<p>I made possibly one of the biggest mistakes of my life by applying early decision to my dream school. I got in and was thrilled until I realized (too late) that there was no way I could afford it. Because I was accepted ED, I didn't put in the rest of my private school applications. All I had in was my UC apps. I originally thought that the UC's would be my financial safeties. However, my family's EFC is just over $30,000 (I have no idea how), meaning that I would have to pay full tuition and housing at either UC that I got into. With my parents only able/willing to provide $11,000 a year, I'm finding myself having almost the exact same situation at the UC's that I had at the private school. In either case, I need to come up with an additional $19,000+ a year. I can't even begin to describe how frustrating this is.</p>
<p>Ultimately it comes down to this: </p>
<p>At UCLA or UC Berkeley, I need to come up with approximately another $19,000 a year. I'm hoping that I will qualify for some type of merit aid but even if I do, that won't come even close to covering the 19.</p>
<p>At the Claremont McKenna, I need to come up with another $24,000 a year. To be honest, although I know I can't afford it, it seems like it would be so worth the extra 5k a year to attend such a good a private school over a UC.</p>
<p>I know that attempting to take on loans in either of these situations is completely irresponsible financially. I'm praying that a lot of the scholarships that I'm applying for will come through, but realistically, I know that most won't. I'm just really frustrated. I've worked really hard throughout high school, got into some incredible schools, and can't afford ANY of them. Now I'm looking at going to a junior college. Any suggestions or advice would be appreciated.</p>
<p>I saw your old posts and noticed that you are active in the Mormon chuch and your parents were making you apply to Brigham Young. I also see that BYU is about $11.5K per year. Are your parents basically saying that that is the school for which they will pay or is it a coincidence that they’re the same amoung? And do you have a BYU acceptance?</p>
<p>Did you just find out that your parents were only willing to pay 11K? You must have gotten your financial aid award from CMC months ago. In any case, that amount of debt – for either a UC or CMC is way, way too much. :(</p>
<p>I’m curious…when you applied to your ED school, were your parents ok with that? If so, how come you didn’t find out what your estimated EFC was then to find out if parents could/would pay it?</p>
<p>"Can’t even afford my financial safeties. Help! "</p>
<p>If you can’t afford them, then they weren’t real financial safeties. You just imagined that they would be.</p>
<p>A real financial safety is one that you can afford out of pocket without any financial aid other than federally determined financial aid. Clearly, no one told you to run any of the financial aid calculators (there are good ones at CollegeBoard.com and at [FinAid</a>! Financial Aid, College Scholarships and Student Loans](<a href=“http://www.finaid.org%5DFinAid”>http://www.finaid.org)). Also, it is clear that no one told you and your parents to be honest with each other about how much your family could afford for college. This is unfortunate.</p>
<p>However, you do have real financial safety options. Take a long hard look at the California CC nearest to you. Talk with the transfer advisors there about the requirements for transferring into the UC and CSU systems after a year or two. You can indeed make your experience affordable.</p>
<p>What is your family’s income and how many people are in your household? A $30K EFC would be completely consistent with a family income of $110,000 or so (recognizing that individual family circumstances could change it a lot, but still) – but if your family income is a lot lower, say in the $50K range then I’d be wondering if you made an error somewhere on the FAFSA.</p>
<p>There’s a good lesson here even for parents. Often you’ll hear advice to apply to your state schools for “financial safeties” but there are states where the state schools are so expensive and aid is so limited (California, Michigan and there are others) that they are not TRUE financial safties. Hopefully you did apply to BYU at your parents insistance because it might have been your TRUE financial safety school.</p>
<p>Don’t want to cast stones, but if your EFC is indeed 30k, it would “suggest” your household income is fairly high…Understanding that peoples income doesn’t always equal “free cash” flow…11K per year seems like a easy $$$ value for your parents,given your household,some posters here only wish they had that kind of income stream…</p>
<p>This is NOT directed at the OP, but many families have lived BEYOND their means on strong salaries,only to be upset when they actually HAVE to contribute to their children’s education,and further upset when their kids don’t get FA…If you make 100k per year, you should easily be able to save for college,maybe not a 50k per year school,or even pay 100% of the costs of a state school,BUT you should be able to put a nice dent in the overall costs…</p>
<p>b3ntley – applying early decision when you need financial aid is a route many families won’t go because they need to compare financial aid packages from all the schools where a student is accepted. That said, it is possible to apply early decision if there is one school you really want to go to over any other and then hope that the financial aid package offered is enough to make it work. In this case the financial aid package needs to be examined right when it is received so that if it isn’t enough you can get out of your contract and apply to all the other schools you would also like to attend.</p>
