<p>My family has an EFC of roughly 52000 (completely expected, no mistakes), but my parents are pretty set on not wanting to pay for my college. I have been admitted to the University of Florida (and likely the Honors Program, find out soon), and my Florida PrePaid covers the entire cost of in-state tuition and room&board (total is roughly $19000). My parents had it easy with my first two brothers, they both went to in-state schools (FAU and UF). However, I'm shooting for higher hopes than either one of my brothers - I've done way better than them in school, and so I hope to go out of state.</p>
<p>So far I have been accepted to University of Miami, UF, Georgia Tech, Rose Hulman, Berkeley, and Carnegie Mellon. I have been waitlisted at Harvey Mudd and Duke, and I'm waiting on Columbia, Tufts, Cornell, and JHU. I do not want to go to a Florida school - part of me just wants to get out of here. In some ways I'm radically different from my brothers/family - they all like the suburban Florida life, whereas I want something like Boston, New York, Pittsburgh, San Fran, you get it.</p>
<p>With that aside, I have a few questions:
1. Should I suck it up and attend UF because it's free and it's academics are pretty good, or should I try to urge for going out of state?
2. If I do go out of state/private and my parents refuse to help me pay, in my second year, will I be able to apply for Financial Aid as an independent and perhaps earn more grants?
3. Are large loans for me a really bad thing? Will it make life terrible after graduation?</p>
<p>Thanks</p>
<p>PS - I will be able to take my PrePaid money to any college I want (~$19000/yr), so that does make decisions at least a little bit more feasible...</p>
<p>I totally understand you wanting to get out of Florida. I was raised in southern CA and felt exactly the same way – it was like if I couldn’t get out of there my head would blow up. My husband is from Florida and he felt the same way about Florida. (Not trying to disparage FL, or southern CA, but those places are not for everyone, and for some people they’re almost toxic.)</p>
<p>And I think it’s great you applied to such a range of schools. However when you have all your offers on the table you can sit down with your parents and have a serious talk about what’s possible. You will not be able to file for aid your second year as an independent, unfortunately. That’s not how it works. You will be a dependent for financial aid purposes until you’re 24 or have completed your bachelors degree.</p>
<p>I think large loans are a VERY bad thing and would discourage anyone from taking them if they had any reasonable alternative.</p>
<p>Once you have all your offers maybe your parents will relent and help you out with an out-of-state school. If they won’t, I’d say go in-state and get out of Florida after college. That’s what my husband ended up doing. He got his BA and his masters degrees in-state and then left and never went back. That was a l-o-n-g time ago now… but it all worked out just fine. :)</p>
<p>Hmmm… It seems to me that your parents are willing to pay for your college and they’ve been saving up for years. Your Florida Prepaid is not worth $19K nor is that the cost of instate tuition+room+board. The instate costs of those things (which would be covered by the prepaid) is under $12K. You are able to use your prepaid for an out-of-state college, but it will give you a lesser amount, probably around $10K. (You can call and ask them what the amount is and they will mail it to you. It is an average of what all the instates cost.) Plus, you’re probably eligible for Bright Futures, aren’t you? </p>
<p>It’s a shame you didn’t apply to Cooper Union since it looks like you are interested in engineering. Cooper Union offers all students free tuition and you could have used your prepaid and a loan for room and board. Other than that, you could have targeted schools known for merit-- like Case Western. </p>
<p>I’m not trying to be harsh but I want you to realize that you applied to schools when you knew there was no way to pay for them. You cannot get $40K in loans to pay for these colleges and I suspect that parents who have paid prepaid for 3 kids and earn enough to have a $50K efc are not going to co-sign those loans. (No one will give you that much loan $ unless you have a co-signer.) You will not be able to apply as an independent. You would have to be 24years old, married, have a child or have been in the military. I really think you would be making a mistake to go to an out-of-state private. </p>
<p>UFL is an excellent school. The last I checked, it was one of the top schools enrolling Natl Merit Scholars. There are TONS of well-prepared, intelligent kids there. It is well-known for getting kids into med school. I understand you want to get away from Florida and I have an idea. If you get Bright Futures, why don’t you see if you can use the extra prepaid $ and some earnings to spend a summer up north? Maybe you can take some summer classes in NY or Boston. Maybe you can find an internship in one of those cities and your parents will help you out with that $. You could also look into spending a semester abroad. Even if you had to take loans out for that, you would be <em>adding</em> to your experience. Really, Chemistry at Berkeley is no different from Chem at UFL.</p>
<p>I think you know that you’ll very likely be full pay at any other school, unless you receive merit aid. Are you expecting to receive scholarships from any non-FL schools? If not, then it would be very tough for you to come up with the funds needed for four years unless your parents change their minds (but they may feel that wouldn’t be fair to the other two who weren’t given a choice). Even if it were possible, you’d be left with huge loan payments for a very long time.</p>
<p>Finaid.org has loan calculators that you can use to run different scenarios. Grad students are considered independent and have access to larger loans, as well as tuition remission and other opportunities. </p>
<p>Good luck and keep us posted as your FA packages come in!</p>
Should I suck it up and attend UF because it’s free and it’s academics are pretty good, or should I try to urge for going out of state?
