How exactly does a "full ride" work?

Paying for College
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<p>Correcting my prior post.</p>

<p>IRS Pub 501 has the info about dependents and exemptions:</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p501.pdf[/url]”>http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p501.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>You need to go through the 5 tests for a qualifying child and if you can claim your son as a dependent, he can’t. You don’t get to choose.</p>

<p>Again, if you are paying for his medical coverage, providing room and board when he’s not in school, paying for car insurance and all those sorts of things you can likely claim him.</p>

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<p>Scholarships are considered to have been provided by a third party, not the student.</p>

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<p>My daughter is on a full ride (merit) to a state school. Her award covers room, board, tuition and a stipend with no student contribution necessary. It does not automatically cover study abroad or a computer, but the stipend can be used for whatever a student decides. The scholarship is for four years only.</p>

<p>The room/board costs are based on a standard dorm room and unlimited meal plan, and that award has increased every year based on the university’s increased pricing. The tuition portion has also increased every year and is based on 18 credits/semester. Anything over 18 credits is something she has to pay. The stipend has not increased over the three years my daughter has been at that school.</p>

<p>The school divides the award by semester and deposits the amount to my daughter’s student/school account about four weeks before school starts. When tuition becomes due, those costs are subtracted from the credited amount in the account. Ten days after the semester starts, any excess money is automatically transferred to my daughter’s bank account. We were given the choice to set it up this way or put it on a school debit card. So ten days after the start of each semester, she has access to any leftover money.</p>

<p>When my daughter moved off campus, the room/board portion was still deposited into her bank account ten days after school started, but she did not have access to this money by the time she needed to pay initial off-campus housing costs. She had to pay her first month’s rent and a security deposit prior to receiving the scholarship money. Keep that in mind. Since off campus has been a cheaper option, the money she does not use toward room/board has been used to help pay for summer study abroad, books, and nice furniture for the apartment (seriously). She also had to pay her enrollment fee, at the end of senior year of high school, prior to getting any scholarship money. That fee was reimbursed to her account when the scholarship was disbursed. The stipend has been used to buy books, mainly.</p>

<p>In order to keep this scholarship, my daughter must maintain a 3.0 (calculated at the end of every school year, not every semester), and she must stay in the Honors College. She was required to live on campus for two years, and she did not have a choice in which dorm to live. This school was not my daughter’s first choice, but it has allowed her to live in a very nice apartment, study abroad twice (she chose summers), etc. It has been a wonderful experience for her. And yes, the room/board part is taxable, but it’s not that difficult to figure out which expenses are taxable and which are not. </p>

<p>Three years into her college experience, she is definitely glad she took the full ride. She is working two jobs on campus for spending money, but the weight of most expenses has been off of her shoulders the entire time she’s been in college. The school takes very good care of these scholarship recipients with special advising, priority scheduling, dinners with the university president, balls, research opportunities, special classes, etc. It was a good decision for our family. Good luck to yours!</p>

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<p>Thank you once again for all of your replies!</p>

<p>annoyingdad, that is a good link for me to read more about. No matter what the tax implications are, the amount of tax is so little compared to such a big award that I probably won’t even think about that part again until I come back here next year for help doing the taxes-lol! For some reason, I thought the tax would be much much more. I have read enough here to know that the 1098T’s are always wrong and we need to keep our own records.</p>

<p>mom2collegekids, his major is aerospace engineering. At Cal, he would do mechanical engineering but everyone is telling us that Cal is so highly ranked in Engineering, top 3 in the country, we would be crazy to pass up going there over UCSD. DS has to visit again and make the decision after all the acceptances come in.</p>

<p>Thanks dumbo11 and mom103 for posting your experiences. It’s so helpful to hear how things worked out for your kids and how the scholarships are handled at your various schools. I think DS is really LUCKY to have this offered to him. Once we went back and looked this morning at some of the additional benefits, they are pretty amazing as well so I’m sure he will take it all in and weigh the options. Thanks for pointing that out to us as well. </p>

<p>There are so many “unseen” benefits too that are just beginning to sink in. We will struggle to pay our EFC without this scholarship so this would really allow him some pocket money, a chance to fly home instead of an 8 hour drive, and not having to work plus the summer travel opportunities in place of summer work are all great things!</p>

<p>Thank you all so much for your help! I’ll let you know what happens.</p>

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<p>I’m an engineer - I wouldn’t get too hung up on rankings when it comes to engineering. UCSD is a school with a great reputation and a grad from there will have excellent opportunities. If he plans to go to grad school, the difference between UCB and UCSD is even less important.</p>

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<p>Thank you, Bob Wallace, for your comment. That is a good reminder coming from you! Yes, it’s difficult to ignore the rankings since Cal is listed as 3rd, only behind MIT and Stanford for Engineering. I still haven’t found out what UCSD’s rank is!</p>

<p>DS is hearing a lot about how much better Cal is for engineering and how he would be crazy to not go there now that he has been accepted. Many of the other students who are telling him this are kids than haven’t gotten accepted to Cal yet so I guess I can understand them but the adults seem to “only have eyes” for Cal as well. I just keep telling him NO pressure but try to round up all the information he needs to make a decision. He’s signed up for the overnight stay program and it looks organized and fun.</p>

<p>As far as I know, he does want to go to grad school and he really wanted to major in aerospace engineering which Cal does not have as an undergraduate. He picked Mechanical Engineering at Cal and I know they are all so closely related but there is something to be said for getting the exact major that you wanted.</p>

<p>We’ll see how it all plays out. He is still waiting on many schools and also applied for the full ride scholarship at Cal so then he would really have to weigh the pros and cons of each school on equal footing if he is lucky enough to win that as well (but we’re not holding our breath.) The more I read about UCSD, the more I like it but it’s hard not to like something when it’s FREE-lol! That is just incredible to me and so exciting but DS will make a good decision, I’m sure of that.</p>

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<p>I’m guessing that one of the “extra benefits” is priority scheduling . . . which for an engineering student at a UC campus, is probably one of the most valuable benefits he could get! :)</p>

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<p>Hi dodgersmom, Yep, he gets priority enrollment but there are 2 passes so he gets a shot of getting 2 classes first, then the second pass he would again get an early try to get the next classes he needs so it’s not as great as he first thought and there is still no guarantee to get all the classes he would need. I guess every little bit helps though but this is a recent change from what I have read from getting all of the classes first which sounds so much better. Thanks for your reply.</p>