<p>I can’t for the life of me figure out why it took you so long to realize you couldn’t afford CMC. Why didn’t you get on top of this earlier when there was still time to apply to the other schools you really wanted to go to? Financial aid packages vary greatly, one reason is merit aid that you might have gotten from another school.</p>
<p>qdogpa – I think you’re being a little judgmental. You can’t just take an anonymous family with an EFC of 30K and say they can afford to contribute more than 10K. We don’t know what the circumstances of this particular family are. Maybe they live beyond their means and maybe they don’t.</p>
<p>I hope that other younger students are reading this thread. </p>
<p>Students who come from what they believe to be “middle class families” often are shocked to learn that they have high EFCs that are unaffordable. By learning what the likely EFC is early (and whether its affordable), the students can make more reasonable decisions. </p>
<p>That said…since the family is LDS, I imagine that they are tithing 10% of their gross to their church. That can severely limit what is available for college. I place no judgments on that decision, but families have to realize that that is a personal choice and that can impact college affordability.</p>
<p>" if your EFC is indeed 30k, it would “suggest” your household income is fairly high…Understanding that peoples income doesn’t always equal “free cash flow”</p>
<p>My point is the #'s suggest the family can afford 30k,this is a fact</p>
<p>^^(re: post #12) And one of the HUGE benefits of that is the incredible bargain available at BYU. It is a wonderful school at an incredible price!</p>
<p>Yes, my family is mormon, and it’s no coincidence that my parents are willing to pay $11,000. BYU is their first choice college for me and they have been generous enough to offer to pay the BYU tuition costs wherever I want to attend. I was accepted to BYU but up until this point I haven’t seriously considered it as an option. Although I don’t think that I will fit in well in that environment, it’s beginning to look like the only feasible option other than a community college.</p>
<p>To answer the other questions, my families income is roughly $130,000. We live in Marin County, which has some of the highest real estate prices in the nation. Our house is partially being paid for by my dad’s work as an incentive to live locally. This means that even if my parents attempted to downgrade from our house to say a smaller house or a condo, that they would end up paying a larger mortgage. On top of this, my parents are paying tuition for my brother (who isn’t listed as a dependent) and they also pay 10% of their income to the LDS church for tithing. Unfortunately, the financial advisors at CMC and in the UC system that I have talked to haven’t been willing to take these special circumstances into consideration.</p>
<p>I think that what it ultimately came down to was that it took me too long to realize that affording Claremont McKenna wouldn’t be a possibility. I was naive and sure that everything would work out just because I had worked hard and deserved to go there just as much as everyone else who was accepted. I just waited, counting on receiving merit aid (which I didn’t), rather than immediately beginning to look into other options. I realize now that this was extremely foolish. What a harsh dose of reality.</p>
<p>On the bright side. I should be hearing back tomorrow on whether or not I will be eligible to receive a full ride scholarship to CMC through the Army ROTC. I wasn’t something I was seriously considering doing until recently, but now it’s looking like an excellent option. Wish me luck.</p>
<p>Bentley, I’m in a very similar situation to you, except my dream school is Harvey Mudd, just next door. I got in ED as well. I only applied to UCs too because I got in ED. I didn’t think about not being able to afford it because I too was naive and thought things would just work out. However, since my school is a new private school that doesn’t rank, we haven’t gotten too many acceptances to UCs, and for whatever reason I was only accepted to UC Irvine (wait listed at UCSD!)</p>
<p>My parents income is high, and my parents (divorced) will only able/ willing to pay 10k a year each. This is also what they would be paying if I had gone to a UC (just like your “coincidence” with the tuition at BYU)</p>
<p>So my options look like at the moment:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Go to HMC. End up in enormous debt and live conservatively out of college (ie apartment), while my friends at state schools are putting down house and car payments, even though I will have worked harder and would be making more money than them. Also going to HMC, it might be harder to get good grades and get into a top grad school.</p></li>
<li><p>Go to UC Irvine, end up debt free, probably have an easier time getting good grades and get into a good Grad School.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Although you don’t have this option for UCs, you have that option for BYU, which is a great school. I can understand your frustration though. I have friends who I now did not work as hard as me to get into a top school like Harvey Mudd like I did, but will still be attending schools better than UCI.</p>
<p>Hopefully things will work out well for you and you can attend CMC. I hope I can figure out a way for it to work for me as well.</p>