<p>Hey all,
I was accepted as a transfer to Fordham University. They gave me my financial aid package 2 weeks ago. It was a total of $26,800 including 4000 Stafford subsidized and 2500 unsubsidized loan. I will be commuting to minimize the dorm fees. However, tuition is about $37,000, which mean I have about 10,000 unmet need. Considering I have an EFC of 0, should I have gotten a little bit more ?
As of now, I think I have two options:
1. Stay in Stony Brook University where I loan about 4,500 to cover my tuition and dorms.
2. Apply to private loan to cover the unmet need of $10,000 which will bring the total to about $17000 loan per year. I have met with my advisor and he confirmed that I will be able to graduate in 3 years.</p>
<p>Does anyone have any advice or opinion regarding my situation ? Thanks!</p>
<p>Based on what you’ve said, stay in Stony Brook. It’s a very good school. Save $.</p>
<p>fordham is not a school that meets 100% of your demonstrated need. </p>
<p>Does your FA package include both a Pell grant and a TAP award?</p>
<p>If these are already included, fordham has left you with a gap. It is up to you how to fill it. IF you cannot fill the gap, stay where you are.</p>
<p>From your post, I assume that you filed your financial aid forms quite late. That combined with the relatively low average financial need met by Fordham would lead me to expect a pretty lousy award.</p>
<p>I appreciate everyone’s responses. </p>
<p>Despite being a good school, I did not exact enjoy Stony Brook during my first year there. </p>
<p>Would you all recommend me to reapply in the next cycle early to maximize my aid ?</p>
<p>Were you admitted to Stonybrook through EOP? If yes than your EOP would convert to HEOP if you did the paperwork when you applied to Fordham.</p>
<p>Applying next year is not going to change your FA situation because Fordham is still not going to meet 100% of your need and you are still going to have a gap in the FA package.</p>
<p>You should stay at Stony Brook, because borrowing that much to attend Fordham will haunt you later. Who knows, you may even like Stony Brook better this year. If you still aren’t happy you can apply to other schools for your junior year. You need to look for schools that “meet full need” for transfers, which is tricky. You could also look at other instate schools. Good luck!</p>
<p>If you are a dependent you might need a cosigner to obtain loans above the federal ones.</p>
<p>MarkTressle…I sort of agree with you and I sort of do not. ALL of your posts on this forum lead one to believe that they will get scholarships to support college expenses “if they just apply”. That isn’t really true. There was an article recently that stated that for every 50 scholarship applications done, MAYBE the recipient would receive ONE. But nothing venture, nothing gained…and so the part I agree with is…sure apply for scholarships. Be persistent and work hard at doing so. BUT also at the same time do not apply to colleges with the anticipation that you will receive outside scholarship money to cover ALL of your expenses.</p>
<p>And remember you are required to report outside scholarships to your college. These scholarships do not reduce your EFC in most cases (there are a some schools which allow “stacking” of scholarships up to the cost of attendance, but not a lot). If you receive an outside scholarship, that REDUCES your financial need by the same amount. In most cases, colleges first reduce the loan portions of financial aid, and then things like work-study. Typically grants are reduced last.</p>
<p>So…yes…apply for scholarships. And good luck. BUT also have a financially possible school in your mix.</p>