If I do go out of state/private and my parents refuse to help me pay, in my second year, will I be able to apply for Financial Aid as an independent and perhaps earn more grants?
Are large loans for me a really bad thing? Will it make life terrible after graduation?*</p>
<p>I don’t think your pre-paid covers that much (unless it’s an unusual one), and it certainly won’t cover that much going out of state. I think what your parents may mean is that Bright Futures (used only in FL) will cover your tuition, and your pre-paid will cover most/all of your R&B. But, if you take it out-of-state, you lose Bright Futures and your pre-paid is reduced. Correct us if you have some unusual pre-paid, but most only cover FL tuition (which is about $6k).</p>
<p>I don’t know when your parents told you that they wouldn’t contribute for you to go to the school of your choice, but if you knew that last fall, then you should have applied to schools that would give you big merit. Since you say you have good stats, likely you could have gotten some good merit that might have made going OOS affordable.</p>
<p>There’s no way that you can go to the schools on your list because they will expect you to pay full freight.</p>
<p>Not only are huge loans a HUGE bad idea, but you couldn’t qualify anyway. You’d need co-signers and your parents aren’t likely going to co-sign. Large loans make your post-college life MISERABLE…while all your peers would be moving on with their lives, buying homes, buying nice cars, getting married, etc, YOU would be stuck living with NO EXTRA money for 10 long years. Remember, you’ll be between the ages of 23 -33 during that time… a very long time.</p>
<p>You cannot be considered an independent until you’re 24…unless you marry, have a child that YOU financially support, etc.</p>
<p>With all due respect, you need to consider this situation from your parents point of view. As a parent of a high school senior, I can understand why your parents may be unwilling to spend tens of thousands of dollars more to send you to an OOS private school when excellent in-state alternatives are available at a reasonable cost.</p>
<p>We are currently evaluating alternatives with our son. My wife and I told him from the start that the EFC will be a stretch for us and that we cannot absorb anything above that amount he has a 12-year-old sister and we are not willing to take out loans for his education that well still be paying back when shes ready to go to college. He has been accepted to two of the top in-state schools (including one which offered a merit scholarship and an honors invitation) and four OOS schools (1 private, 3 public). We use a spreadsheet which compares the COA, various financial aid packages, expected loans and our EFC, and shows the gap left over for each school. We have been completely up front with him that in order to attend a pricier university, he needs to eliminate the gap. He is calling several of the schools to see if they are willing to increase their scholarship or grant money. We are also stressing to him to carefully consider how much in loans some schools are recommending that he take on. We used an online college loan calculator to show him his expected monthly payments after graduation based on various loan packages, which was an eye opener for him. He has dreams of working in a big city when he graduates, so Im hoping he seriously considers the in-state alternative to keep his eventual loan payments low. </p>
<p>Ill offer one final piece of advice that Ive told my son once the initial excitement wears off, college is college. Do your homework and find schools that are well-regarded and offer what you want, and then pick the one with the best overall cost. Use the money you save for summer courses OOS or abroad as others have recommended. Most employers care far more about what you did in school than about which one you went to. </p>
<p>Something I discussed with my daughter who, like you, has lots of options and would like to be OOS. But, she would love a gap year to travel. If she stays in state, she can afford a gap year in which she is planning to volunteer and take language immersion in Latin America. If she goes OOS, financial aid packages are such that a gap year is doubtful. </p>
<p>If you stay instate, you won’t have to work so hard for money and may be able to do interesting things in the summers and breaks.</p>
<p>Need to voice an opinion on schools…Yes, cost is very important, but you can’t say a highly regarded(costly) school is not a better opportunity then a less costly school,not highly regarded,located in the middle of nowhere…Unfortuneately, where you get your degree IS important…It opens doors, a student with a degree from a well known school will likely get better opp’s then an equal student from a lesser known school…Early in your career,even more so…That said, at some point in your career,it’s how good you are at what you do, and less of where you got your degree from…</p>
