Okay so I’m an incoming college freshman at Buffalo State College, I’m from New York so I’m staying in state. I decided to go to buff because it’s the cheapest school I got into but I just recently (two days ago) got my financial aid report in the mail. So basically the school cost $23,974 a year and I only got $6,642 in aid not counting loans. I got money from the pell grant and TAP. My Family contribution amount on my report is $1900 but my contribution is $15500. The report they sent me in the mail also gives me slightly a but more aid then my report online. I sent the school an email but they never responded and I sent the email when I got the online report about two weeks ago. Every other college I got accepted to have me merit based and and more grants/scholarships than this school did. I’ve been considering holding off for semester or maybe a year, I’ve also been looking up essay scholarships. I really don’t want to take out a loan and I only plan on going to this school for two years and hopefully transferring to a better school. Should I call the school and ask why I didn’t get more aid. My mother has horrible credit and lives paycheck to paycheck so I don’t want her to cosign on a loan for me because she isn’t good at paying bills. My dad has been in the hospital since last August so he can’t pay anything but my parents are divorced so I don’t think he’s required to pay anyway. For the record I’m not going away to college (I’m from NYC going to Buffalo) just for the fun of it, it’s because of my home situation so I tried to find the cheapest away school. Any advice is appreciated.
What are your stats? Major?
Is there a community college you can commute to from home?
@Madison85 I’m a political science major and there are two community colleges near my house my combined SAT is 1900 and my GPA was an 80
Even with the full amount of TAP and Pell you can’t afford to go to that school. The only affordable way for you to go to school is to commute from home.
@sensation723 the community college I would go to if I take back my enrollment from buffalo cost $5000, would my pell grant and TAP stay the same?
Your Pell will stay the same. TAP is a tuition aid so it will change as the tuition change. Either way, you should be cover in full or almost in full. If you commute from home. Is there are a reason you didn’t apply to CUNY school since you live in NYC? It would have been the cheapest way for you to attend school.
I believe your Pell grant would stay the same. How much was that?
And if the community college participates in the Direct Loan program, you would also get $5500 in Direct loans for your first year.
@sensation723 I didn’t apply to CUNY because I didn’t want to stay in the city at all because I would have to stay at home and that’s something I really don’t want to do. I only applied to SUNY, Private and out of state I didn’t even look at CUNY.
@thumper1 I got $3865 from the pell grant and $2777 from TAP
Well, it looks like you might have to stay at home anyway since your school isn’t affordable.
What is an 80 GPA on a 4.0 scale?
What will you do with a degree in political science?
Even with full Pell and Tap you can’t afford to go away to college. So you might not have a choice but to stay in the city and commute from home.
@Madison85 it’s only about a 2.7 to some schools and a 3.0 to others. I want to either be a litigation attorney or criminal defense attorney, that’s why I don’t want to take out loans for undergrad.
@sensation723 my mother said she thinks I can make it work somehow to go to still go away this fall but I think you’re right. She said “it’ll work itself out don’t worry about it”
Since you want to go on to law school you should look into John Jay.
“It’ll work itself out” sounds like either magical thinking or code for loans.
You Pell Grant & Tap will likely cover most of SUNY/CUNY tuition & fees. Unless you can find some money to pay for away SUNY’s room & board, you may have to commute to attend CUNY.
Lots of loans. The cost is above the federal loan limit.
@sensation723 my mom told me to just do the payment plan at buffalo and call the aid office tomorrow, I don’t know what I would say but she wants me to call
How will the payment plan help? You’d still need to come up with $2K/month.
@Madison85 my mom said it so it’s magical thinking, she said don’t worry about it bills are bills