<p>*
Thank you. Prestige is just definitely a problem in my family…being half-asian. *
What a silly statement. Is there some kind of handbook going around like the * gay agenda*?;)</p>
<p>There isn’t a commandment that everyone must attend college after high school.
[Not</a> Going to College is a Viable Option | Education.com](<a href=“http://www.education.com/reference/article/Ref_Going_College_Not/]Not”>Education.com | #1 Educational Site for Pre-K to 8th Grade)
If you dont like the choices you can have with your parents help, make your own.
I moved out when I was barely 18 because my recently widowed mother had too much on her plate. It sounds like your parents are equally challenged. Consider behaving like a responsible adult instead of an entitled child.</p>
<p>And how’s that going for you EmraldKitty? Sure, not going is an option…one I’ve considered but I don’t plan to be someone like you in the future, because there’s no need to give up your future completely for others…I consider myself accepting a spot at LehighU or BU or Dickinson sacrifice enough and a good way to economize considering my parents would not have to pay for nearly anything. I already talked to some of my teachers about not going and they told me college is meant for students like me and have urged me to go…my Calc II teacher even stated “If anyone in this school deserves to go to college, it’s you.” As I’ve said before…people these days misuse the word “entitled” as commonly as people misuse the word “ignorant,” just shows how ignorant they actually all are. If a person WORKS for something there’s nothing wrong with them feeling like they deserve to see it pay off. If you go out to eat and pay $50 for a steak, don’t you expect to get a Morton’s quality state…not Taco Bell grade meat? Of course, and it’s the same with college. It’s not entitlement if you’ve earned your spot with blood, sweat, and tears…entitlement would be a student complaining that they didn’t get into Plan A and how unfair it is and how someone they know who’s a complete moron did…that’s entitlement. As I originally posted, the issue at hand is how can I successfully appeal to a school that already ACCEPTED me, not if I was entitled to get in…I never said I deserved anymore money than anyone else, I just was shedding light on an inconvenient circumstance and looking for guidance on how to overcome it…skipping out on college definitely has not helped your analytical skills ;)</p>
<p>Pitt Honors never requested anything but the FAFSA which had our tax returns for the past year and nothing else…so I received a grant and loans…which actually would make me pay more than I would to attend LehighU, BU, or Dickinson. We are appealing for Pitt, but right now it seems that BU, Lehigh, and Dickinson are offering me a lot more and they also are reviewing my appeal due to our situation concerning my father’s job.</p>
<p>I’m not saying you are acting entitled…I’m not saying you’re not. I’m just curious which of the above words you think all the proud graduates of Lehigh, BU, and Dickinson would use to describe you?</p>
<p>Hocelyn, Pitt uses FAFSA only which will just look at your 2012 return numbers. Your parents may have used 2011 numbers as an estimate but that was up to them because the 2012 numbers may not have been yet available. </p>
<p>And I think thin she is acting entitled, something that her school and teachers are feeding. These are private schools and they decide what they want to pay her to come or have her pay to come. That’s the way it works. Clearly she is not entitled enough to get full merit from schools that do have the capability to do give out that kind of award </p>
<p>There is absolutely nothing that makes the OP entitled to a private school education even though she was accepted to the school. One always hopes that students win out on an appeal and that it is possible for the family to send her where she wants to go. But there is no entitlement there.</p>
<p>I am troubled by this thread. I think some valid/sensible points have been made by lots of people. Its up to the OP to decide what to do given her family situation and her relationship with her parents. If you have nothing else more constructive to offer why beat the OP up ? This is not a debate where someone ( from this thread) has to win. Is it ? People like awildoddone just making up an id to bash her up. common on people … She maybe 18 but she is still a kid.</p>