<p>Don’t forget the connections and doors that open from Alumni…Nevertheless, i don’t think it is prudent to take on all kinds of debt to attend ANY school…Also the average salaries of those from “costly/highly regarded” schools is higher then those of the average state school,along all time frames…</p>
<p>Should I feel guilty about trying to pressure my parents to help me? They were the ones that originally pushed me in doing well in school, but now they want me to settle with something that I feel is a tier below me (I don’t want to sound elitist/etc, but is it not true). I don’t understand my dad. He recently spent like 30k fixing his stupid engine in his yacht but he doesn’t want to pay for my college. I’m pretty certain he makes enough in a year to cover all four years of college…</p>
<p>I know someone mentioned it being unfair to my other brothers, but they didn’t really try to go for any other colleges. My brother at UF only applied there, and my middle brother at FAU only applied to there as well.</p>
<p>As for prepaid/bright futures, my prepaid plan covers all costs (tuition, room, meal, etc) except the smaller fees. UF stated its COA at something like $18000, that’s why I said I could transfer $18000, but I’m not sure if I get all of that? Also, the Bright Futures covers 75% of the tuition costs, so I guess I would get all of that money as cash to me.</p>
<p>I understand that monetarily UF is the best choice by a long shot, I’m just tired of everything in my family being based on money. I don’t expect a couple thousand dollars from Bright Futures to influence me because I can make that with a job over a summer/etc.</p>
<p>JayDee, we did the same thing with our kids. Son, a freshman at a excellent in=state school, saw how he could not afford to go out of state. Daughter, a senior, saw that process and knows going in to the decision process how much she’ll need to cover gaps.</p>
<p>OUCH!!! Fixing his yacht? and not willing to help pursue a great education? Biting my tongue as i type so as not to post something negative…Best of luck</p>
<p>UF stated its COA at something like $18000, that’s why I said I could transfer $18000, but I’m not sure if I get all of that? Also, the Bright Futures covers 75% of the tuition costs, so I guess I would get all of that money as cash to me.</p>
<p>Are you sure that your pre-paid pays for COA? Which pre-paid is it? And, how does it transfer elsewhere?</p>
<p>Can Bright Futures be used out of state? I didn’t think it could.</p>
<p>Since WHEN is the University of Miami NOT a great education…since when!!! Some of the “facts” you also are supporting are not proveable in the least. An expensive education does not equal a “better” job. Perhaps HYP might allow some connections but even that has not been quantified or validated and the OP is looking at Georgia Tech, Ruse Hulman (Indiana), Cornell, Berkeley and CM plus it sounds like the OP wants to be an engineer and believe me starting engineering salaries are not all that different school to school and region to region adjusted for cost of living. The OP needs to look at the list of companies that recruit at each of the schools he has been accepted at including Florida. The OPs arguments are weak…since when is Georgia or Indiana in the NE or the Pacific NW. If I were the OPs parents I would be peeved that the OP’s argument isn’t a heck of alot stronger before I agreed to spend “more money” or allowed my kid to take on loans. What the parents “do” with their money has zero bearing, it is their money and they are entitled to make their own decisions. Clearly they can probably “afford” to give more to the OP, but the OPs arguments, if what the OP is saying to us is what the OP is sayinig to the parents, are weak…very weak arguments. And finally, OP, $30,000 of Stafford loans is $30,000 of loans…when you graduate your loan repayments could be used for a vehicle, for an apartment, for traveling to other parts of the country to interview, to go visit friends and travel…I think you need to think this through practically and develop much stronger “reasons” to present to your parents why you should go elsewhere. Sorry it’s probably not an opinion you want to hear.</p>
<p>The OP doesn’t want to go there!!! He/she wants to pursue other avenues…If his parents do indeed have a yacht and think “toys” are more important then an education,one they clearly can afford, why restrict the choices? </p>
<p>And i’ll get back to you with the FACTS about graduates from lesser schools and more prestigious schools and their salaries…</p>
