Advice for Low income/EFC 0 students

Paying for College
1

<p>As a senior, getting acceptances and financial aid letters from the colleges I applied to, there are many things which I know now that would have been a great help to know as a sophmore or junior.
I often see people wondering how an EFC of zero will correlate to the fin. aid they get - let me tell you that it guarantees nothing but perhaps a pell grant and some federal subsidized student loans which won't be enough to fund an education at any private college I know of.
I have an EFC of zero and have been gapped between $5000 & $10000 from 4 of the 7 colleges I've applied to (3 of which I have yet to hear from) which given my finacial need was enough to render all of those colleges unaffordable to me.
If you're going to be applying to college next year here are some things I would suggest:</p>

<ul>
<li><p>Apply to a local (at least) semi- affordable college to which you can commute from home. Luckily for me, one of the four colleges I was accepted at gapped me just enough that I can still afford to go there if I live at home and subtract the 8,000 room & board from my expenses.</p></li>
<li><p>Apply to a 100% need meeting reach college - while it acceptance may be a longshot, you won't have any "what if" regrets (just realize that even if accepted you'll still have loans, but it's better than a gap)</p></li>
<li><p>Plan ahead: write admissions essays and work on outside scholarship apps over the summer. One of the things that kept me from applying to many outside scholarships was a lack of time during the school year.</p></li>
</ul>

<p>-Do community service. Another thing that prohibited me from applying to some outside scholarships was a lack of community service. If you aren't well rounded your chances of finding scholarships that you can actually apply for greatly decreases - in my experience.</p>

<p>If you took the time to read this - thanks. I hope it at least helped someone out.</p>

2

<p>I hope many, many low income kids read your thread. It would surely save a lot of future heartache, confusion, and frustration. </p>

<p>Unfortunately, the whole EFC thing has caused too many to think that the cost of college is on a “sliding scale” based on what you can afford - as if colleges have gazillions of their own dollars to award each year for free. </p>

<p>It is especially shocking for low income kids to find out that nearly all out of state publics are not going to help them cover those high OOS tuition rates. After all, what would be the point of charging OOS tuition rates if schools were just going to cover them with grants.</p>

3

<p>I totally agree. I was in the same boat as most “efc=0” kids. I figured with an efc so low and pretty solid SATs/GPA that scholarships/grants would be a cake walk (of course my grandmother helped put it in my head but whatever). WRONG!</p>

<p>I wish I would have read a thread like this last year. It would have woken me up. So here I am ringing the bell just like the OP. EFC=0 ONLY means you can get pell grants. Thats it. They’re a nice chunk of change but simply not enough.
That being said, many OOS schools are impossible to afford, especially with mediocre stats. That means your REAL options are probably gonna be in-state. DO NOT get attached to an OOS school just because you think you can be “accepted” there. I did this with some top 10 engineering schools. Sure enough I got into several of them and now that my hopes are all high and mighty I have to realize that affording them is not really gonna happen. And that right there is beyond humbling. Its dissapointing as hell when you get so close to reaching a dream just to realize it is still just out of reach. I don’t want anybody else to go through these emotions like I am. it sucks…</p>