<p>@alamemom Thank you SOOOO much for your kind words and awesome thorough advice. I truly appreciate your time and efforts! I recommended this thread and will continue to follow it and post my financial aid package when I receive it!</p>
<p>Awwwww! My shameless self-promotion has paid off!!!</p>
<p>THANKS, everyone!</p>
<p>Hey guys! So I’ve been admitted into Marshall recently, and I’m so excited to be attending next year 
I just had one question…my EFC should be pretty low because my parents are unemployed. However, my grandparents, specifically my grandpa, has left me a will/trust fund type of thing that is pretty significant(i put on CSS about 35-40k). However, I don’t know if I should have because I don’t really have full access to it and won’t have full access to it until several years later when I will hopefully already have graduated(I do have partial access to this fund - it’s very limited that the amount of money is not very significant). Basically, I’m hoping this trust fund doesn’t inflate my EFC. So my question is how much of this trust fund will the Financial Aid people take into consideration for my overall EFC? Thanks :)</p>
<p>It is good that you listed it on the CSS/Profile, because you were required to do so. Yes, it will add to your EFC because it is an asset in your name. I do not know how USC will consider it, but in general student-held assets are assesed at about 20%. That will add about $7,000 to $8,000 to your EFC. </p>
<p>Not having access to it at this time does not exclude it from consideration in calculating your need because you would in the future be able to use it to pay off student loans, for example.</p>
<p>It is wonderful that your grandparents left you that trust fund. Being free of student loan debt will be a wonderful gift.</p>
<p>Thank you so much alamemom that was super helpful!! Just like your name, you are such a mom to all of us with your efforts to help all of us with your knowledge about USC financial aid!</p>
<p>Thanks again, you’re a blessing to these forums :)</p>
<p>Just received the financial aid award for my son(posted on the USC financial aid website, under awards), a returning student (returning as a sophomore). It is shocking. The package contains no university grant, which was in excess of $ 35000 last year. Our financial situation has not changed. </p>
<p>We are in complete shock. If not corrected, my son will have to drop out and now it is too late to apply for any other colleges as a transfer.</p>
<p>We all were told by everyone including the USC financial aid office, that if your financial situtation doesnt change, the award would roughly remain the same. The FAFSA and the profiles for 2009 and 2010 look roughly the same in our case, with the EFC being the same as well. </p>
<p>Can anyone tell us, what is going on ?</p>
<p>Did you receive an email telling you your package was ready to be viewed? If not, they have not completed your package. This happened to several Freshman applicants this year. After they received the email telling them their package was ready, a USC grant was included. Let us know if this turns out to be the case.</p>
<p>If this is not the case, contact USC financial aid and ask why there is a change. If your financial info is the same, there should not be a $35,000 change in aid - either the package is not yet complete or there was an error. </p>
<p>Let me know as soon as you find out.</p>
<p>rbapna, I just checked my daughter’s financial aid page - I now feel certain it is just that your package has not yet been completed. All that shows is her two USC scholarships - in a complete package she usually has about a dozen items.</p>
<p>Please be patient - last year the returning student packages were not complete until mid-June.</p>
<p>Again, when your son’s package is complete please come back and update so that others won’t feel the same panic you did - thatnks!</p>
<p>i recieved an email to check my award. all that is included on it is my trustee scholarship but it then says my efc is 0. i’m living in university housing and theres still university fees so idk how the efc is 0? last year my package included loans shouldnt they still be included?</p>
<p>PLEASE don’t panic! Everything say 0 right now - enrollment plans, etc. Yes, Federal aid is always included - even students with an EFC of $100,000 do not have a complete package until an unsubs loan posts. So if you applied for finacial aid and your page is not displaying any Federal aid - it isn’t complete yet.</p>
<p>Really.</p>
<p>This happened to several freshman applicants. Then their aid posted. Some of them were a bit embarrassed because they had posted very insulting things about USC financial aid and then found they had been awarded in excess of $50,000 in aid.</p>
<p>Please</p>
<p>be</p>
<p>patient.</p>
<p>Please.</p>
<p>swoopes2, was your email saying your aid was ready to be viewed, or that *a new billing statement was ready? *They are two different things.</p>
<p>“We write to inform you that 2010-2011 award information was recently posted to your online record.”
That’s what the email said</p>
<p>Yes, it seems the emails have gone out prematurely. Sigh. Please believe me, if your federal aid - at minumum an unsubs Stafford - does not appear, your package is not complete. Really.</p>
<p>Yes I’m not panicing I was just wondering if this was happening to other people</p>
<p>Yep! lame-daughter’s page just shows USC scholarships so far. Hawkwings has the same. I am guessing the financial aid office will be swamped with calls today because of the early emails. It could be the packages will update later today, though - which would be very early for returning student packages.</p>
<p>They have an automated email system where it sends you an email as soon as anything on your financial aid package changes. So this is just the initial run-through of some scholarships and grants. Don’t worry about it.</p>
<p>I talked to them on the phone cause was in a HUGE panic that there was nothing there and they said its only the scholarship renewal at the moment and the rest of the package will be up later this month</p>
<p>By the same token, if the federal Safford unsubsidized loans are posted, our financial aid package is complete, correct? Because that’s all I see - two unsubsidized Safford loans (one for each semester)</p>
<p><em>Sigh</em>, the whole system is so unfair. Yes, both my parents make around 100k but almost all of that goes towards their multiple mortgage payments. Why am I punished for my parents bad decisions? It’s not just USC, Oxy (at 53k/yr) took away my 10k in aid that I received freshman year because my sister graduated from college, a state school that my grandma mostly paid for. So my only options now are go into an insane amount of debt, take two years off till my little brother starts college or go to community college. None of those sound very appealing :(</p>
<p>If you are a new student (it sounds as though you are a transfer), have received an email saying your package is ready, and your federal aid appears yes, your package is probably complete.</p>
<p>Returning student packages are still probably not yet ready.</p>
<p>Hey, returning 2nd yr student here, and complete financial aid is up for me!
it looks like cost of attendance INCREASED by slightly under 2000$. wow.
but man i love usc, efc at 3.5k even after my 2 siblings graduate this yr.
then again, my family does hover around the poverty line</p>