Did my school screw me out of a Cal Grant Award?

Paying for College
1

<p>So apparently I was awarded Cal Grant last year and I didn't even know it. </p>

<p>To be honest, I kind of never really knew about cal grant. When I was still at community college,
I would sometimes be awarded a few hundred dollars a year by Cal Grant, but I always thought it was something
exclusive to community colleges so I never paid it much attention. When I transferred to SJSU last year I received the
usual federal grant but nothing else. A few days ago I received an email from cal grant asking me to update my info, so
I go to their website and log in after having to reset my password (I had completely forgotten I even had an account).
After I logging in, I click on 'view my award detail' our of curiosity, and I find nothing in the 2014-2015 year because I guess I didn't apply or whatever. I go to the 2013-2014 page to find that I "have been awarded" $7000! The only problem is that I have never seen any of that money. It even says that it was awarded for my school, which is SJSU. </p>

<p>I go to my school website to check my awards for last year and I see no mention of cal grant. It was just the federal pell grant and a bunch of loans. last year I paid the rest of tuition out of my pocket, because the federal grant doesn't cover
the whole tuition. </p>

<p>Do you think it's still possible to be reimbursed for the money that I was 'awarded' last year but never really received? Heck, on the website it even says that the money was deducted from my "remaining eligibility".</p>

<p>What do you guys think?</p>

2

<p>You need to call the Calgrant people.</p>

3

<p>Regardless of the reason you didn’t receive your Cal-Grant, CSAC isn’t going to retroactively award that money for an award year that has already closed out. </p>

4

<p>Go immediately to the SJSU financial aid office with a printout. It is possible that SJSU somehow mis-allocated the CalGrant funds. Not likely, but it is a bureaucracy, and it could have happened. Also go over with them to make sure you have all your paperwork lined up so you will receive the CalGrant in the 2014-15 school year.</p>

<p>Just make an appointment with financial aid and straighten it out. Nothing venture, nothing gained. It will make you feel better to understand what happened, even if nothing changes for last year. And something should happen for this year.</p>

5

<p>@ItsJustSchool,
Isn’t it too late to receive CalGrant for this school year? My status on the website says “pending renewal” even though there are green check marks next to all the requirements. </p>

6

<p>I don’t know. Your financial aid office will know. Or log into your WebGrants portal. I would ask Financial Aid.</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.csac.ca.gov/doc.asp?id=928”>http://www.csac.ca.gov/doc.asp?id=928&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

7

<p>If you are Cal eligible for 2014-2015, it shouldn’t be too late for your school to request the funds. </p>

8

<br>

<br>

<p>Re-read your own words and learn from them. You “didn’t really know” and “never paid much attention”…you’re now an adult and part of life means being proactive. There will be a gazillion times as an adult that you will fall victim to various things if you’re asleep at the wheel. Look into things, ask questions, don’t be a victim.</p>

9

<p>I appreciate all your input. I called cal grant and they told me that they have no idea why the school didn’t offer me an award. I spoke with the financial aid office and I was told that there “must have been some kind of a mistake” but they can’t reimburse me for last year’s award. At least now I will receive cal grant for this year. </p>

10

<p>Great!</p>

<p>I would ask to speak to a supervisor at SJSU Financial Aid. If the block of money that SJSU received from CalGrant last year includes a portion that was earmarked for you, if they actually received the funds, they will be able to look and see where the discrepancy occurred and make it right. If the money came in, it went somewhere. If it didn’t go where it was supposed to go, that is a real problem for SJSU. Just because the person who answers the phone puts you off doesn’t mean you shouldn’t pursue this. They need their accounting straightened out as much as you would like the funds.</p>

<p>If CalGrants told you and SJSU that they have money waiting for you and it was not ever transferred to SJSU, however, you may be out of luck.</p>

11

<p>Yea I think I’m going to do that. But even the people at cal grants told me that it was very unlikely that SJSU would still pay me the money from last year. What I want to do now is make sure that if I do not receive last year’s cal grant, it won’t be deducted from my remaining eligibility, because I still have three more semesters until I graduate.</p>