Help interpreting my FA package!!

<p>According to my online account, I am being offered $3500 in Fed DL Stafford Sub Loans, $2000 in Fed DL Stafford Unsub Loans, $26118 in Parent (PLUS) Loan Eligibility, and $15000 in scholarship money for the 2014 school year. </p>

<p>Honestly, I have no idea what this means, except that I definitely have a $15k scholarship. What do these loans mean, and why does all of my financial aid add up to more than the cost to attend UConn? My dad and I are going to try to figure it all out, but honestly I'm pretty lost...</p>

<p>This may help you, it’s info from SUNY Geneseo regarding FA. <a href=“http://www.geneseo.edu/webfm_send/7732[/url]”>http://www.geneseo.edu/webfm_send/7732&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Thank you, that was very helpful!! But I am kind of disappointed that all my aid is in the form of loans :(</p>

<p>So basically disregard the last $26K loan. You might have gotten this from that link, but in short subsidized loans don’t accrue interest, and unsubsidized loans do. I didn’t take the ones that were offered to me, but from what I’ve heard they’re pretty fair deals if you need loans.</p>

<p>DO NOT accept the Parent Plus loans. What’s it meant to do is cover the full COA in case your family can’t afford any payments for the first years. It’s a bad idea because you’ll be hit hard with debt after you graduate, and the interest rates aren’t very generous (you can probably find better ones).</p>

<p>The good news is that you should be getting $15,000 per year so you don’t need quite as many loans.</p>

<p>I’ll clarify part of TaciturnType’s post. Subsidized stafford loans won’t accrue interest while you’re in college, and the interest rate is lower than the unsubsidized loan after graduation.</p>

<p>The unsubsidized loans accrue interest while you’re in college and have double the interest rate as the subsidized loan (6.8% vs. 3.4%). If you accept these try to start paying off the interest while you’re in college if you can.</p>

<p>Keep in mind that stafford loans are student loans, meaning you’re directly responsible for paying them off.</p>