<p>My parents have been divorced since February of 2010. I live with my mother who makes somewhere in the range of 50,000-60,000 per year, supporting 5 children including a new born. My dad makes slightly more (~63,000) and is remarried to a women who works (not sure how much she make but probably in the same range) and has a daughter. I have had almost no contact with my father since the divorce (only the occasional text or phone call that last less than 10 minutes) and he now lives in a Illinois while I live with my mom and siblings in California. </p>
<p>I seem to have two options:
1.) Try and request to have the NCP profile waived by the schools which ask for it. I think my guidance counselor would be willing to act as a "third party" to attest that I have had no contact with him for the last few years. However, even though I have had no contact physically with him, he still pays child support so I am not sure if this would even work.</p>
<p>2.) Try to get my father to fill out the NCP profile. The issue with this is that I know from previous conversations with him about the topic, that he is reluctant to fill out any info; his wife has convinced him that it isn't necessary. But, even if I can convince him to fill out the forms, my worry is he will lie on them and falsify information. He done this in the past when my parents when back to court to have the child support altered (due to both parties moving out of state). He lied about his income and then doctored documents to support his lie. I am worried that he would try the same thing on the NCP profile and in turn could either ruin my chances of receiving financial aid or worse, result in an institution revoking an application due to his dishonesty. </p>
<p>I have already applied to some FAFSA only schools and other financial safeties, but some of my top schools (Yale, UPenn, NYU, ect.) require the CSS and NCP profiles. I guess my main questions are what I should do?</p>
<p>Sorry for the long winded post and thank you in advanced for any advice</p>
<p>I think you need to at least attempt to get him to fill out the NCP. You can’t control the possibility that he will lie, but hopefully he will not do so. He has to actually provide his tax returns that will support some of his info (at least the income side, and colleges can see something about some of his assets as well in some cases from the tax returns). So you might be sure that he knows he needs to do the NCP and also that they will need 2012 tax returns as soon as they are filed to confirm the information.</p>
<p>I see your point, I guess my fear still is that he will lie on the profile then edit/doctor documents to support his lies. I would hate to be accepted to my dream school then have my acceptance revoked at the last minute because of his dishonesty. How would a school handle this situation? Would they simply not award any financial aid or would they see the applicant as being as dishonest as the parent?</p>
<p>You can only do what you can do - and your father’s actions are not within your control.</p>
<p>I think it unlikely that you’ll get a waiver, so all you can do is ask him to complete the profile and hope for the best. If you see it and know that it contains false information, then I think you are also obligated to report that to the financial aid office. That shouldn’t interfere with your acceptance, but it might prevent you from getting institutional aid. Nonetheless, if you know information is false and don’t say anything, then you are being dishonest . . . and that’s a whole different issue.</p>
<p>If all you’re dealing with are suspicions, you have no obligation to report that. But if you have good reason to believe that he lied . . . then, yes, I think you’ll need to say something.</p>
<p>It is highly unlikely that you’ll get a waiver since your parents haven’t been divorced for that long and he does pay child support. Occasional phone calls are contact. It would be dishonest for a school official to claim “no contact” when there have been phone calls and child support paid.</p>
<p>When you add your mom’s income to all the child support she gets (from your dad and the father of the newborn), then her income could be much higher than the 50-60k per year. </p>
<p>How much is your mom agreed to pay towards college? That can also be an issue. Even your FAFSA only schools may not be affordable if your mom can’t pay much/anything. </p>
<p>Did you apply to any financial safety schools? Those are schools that you know FOR SURE that all costs are covered.</p>
<p>In another post, you mention that you and your siblings spent the Christmas holidays in 2011 with your dad. You really can’t claim “no contact”.</p>
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<p>Unless he is willing to also lie to the federal government with the possibility of liens and penalties, he will have to turn in the transcript from the IRS to verify his taxes.</p>
<p>Keep in mind that willful misrepresentation on your financial aid forms are grounds to kick you out of school and your having to repay all of the aid that you fraudulently received.</p>
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<p>But that’s the OP’s question, isn’t it? Can the OP be kicked out of school for his dad’s dishonesty if the OP wasn’t aware of it?</p>
<p>I agree that if the OP is aware that dad is lying on the forms, he’d better speak up and inform the school. The question is what the consequences would be if he is not aware of the dishonesty. (And, frankly, there’s no way for the OP to know all the details of his dad’s financial situation.)</p>
<p>dodgersmom is exactly right. My main concern is what would happen to me if my father lied on the fin.aid. forms?</p>
<p>For example, if I was accepted to a school and received aid for my freshmen year then, I applied for aid for my sophomore year and the school noticed problems with the numbers, what would be the consequences? Would I still be kicked out of the school even though I had no idea/nothing to do with the lie?</p>
