<p>Anyone get it yet?, assuming you are a current student.</p>
<p>No, none of the Texas schools are distributing financial aid until late June/early Julyish due to new cuts in budgets and what not.</p>
<p>I talked to an advisor yesterday, he said some may get their package next week…most of them sent out in the next two weeks.</p>
<p>I have received my updated financial aid in the howdy portal…however they have yet to send an update to my email.</p>
<p>Son got his last night and got a big fat whopping nada! Had his Aggie Grant pulled and missed the GPA for keeping his TX Top 10% by .6 point. No dept, no merit…nothing. I know they were telling the kids to brace for cutbacks, but wow. So upsetting to see him work so hard and get absolutely nothing but loans to pay back as a reward.</p>
<p>aggiemomma- Just out of curiosity what was the fafsa efc your son recieved, and was there qualification for the aggie assurance. Im starting to get very worried about my own finical aid</p>
<p>aggiemomma, its a very common thing at this moment; my EFC was 0 and I still am under the regular cost of attendence. My friends who had the top 10% scholarship last year, lost it this year, and the Texas grant and Aggie grant were also pulled for many, if not all people; it says on the financial aid award page that some of these grants basically became Pell grants and may still be pending on the outcome of national legislature.</p>
<p>whoops, turns out I got my Texas grant renewed, but I’m not sure if it exists for others</p>
<p>More information here: <a href=“https://myfinancialaid2.tamu.edu/forms/award_letter_supplement.pdf[/url]”>https://myfinancialaid2.tamu.edu/forms/award_letter_supplement.pdf</a></p>
<p>NewAggie I honestly don’t remember what our EFC was off hand, but we did not qualify for the Aggie Assurance, we were over the income limit. We are in that lovely grey area that is too much to qualify for anything of substance (besides loans) so we get to finance the FULL sticker price of education…yet don’t make enough to actually BE ABLE TO finance the full sticker price of our kids education. Such a fun place to be…some pay little or none…some pay all. We get to pay all, and sorry if I sound bitter but fact is that I am. The system is so messed up, it ranks right up there with the healthcare sector, where we pay thousands out of pocket in medical bills to make up for the ones who pay nothing. Procedures don’t actually cost the thousands…but they have to make the costs up somewhere and it just happens to be us. Same screw over second verse with college. Again, sorry but I am quite fed up with it all…and not upset with the Texan kids that recieve the extra funding…not their fault, heck take what you can get… but with the system that put us all in this situation!</p>
<p>BTN, thanks for the extra info you recieved. I wont expect anything to change on our FA, but will just wait and be pleasantly surprised if anything shows back up later on. Good Luck!</p>
<p>It happens to many. My EFC is around 1100 and the only aid I received was 80% of the Pell grant and 15,000 worth of loans. I didn’t get offered any scholarships even though I transferred 60 hours with a 3.86 and got into business, as well as no state aid despite receiving a huge part of the pell grant. My first two years were similar to your sons, in that grey area so to speak. I had a parent that was the bread-winner that got sick and had to quit their job, yet still there is hardly any aid to speak of. Crossing my fingers it will somehow get better though. Lol</p>
<p>No disrespect aggiemomma, but the healthcare thing is moreso determined by the place of service; last semester a friend of mine gashed her arm in an accident and got it taken care at Beutal for very little, her ambulance trip (provided by an off campus hospital) is still a thorn in her side. High taxes would be what you are thinking of; like how the Europeans have high taxes and pay for each other, but at an otherwise low cost to themselves. Many of my friends however are in the same boat as you, and I have a feeling I will be there eventually too. I wish you the best of luck! I hope the Texas Senate doesn’t decrease funding and next year, and will increase it, or finding solutions will be even harder…</p>
<p>Aggiemomma, are you out of state? If your son’s scores were that high and his GPA that high and he applied in time and he is instate, he SHOULD have gotten some kind of merit aid? No Lechner scholarship?</p>
<p>Nobody “should” expect to receive a scholarship from this university unless they are National Merit Scholar. That is the only sure way to get a scholarship here. It is sad because a lot of highly qualified students do not get any incentive to come here, but it is just the way it is. Even if you have high test scores and rank and gpa, you may not get a penny. </p>
<p>Funding got cut back pretty significantly this year and that is probably the reason for the financial aid troubles. Unfortunately, unless the economy bounces back, this could be a common theme for a long time.</p>
<p>Aggieengineer, I totally agree…should was probably not the right word to use…also, top 10% can vary widely in the state of TX…in my HS, top 10% was over 99.8…But you are right. The state keeps putting a low priority on education at all levels and it doesn’t look like it is going to change soon.</p>
<p>No disrespect right back at you btn1229…but you have a lot to learn before you give opinons on things you haven’t experienced for yourself. Get back with me when you pay a thousand bucks a month to pay for high deductible insurance for your family. Then when something requiring medical attention happens and you make “surgery payments” monthly to the hospital to cover the deductibles and out of pocket costs…think figures that will get you a decent new economy car fresh off the lot. Hundreds a month for years… on top of the thousand already going out. I don’t know what Beutal is, I assume it is some sort of county facility, but we would have paid the same thing at a county hospital as we would of at the facility required by our insurance. Thus the refrence to the medical system being related to the educational system. The ones who are deemed to have money pay hyperinflated costs to defray the people who pay pennies on the dollar or absolutely nothing. They are birds of the same feather, so hopefully the analogy isn’t totally lost on you now. </p>