<p>Profase, clearly you parents value college, since they put away enough money to fund your prepaid college plan and have funded two older siblings through college. Are either of your older brothers still in college? </p>
<p>I can see that you feel pretty aggrieved that you’ve worked hard and have some cool out-of-state college choices that they are not inclined to financially support. But the deal is that there is no requirement that they choose to spend their money in the way you’d like. Lots of families feel that kids can get a perfectly adequate education at an in-state public college. Lots and lots of others simply can’t afford more than that, and if you look around on CC you’ll see many tales of woe where smart kids from relatively poor families have very few choices. My father wasn’t interested in supporting college unless I chose to get a nursing degree or a teaching credential – the only two jobs he thought were worthwhile for a woman. I paid my own way (back in the day when that was much, much easier to do.) I love my dad, but he just had a really different view of what was worth spending money on – and he also had a boat (but at 19 feet I wouldn’t call it a yacht.) </p>
<p>If getting out of state is really important, then perhaps you should consider a gap year, work to raise some money (you’ll need it) and then carefully plan applications next fall to out-of-state schools that give very high merit awards to someone with statistics like yours. (Are you a NM finalist?) With high SAT or ACT scores, and a strong scholastic record, there are some out-of-state publics that could give you a full tuition scholarship – but they are not likely to be Berkeley, Michigan, or the University of Virginia. Your prepaid plan will cover all or the vast majority of room and board, leaving you to cover personal expenses. It’s doable, but you might find that the schools that will make that offer to you aren’t necessarily better than the choice available to you in Florida.</p>
<p>OP, The COA includes books, transportation, personal expenses-- those things will not be covered by your prepaid. At most, your prepaid is tuition, fees and dorm. (And a lot of people just buy tuition but you can buy tuition/fees and dorm.) I don’t even think it includes food. The cost of UFL, with food (which I don’t think is covered) is under $12K. The cost of UFL without food is about 9K. You aboslutely can use your prepaid oos but if you take it oos, they will give you a touch less because it’s something like the average of all the public colleges in FL, so estimate around $8-$10K/ year oos. That’s half of what you thought it was.</p>
<p>momofthreeboys, U Miami is a private school. The OP’s parents want her to attend UFL-- an excellent, well-regarded school. Florida has very low-priced colleges. It would be unusual for a Florida kid to get the same kind of deal oos unless he/she received a lot of merit or a lot of financial aid. </p>
<p>Please look at the profile of admitted UFL students. This is a competitive, bright crowd.</p>
<p>By the way, when you take Fla. Prepaid out of state, it only pays around $100 per credit hour. The actual amount is based on the average cost per credit hour of all Florida public colleges and universities. My S goes out of state and our Florida Prepaid plan has only paid around $2800-$3000 per year. We only have the tuition plan, not the dorm plan, but I imagine that one works much the same.</p>
<p>And did you ever stop to think that maybe the reason your father can afford a yacht in the first place is because he spends his money wisely? He realizes that it’s not a smart financial decision to spend 4 times the cost of a UF education just so you can have a change of scenery.</p>
<p>If getting out of state is really important, then perhaps you should consider a gap year, work to raise some money (you’ll need it) and then carefully plan applications next fall to out-of-state schools that give very high merit awards to someone with statistics like yours. (Are you a NM finalist?) With high SAT or ACT scores, and a strong scholastic record, there are some out-of-state publics that could give you a full tuition scholarship – but they are not likely to be Berkeley, Michigan, or the University of Virginia. Your prepaid plan will cover all or the vast majority of room and board, leaving you to cover personal expenses.</p>
<p>If the student is a NMF, then he can’t delay a year. </p>
<p>You really need to check your pre-pay to see what it covers and what it would cover if taken out of state. </p>
<p>Taking a gap year to “raise money” isn’t going to work, since the student has 4 years of schooling to cover, not just one. </p>