I hate to go off topic but assuming I take out direct loans and I have to pay the entire EFC , what can I do to avoid more than the direct loans?
I applied to 4 merit scholarships so hopefully that may help but I am expecting a no go (hopeful pessimism). I have looked at fastweb and I literally can’t find anything. I am quite generic so there aren’t any special scholarships for me.
If I do workstudy, I still have 4400 to pay. That is scary and I want to find a way of paying that without taking more loans.
Is taking out the max Stafford 5500 a year manageable later on or is this already considered massive debt?
Ok, you are looking at this from short range and not a long range perspective. BC is not affordable to you and it will be very challenging for you to complete your education. You need to figure out how you are going to pay for BC over the course of 4 years
Your parents are not in the position to pay the 5k EFC What are you/they going to do when your brother graduates and your EFC doubles? It looks like your parents don't have a problem cosigning for loans but they are not going to take out any PLUS loans
You can not use outside scholarships to pay your EFC
Your parents are tapped out and cannot sign for any more student loans. Do you really expect your sister to sign on for the possibility of paying more debt
Once you go to med school your parents will still have to fill out financial aid firms through Needs Access (even though you will be independent on the FAFSA ).
My brother graduates in two years and I will have one year where I have no siblings in college and then my senior year my younger brother will be a freshman.
Okay so I read up on outside scholarships and it seems they can only replace loans and work study. Say I replace these, can I still ask for a loan to cover efc?
UMass Boston will allow you to focus on grades, research, volunteering, shadowing and having some time for a college experience without financial stress. I don’t understand how anxiety about money, taking on debt and putting more on your parents’ plate and giving up ALL the perks of a full ride are worth it here.
Go toUMass Boston, try and make a great name for yourself as a standout student (as you’re being welcomed in as one)., and save your money, debt and (if you have to have it) name recognition for medical school.
Really think about the gift you’re being offered here by UMass Boston.
Because outside scholarships first reduce self help aid (work study and then your student loans). After that, the outside scholarship reduces your need based aid. If you want outside scholarships to over your EFC, you will have to first get enough outside scholarships to cover all of the financial aid that BC is giving you.
ETA: If you get $5500 in outside scholarships to replace the loans in your FA package and then take out loans to pay your EFC, those loans will be unsubsidized. the challenge with what you propose is that most outside scholarships are one shot one year loans.
While you are looking at the opportunities, how are you going to feel when you have used every dollar just to get to school and it is a big deal for you to go off campus for pizza or an outing with your friends because you are always cash-strapped?
What are your plans for years 2,3 and 4? Unless your family its a financial windfall, your situation is not going to change you are prolonging the school not being affordable.
I think Boston College is meeting your need.
It does require you to 1° take a job now and save earnings 2° have work study 3° work during Christmas Break 4° renting books/buying used books 5° living frugally from home.
Federal loans of 5.5K for freshman year, 6.5K for sophomore year, and 7.5K for each of jr and sr years are the maximum you should take because that’s how much you can reasonably pay back as a college graduate. If you wish to go to med school, it means you’ll work for a couple years before you go. All in all, the BC packages is really good compared to most offers from BC I’ve seen or heard of.
You have a roughly 3K gap due to your parents not being able to pay their EFC:
either you figure out a way to pay this (I suggest finding a part time job for now, 15h/week, switching to full time after graduation) or you have to go to UMass Boston. I agree that for a premed though BC is better, not because the students won’t push you but because UMass Boston is hugely commuter and not very good in terms of support and advising for premeds. In addition, if you change your mind about premed, a BC degree will help you more than Umass Boston. (Also, isn’t “full tuition” at Umass a misnommer, in that the real costs are hidden in the FEES? SO that UMass Boston may well be as expensive as BC!)
Boston College IS meeting your actual calculated need. You want them to pay part of your EFC. According to my simple arithmetic and @BelknapPoint, BC is already giving you need based aid in EXCESS of what you FAFSA EFC would indicate.