<p>I didn’t say that my son was entitled to large amounts of financial aid…I am not remotely that delusional…I was just surprised that the thousand or so that he did get was POOF gone and now we had 0. The full inflated sticker price of a college education is ours to pay, that was what I was trying to reconcile. The reasoning behind the high costs and funding/not funding is 99% political and that is a shame. We did know going in that A&M is particuarly thin on any financial aid vs other state schools, he could have gotten 75% at others, but chose the best. ;o) </p>
<p>Moral of the story was that a whole lot of people out there are just like our family…making too much money on paper and thus being responsible for financing every penny of our childrens education…yet not having enough REAL money flowing through the pipes to actually do that without great financial hardship on ourselves and our children as they try to start their adult lives after college. Oh well…it’s only money right???</p>
<p>Aggiemomma14:
Beutal is the medical facility on campus. Just an fyi so if you need to look into it as far as insurance then that’s where to start. Can’t agree with you more really. I’m not the one paying my education, but I certainly realize just how difficult it is to pay for any college education much less one for full sticker price.</p>
<p>I just wanted to say to those that have a high EFC that I am sorry that you aren’t eligible for anything big (especially at A&M), but then again be thankful that you have that money. At least you could have afforded the medical bills, private schools, tutors, etc… Again this is just a generalization. THe point is be grateful for what you have. And yes the system does need tinkering.</p>
<p>Not trying to throw a pity party, just trying to get across a point here… but again we DON’T have the money…that is very much part of the problem with perception. Private schools…not a day did my kids spend in private schools, and never once did we have any money for tutors, that was a big “generalization” there, and exactly my point. We don’t have cable, or iphones…our newest car is 8 years old and I try to keep our grocery budget for 6 down to 200 a week, and the house thermostat is set on 82 here on the 4th of July in Texas. There are no trips to the mall, vacations of any kind, and things like dinner out and movies are reserved for special occasions like birthdays. The perception of a family that should be “grateful” for what we have (which of course we are VERY grateful for every blessing recieved) is very different than the reality of that said family. Most see full cost EFC as someone who should be “thankful” for the ability to pay their own way and not recieving of any sort of discount or reduction of cost. I see the reality of families that on a good month may cut back and have an exta hundred here or there…nothing remotely touching even the smallest of college expenses. We aren’t unique either, we ARE the typical middle class family…I know tons just like us! </p>
<p>Private schools and tutors…yep that does sound nice, but not even close to reality and that is the problem.</p>
<p>minipuma, no disrespect, but for A&M, an EFC of $15, 000 will get you no aid. Tuition is just not that high! So, a “HIGH” EFC is not so high. Furthermore, most kids you meet at A&M have attended small, PUBLIC schools in the state of TX. I don’t have any friends that went to private schools. To get into the top 10% of any TX school, or do well on your standardized testing, you just need to do the work and time. No private tutors needed. It’s hard work for four high school years and studying for the tests. You are right, you made a gross generalization. You must be thinking of another texas School, because Aggies are not that pretentious! The reality of Aggieland is we are a bunch of down to Earth, homegrown kids that work hard to be the spirit of Aggieland! Good Luck and Gig 'em!</p>
<p>The fact of the matter is that there is more than one issue at hand. At least in my opinion.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>@aggiemomma, I hear you and I get where you are coming from, the fact is though the system is screwed, and there is a handful of other families below you that go to TEXAS colleges. These are the people who get the money and quite frankly the majority of them are minorities. I do believe that there is something missing from your story and the rest of those families you are talking about. (I am not saying this harshly, I am just saying there is more to the picture) Most of the families I know are sending their kids to two Public Schools in Houston. They also are in the same boat as you. However, to each of these families, there are reasons that they SHOULDN’T be getting the money they are complaining for. I am not saying that these are in any way YOU. I don’t mean to cause a flaming war, all I am saying is that yes the system is screwed and EFCs should not define whether you get grants/aid, on the other hand there is something missing storywise on a majority of the families that are complaining.</p></li>
<li><p>@bandnerd. While I agree that an EFC of $15,000 will get you barely any aid, it is a pretty high EFC for a middle class family. Also, the family friends that I know that have attended A&M have gone to pretty large public schools. I also have met several people who attended private schools and then went on to A&M and similar schools of its stature. Once again, at a public school like Bellaire, Lamar, etc… it is very difficult to be in the top 10%. Private tutors, classes, whatever, these are all means for people who cant study on their own to get top grades. I am sorry if I seem “pretentious” but when you are coming from an urban environment, and you are the average or slightly above average student, you can get into A&M but you will not get any top scholarships.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>No offense meant to either of you. Thanks and Gig Em</p>