<p>OP…what matters is your bottom line cost, not the amount of aid you receive. BU, for example, costs $60,000 a year. Pitt, even for OOS, doesn’t reach that amount. And for the OP as an instate student, Pitt just might be the most affordable net cost. In addition, Boston is a far more expensive town to live in than Pittsburgh.</p>
<p>You are appealing ALL of your awards…and to several schools which do NOT guarantee to meet full need (and they don’t).</p>
<p>I hope your appeals are completed in time for you to make a matriculation decision.</p>
<p>And now my opinion…the schools on your list just might be unaffordable. I hope you have an affordable option to consider if that becomes the case.</p>
<p>The reason I am beating up this kid is because…well, read the first post in this thread. Dad lost his job, mom is now sole bread winner, they could lose their house, there are 3 other kids involved, and the focus is that she deserves to go to Emory. The family has hit a financial crisis and this spoiled brat is just concerned that she isn’t going to get to go to a high priced private school because of it. What is there NOT to see wrong in this picture? I am appalled.</p>
<p>College is not the be all to end all. It’s not an entitlement. Parents are down and worried, on unemployment, trying to figure out how to make this work, raiding the pension plan, and the kid is just worried about her sleep away school chances being jeopardized. </p>
<p>I would hope there is enough compassion is our children that they can see and feel the stress and worry and that as a young adult, love us enough to offer whatever help they can, not remind us in a nasty threatening way that they are entitled to their college because they earned it and they better not screw that up. </p>
<p>Am I missing something here? I am very disappointed in this young woman as a person. I’d love to have a word with that teacher of hers that is telling her she is entitled to go to Emory or other private school. Shame on her!</p>
<p>With all due respect, cptofthehouse you cannot parent via a forum. I know you have the best intentions. I don’t disagree with anything you said but your point has been made multiple times and OP still insists for whatever reason to go to Emory.She is already stressed and I am afraid this badgering is not helping.</p>
<p>I am not parenting. As a parent, I’d be painfully hurt, if one of my kids reacted that way. Very hurt. And I’d feel every ounce and more of the pain that kid were feeling regardless of how he reacted. I would cry.</p>
<p>I 'm assessing this impersonally as an outsider and how it thus looks. Her parents can cry and scream and work it out for her as I am sure they are frantically doing. They clearly feel she is entitled too. So, no I am not parenting, I’m calling it as how I see it. I may be crossing the line in terms of being hard about it but the feedback this kid is getting from friends, school, does not seem to be addressing the aspect I am. </p>
<p>She will most likely end up going to one of her choices, not Emory, but one of the others, and consider it a huge sacrifice on her part, from her attitude. I disagree and think she is a spoiled entitle brat with the way she is approaching this. There’s no other way to put it. There are kids in similar situations, that are taking it the way one would more expect. I’ve not addressed them the same way. I don’t see a thing to which this student is entitled to get that she is not getting other than her own expectations.</p>
<p>It is a very long way from “If anyone in this school deserves to go to college, it’s you.” to deserving a particular institution. You need to get straight about the money. Yes, college. But at a place that you can afford.</p>
<p>And go through your records about what you were paid at that under-table job declare it as self-employment income and pay those taxes that you owe. Shame on your boss for not doing the paperwork for you.</p>
<p>I know that most kids work hard in school or at whatever endeavors they attempt because working hard is rewarding in itself. They enjoy knowing they did their best and they enjoy learning.