<p>Do we actually know of kids getting “kicked out of school” when their PARENTS have provided wrong info on FAFSA or CSS? </p>
<p>I know that the school can remove aid, and then the student owes money, but have students actually been told “you must leave” as soon as the school is aware that the PARENTS lied? </p>
<p>I realize that if aid is removed, and the student now “owes money” that the student may not be able to pay, but that’s a different situation. </p>
<p>What exactly do CSS schools do with NCP info? How do they verify that info is correct? With CP’s they can check some info with FAFSA, but with NCPs, how do they verify info?</p>
<p>I think a bigger problem that this student may face is FUTURE years. Even if the dad does do the NCP paperwork this year, what will happen if he refuses next year? </p>
<p>Also, since it seems like the Dad and SMom’s combined income is high enough that it will cause a substantial contribution, who is going to pay that? The mom can’t and the dad won’t. So this whole process may be moot anyway.</p>
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<p>IRS transcripts and any other documentation that the school wants to request. Non-compliance will result in the student not receiving aid. Since student will be the “beneficiary” of aid (and will be the one to suffer the consequences if parents are less than truthful), he needs to to communicate to dad that filling out the NCP does not obligate him to pay for college. With this in mind, dad needs to be truthful about giving information because willful misrepresentation will result in the student not receiving aid.</p>
<p>I don’t think the student can even see the NCP information unless the parent chooses to share it. So I don’t see how a school could hold the OP liable if the dad lied. Now, he might be in trouble if it comes out. And your aid picture could change dramatically at that time. But I think you need to go ahead and ask him to fill it out.</p>
<p>To heck with this! OP, PM me a list of schools and I’ll call and ask. No promises that I’ll get through to all of them, but I’ll try.</p>
<p>If the dad already has a history of lying and falsifying documents to the court system in order to hide income, then it’s unlikely he’s going to trust that truthful income documentation won’t somehow get used to get more child support for those younger siblings. </p>
<p>And, frankly, who really knows??? could a judge order this girl’s school to release copies of the NCP documents to the court during a future child support hearing?? It would seem that a judge could order that only S/HE see the documents (not the ex-wife) so that S/HE can determine proper child support payments.</p>
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<p>No. Because the college is not a party to the parents’ child support proceedings, it could not be ordered to release documents. Only the parties are subject to court order.</p>
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<p>Again, no. A child support order has to be supported by evidence in the record. A judge cannot rely on “secret” documents as the basis for a support order.</p>
<p>Ask your dad to fill out the NCP asyou will not be eligible for any financial aid from the schools without it. Just let him know that he should expect verification of the numbers with his 2012 tax returns so that he should use those same figures. Then you’ll just have to see how it goes. If he refuses to fill out the forms or upon verification the numbers don’t pan out, you will not get the financial aid. How an indifvidual school will handle the matter, is up to the school, but you will not be prosecuted legally for what someone else, even a parent, does. </p>
<p>You should also have some schools on your list that you know you will be able to afford and that you know will accept you. Give your parents’ joint incomes, you are likely to have enough of an expected contribution even from schools that meet full need that you will need some moneyhis year. from your parents. You should run some NPCs, using schools that guaranee to meet full need and don’t give merit awards to get an idea of what you can be expected to pay in a good outcome scenario. If your parents are unable or unwilling to come up with that amount, and you can’t come up with it yourself, it’s pretty clear you can’t afford such schools. Gettng a full need package met or a heftyenough merit award to cover what you need is truly a lottery. Make sure you have some sure things in your mix.</p>
<p>*Quote:
could a judge order this girl’s school to release copies of the NCP documents to the court during a future child support hearing?</p>
<p>No. Because the college is not a party to the parents’ child support proceedings, it could not be ordered to release documents. Only the parties are subject to court order.*</p>
<p>I’m not so sure about that. I know that in my state, during a divorce proceeding, a court can order a doctor and hospital to release private health records of one of the spouses. The other spouse can’t see the records, but the judge can and the judge can use that info to make decisions in regards to splitting assets/support/etc.</p>
<p>Thank you everyone for all the advice.
I was able to contact my father today and he is willing to fill out the NCP profile (so he says, we will see if he actually does it). So therefore I won’t be requesting the waivers.</p>
<p>I guess my last questions are: Is there any way I can make sure he sends the profile, not actually seeing his information, but just like some verification that he has sent it? and if he ends up later refusing to fill out the profile, what should I do? I know the school probably won’t just waive the profile, but would they accept some rough estimates or something?</p>
<p>BruinBound17 -</p>
<p>As others have written, you need to find out just how much money your dad will firmly commit to paying each year. If he won’t commit, even with aid there places may be unaffordable. Re-check your application list and make certain that you have truly affordable options.</p>