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. I live with my mother and step father. Their combined income is 85,000 but my mother’s alone is 34,000
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You need to include mom’s and step-dad’s incomes on FAFSA. Your EFC should be higher than $4k…unless there will be 2 kids in college in the fall.
Will there be???
Please ask your MOM if she can pay $300+ per month for you. With her very modest income, likely she cannot.
vs.
Honey, that’s just to pay tuition. If Mama is not good with money, how do you know this will happen? One bad medical bill and you will be toast. How will you fly out of state? Even with Southwest, it gets to be quite expensive.
I had one kid flying from California to NY and another child flying from Southern California to Sacramento. It all adds up.
You need to account for living expenses, and, your medical insurance, which is typically not included in your COA sheet.
Did you apply to the Daniels Fund Scholarship? It is merit and income based, and goes a lot further if you use it in Utah, Colorado, Wyoming or NM, but can be used in other states. Very competitive and application is due by Nov 30.
You really are going to get the most money by staying near home and you are going to cut your expenses. If you feel you must go out of state, look at the WICHE/WUE schools. Some are smaller than the Utah schools. At Wyoming you would receive the top Rocky Mtn Scholars award and pay about $6500 in tuition and about $8500 in room and board. U of Washington doesn’t participate but Western Washington in Bellingham does and it’s gorgeous. Humboldt in California is very different than the Utah or Utah State.
I think you should really look at Utah/Utah State and see all they can offer for a very affordable price. Consider study abroad to experience another part of the world (for a cheap price). You really don’t want to be at a school you can’t afford as you won’t be able to take advantage of all the student activities as you’ll either be working or won’t have the money to go to a concert or movie or event. You don’t want to have to worry about being able to buy a book or figure out a way to get home for Christmas break. I went to school poor and it was really hard to be around other kids who had cars, could travel, could buy gifts for each other. My roommate’s mother sent her $20 every Monday morning (arrived Tuesday) for the entire time we were in college so she didn’t have to work (her father paid all her expenses, the $20 was just a bonus). I made just over $30/wk typing for 15 hours. It was tough and my roommate could do a lot of things I couldn’t, like go skiing, go to the movies and out to dinner. She also had a car and could get a lot farther than my two feet could get me.
Western Washington would be very different from Utah, is a very good school, gorgeous campus, and is wue.
I don’t think out of state is going to be possible given what you’ve shared - the private schools that only expect you to pay your EFC counting only one parent’s household income are pretty much non-existent. State schools rarely meet full EFC for out of state, and even if you qualify for a merit scholarship or WUE, I don’t think it will be enough.
You really need to look at your less glamorous in-state options due to their lower costs (including lower travel cost) and easier to qualify for scholarships.
Weber state scholarship page: http://www.weber.edu/FinancialAid/resident.html
SUU scholarship page: https://www.suu.edu/scholarships.html
If your mother is married to your stepfather, then both her income AND his income MUST be listed on the fafsa form. Did you list both incomes or just your mom?
With $85,000 in income, you would not have a $4000 or so EFC…sorry. It would be higher…closer to,that $11,000 mark.
Your mom can’t just decide to put her income and not include her husband’s. Is that what she did?
One issue with going OOS is travel, as mentioned above.
To accommodate those costs, while also minimizing them, look instate or at states that are very closeby. University of New Mexico is often very generous with merit to those who live in nearby states.
What will your major be?
I know that on this forum large numbers get thrown around quite easily. So much so, that much smaller numbers can seem “easily do-able”. However, families that struggle with money issues and medical bills do not have “extra money” leftover each month. That’s why they don’t have savings. That’s why they have credit card bills.
Obviously, we don’t know your family, but we know many families who can be described the same way that you’ve described yours. They can’t come up with $100 extra a month, much less $300…at least not most months.
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen families sign up for the “payment plan” at their child’s college, thinking that making monthly smaller payments will be “do-able,” but soon they start missing payments and their child needs to leave the school.
I don’t think Alabama would be affordable because you’d only get 2/3 tuition award.
I don’t think WUE schools will work since you can’t pay 100% of tuition, much less 150%. WUE schools generally do not let you get the WUE discount plus merit.
YOU need to find schools that will give you a MINIMUM of free tuition.
Also…you’ll need to work/save every summer.
On FAFSA, did your mom include her husband’s income? Did she include your college savings acct?
Do you have a sibling in college? If not, then your EFC must be higher.
I see the benefit of getting a school that can provide free tuition. My mother must have specified herself and my stepdad as college students because they are hoping to begin working on their degrees at a local college. What do I do if she filed my FAFSA incorrectly? Her husband’s income was included. I am looking over a copy of our submission right now.
Parents can not be included in the number of people in the household who are college students, even if they are taking college courses.
Your parents being in college should not matter for financial aid purposes:
Do you have siblings? Did your parents put that there would be THREE people in college at the same time? If so…I believe this needs to be changed if two of them are the parents.
To correct an error…you go into the fafsa after it has processed…and you make the corrections.
You can amend the FAFSA to correct mistakes. Usually it’s locked for a couple days for the initial processing, then it’s editable again.
Parents are never included in the “number in college” value. However, if your mom and step-dad do go to school full-time (NOT part-time) you can use that as a basis for doing a financial aid appeal.
Thank you, I had no clue this was a stipulation. I will go fix it!
I am not sure any real 4 yr in Utah will give you actual free tuition with your stats, but the U of U would give you something helpful, USU is really up and coming but i am not sure you are science or engineering (or ag) directed? Because it would be even more generous than the U. How are you doing on your Regents? That is quite nice if you have got that pinned down. You should easily be base plus exemplary, that is more than 4K over 4 semesters. The chance of you getting a really decent paying part time job in Utah is pretty high, as you know that almost everywhere is short of workers and will pay above min wage. A decent internship might get you over $13 an hour (not sure what your major would be).
I have completed and applied for my regents scholarship. It is heavily marketed at my high school. I have no clue what I would like to major in and consider that as a contributor to why it is so difficult for me to decide on where to apply to. SUU and UVU both offer free tuition with my stats but are much less prestigious than the U or USU.
No, she listed both incomes. She did however list and additional person in college.
You need to correct the number in college. Parents are not included in the count. That is what made your EFC lower.
Yes, you need to correct that inclusion of another person in college. Parents cannot be counted as students on a child’s FAFSA.
Corrected FAFSA, now my EFC is 6900
$85,000 income with one person in college…and your EFC was $6900?
Maybe I’m wrong…but,that sounds very low to me.
I had a friend with similar numbers last year. I couldn’t believe it either but ran a sample and with paying a good amount in taxes, it does come out that way.