They hope to perhaps attend college, but they dont expect that " because A happened, B is a foregone conclusion".</p>
<p>Definition of Entitled
An attitude, demeanor, or air of rudeness,ingraciousness or combativeness, especially when making excessive demands for service. ( regarding behavior)</p>
<p>Please explain again OP, how " entitled" isnt really you. </p>
<p>I don’t have to explain myself to a bunch of washed up, judgemental, middle aged, rude adults who made their choices and are badgering a kid. As I originally posted, I was looking for advice on how to make the most successful appeal. I don’t feel bad about getting out of an income tax…I don’t use the roads, I don’t own land, and I just turned 17 a few weeks ago…why shouldn’t I be able to keep my money? Every year in D.C. government officials throughout tons of high-end merchandise to get new items of luxury…who’s paying for that? If anything we lost our freedom when the income tax was put in place…what a stupid idea. People make the most of what is available to them…if we just keep giving the government money to spend and waste, they will continue to do so. It disappoints me how submissive you all are to such ideas, no one seems to question anything anymore…seatbelt laws, soda laws in new york, gun laws…people just give away freedoms on an emotional basis soon we might not have that many freedoms left. I’ll keep my money thank you very much. I am far from spoiled cptofthehouse, I have not asked my parents for money or anything since I was 14 years old. When my grandpa passed away and my gram had to move in with us I gave her my room and I now sleep on a futon. Nothing has been handed to me. My father came from a family of immigrants and worked extremely hard and went to CMU, my mother was raised by her teenage mother and went to Pitt. Both were first generation college students. They worked for everything they have, they are the definition of hardwork and determination and even they have urged me to take on less throughout high school, because I’ve done EVERYTHING I could have. As for my teachers, friends, and community pushing forward for me…you don’t know me or any of my accomplishments or contributions to my town and surrounding areas, you haven’t seen me in action or at work or at school so how dare any of you judge. Yes I see accepting plan B as a downgrade because it is…my other choices don’t have as much opportunity openly available but I know I’ll earn whatever opportunity they offer as I always have regardless of where I am. I never said Emory should or needs to give me money, I just was asking how to present my case for them to offer me a more attractive offer. Oh and emraldkitty entitlement is “belief that one is deserving of or entitled to certain privileges.” I never said I was more deserving to more money, I just said realistically speaking that I wouldn’t be able to afford Emory and I wanted to make it work somehow. If you have no positive input on how I can make an appeal then stop posting. I have two parents, I don’t need the anonymous, spineless input of some sad, small adult who has nothing better to do than to throw in all this negative, irrelevant input because they’re just negative, miserable people. Sorry life didn’t work out for any of you and I’m doing all I can to make it work out for me.</p>
<p>Oh an emraldkitty I did enjoy the work, I enjoyed it a lot. Even things that I wasn’t good at like Physics I Honors, I still put my heart into and trudged along for AP Physics/Physics II this year. I didn’t double up for the past 2 years in AP math classes and history classes because I had to. I didn’t do any of this because I had to…I had all my science, math, history credits for graduation at the end of my junior year…I could have taken a half day schedule this year, all I needed was APLit and gym. I did all of this because I wanted to, because I loved the challenge and that feeling that I could do everything and do it well, because I thought that learning about particle physics in APPhysics/Physics II and studying the diversity of life in APBio were the most interesting things I had ever learned about. I put in the hard work because it felt good and just because I’m disappointed about not being able to afford my plan A doesn’t make me regret even a second of that hardwork. Shame on you for pestering a kid who just turned 17 who you don’t even know. That’s pathetic.</p>
<p>And if you think for a minute that I’m not worried about my family or our house you’re a fool. This is not supposed to be a personal forum though, just because I’m not posting about personal anxiety about my family’s situation doesn’t mean there isn’t any. When my brother got a full-ride to Georgetown Prep we literally were crying tears of joy because there was just no other way to afford it. This forum was supposed to be about financial aid, if you have no input about it then get off. I can’t believe I just turned 17 and have more sense and common decency than the adults on this post. Shame on you.</p>
<p>Prestige is just definitely a problem in my family…being half-asian. </p>
<p>I think this is a large part of your unhappiness. You asked for advice about appealing FA and everyone agrees that your Dad’s unemployment is your best hope. But many people on this board know that getting enough aid for your situation is unlikely. You have less than one month to make a decision. Luckily you do have several offers to compare, but you are fretting over not being able make the most “prestigious” one work. All of the colleges you have mentioned are comparable prestige wise, regardless of what some article or neighbor says. I hope it works out for you.</p>
<p>Thank you woodswoman, it just was an initial disappointment, it goes deeper than my asian heritage…my aunt and uncle both work with UPenn now and most people considered Lehigh a safety…I know it’s not so and I was very excited to get into Lehigh and all the rest of these schools, but of course I want my family and community to be proud of me and I want to grasp the best opportunity presented to me. I also was concerned about diversity life at campuses like Lehigh, BU, and Dickinson compared to Emory which is 27% Asian, 16% African American, 6% Hispanic, and 17% International students…I grew up in a town where my family was the only asian one and of course I think it’d be nice to be on a campus where there is a rainbow of diversity and backgrounds that I don’t know I’d get at Lehigh, BU, or Dickinson…especially Lehigh who I’ve read has race issues on campus.</p>
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