but if you set your sites on it and get involved with the housing office freshman year (he worked as a desk clerk) it could lead to the job and is a means to pay for it.
All that being said, in my opinion if you can live at home for free and have a reasonable commute, I would do so IF you had to borrow money to make the alternate path of dorm living a reality. If no need to borrow? I would say try the dorms. It is an experience. But to the tune of borrowing money? No, stay home, but be prepared to perhaps work a bit harder at meeting people and being involved. You live close enough to make commuting work.