Your family would be expected to pay your family contribution at ALL colleges…unless you happened to get merit aid that was for a full ride…in your case…full tuition, fees, books, person expenses.
It sounds like you have already talked to BC once…as they offered you a $4000 grant in lieu of the unsubsidized loan. Did you include the $2000 unsubsidized loan in your calculations?
My opinion…the total Direct Loan amount is $27,000 for all four years. Seems like a very reasonable amount of loan debt for a college that costs $50,000 a year about…for a commuter student.
Premstudent, I didn’t pick up on the fact that there’d be a year when your family only has 1 student in college. Unless something else changes, your EFC is going to go up (since it’s now split between you and your brother) that year and your aid will likely go down. Are you prepared to cover that amount? The bottom line is that BC is covering your need. Your EFC is not “need” for purposes of financial aid.
For someone who has no alternative other than to take on $27K in debt, I’d say it’s reasonable to do so. Sometimes you need to take on debt to get where you’re going. However, you have an alternative. In your case, I would not take on $27K of debt, especially since you’re likely to have other financial stress through your undergrad years. It’s hard enough to get top notch grades and do all the other things you need to do to get into medical school. Why make it more difficult by adding financial concerns to the mix?
Not having to work and thus getting a higher GPA is far better for med school than a degree from BC and a busted GPA because you spent all your time trying to earn money for school.
Definitely ask BC for more money. Make your request in writing. Explain that you have received a free ride to UMass-Boston and include a copy of the award letter with your request. Your request should be very polite. Say that you much prefer BC and don’t want to feel forced to choose UMass-Boston for financial reasons. If you have documentary proof of the loans your parents have for your siblings AND you have not already given BC this info, provide it.
Now, do some investigating. How many people from UMass-Boston go on to medical school each year and who are they? (UMass-Boston has a post bac premed program; make sure those students aren’t included in the stats.) What is the median MCAT score? Is it “open application” or does UMass-Boston only recommend students with a certain GPA, etc? (A lot of colleges do this and it makes the med school acceptance rate look much better than it really is.)
Find out the same info from BC.
I know someone who took the merit money for UG to save $ for med school. He is now a podiatrist. That’s an excellent occupation, but he really wanted to be a MD. He didn’t get into med school. He bombed the MCATs and it was because he didn’t have a good enough science background. He took a year off to study for a retake. He worked only part time that year, giving up income. He retook the MCAT and still didn’t get in.
Mass has a very highly ranked public med school. While the cost is high, IF YOU CAN GET IN, it costs less for Mass residents. I assume you are a Mass resident. Check the actual fees and the fin aid rules. So, borrowing more to go to BC now may make sense if you’ll have to borrow less for med school. Here’s the best info I could find googling. DO NOT RELY on this. Check yourself. http://www.umassmed.edu/financialaid/currentstudents/tuition-and-fees-new-students/
Personally, I’d suggest you go to BC UNLESS it turns out that UMass-Boston does as well, or nearly as well, in med school admissions as BC does.
Financial aid will not cover your expected family contribution. Alas, this is what a college determines you should pay, not what you “think” you can. Moreover, many colleges treat student loans as “financial aid” when they are really “self help”. If you are lucky enough to get into one of the few “no loans” colleges, you may escape college debt free.
So I emailed BC’s premed. They said that 86% students with a 3.5 or higher GPA and an MCAT of 27 or higher got in to med school. That is pretty good from my view.
Any idea how much of the general med-school applicant population with a 3.5 GPA and an MCAT of 27 or higher gets into med school? Without some context, it’s hard to know whether coming from BC (as opposed to UMass or any number of other schools) with those stats makes a lick of difference.
Does BC do committee letters of recommendation, or is applying to medical school a free for all there?
Using committee letters improves admission rates, because they can tell no hopers that it would be a waste of time and money to apply (and refuse to write committee letters for them). This can be of some value to the student in letting him/her know earlier to give up an impossible dream.