Hi all, so i decided to take the CAP program for Ut Austin. For my freshman year i will be attending the University of Texas at Arlington and then transfer to UT my sophomore year.
My father lost his job last December and he still has yet to find one. my mom, a 5th grade math teacher has to support our family of 5. The FA at UTA was no where near enough for me to attend so we applied for a special circumstances review. We were approved but the money they gave me is still not enough. I have enough to cover tuition and thats it. Though UTA is about 30 min from our house, I can’t commute because I don’t have and can’t afford a car. I took all AP classes in high school but my senior grades are low because I started having anxiety and depression issues my last year of high school. I can’t afford community college either because we don’t qualify for the in county discounts. Neither of my parents can cosign on my loans because my mother already has to pay back her college loans (she graduated with her masters in 2012) and my father isn’t working. Also their credit is low because they don’t have enough money to pay the bills on time every month.
Is there anything i can do so that i can get an education?
Could he drop you at UTA in the morning and pick you up later in the day?
This need not interfere with any of his job hunting efforts. If he has an interview, he can just drop you early and pick you up late. Universities have plenty of places where you can hang around if he can’t pick you up right after class.
If that won’t work, does your mother have a car? If she does, could you drop her at her school in the morning before you go to your college classes and pick her up later in the day? Whether this would work depends on the timing of your classes and the hours when she can get into the school building (after all, you can’t expect her to stand on a sidewalk for two or three hours), but it’s worth considering.
Hmm, you could defer for a year and work. I don’t know what the policies are for UTA but you could see how they stand on deferment. A lot can happen in a year. With you saving and hopefully dad finding another job, Fall of 2016 could be a much more promising year to start college.
It would take careful planning but could take public transit school? My high schooler takes the bus and trolley home from school (same distance as you) each day. Some colleges offer free bus passes to their students. I’d map it out and see what is possible.
I live too far away for a bus.its possible for me to drop my mom off at work and pick her up because my classes will work with that. But I’m not sure if my work study will work with that. Also, my sister just started a new job If i commute, she will either have to quit or walk 30 min to work from the high school on days that I can’t take her.
If you don’t think it can work, then it won’t. It sounds like there is no more money available to you for you to live on campus. If your w/s job doesn’t work with your schedule, get another job, get one close to your home, take your classes MWF and work on TTH.
It sounds like you need a family meeting that includes you, both of your parents, and your sister, to see if you can figure out how to make transportation work for everyone. You could prepare for that by finding out as much as you can about public transportation in your area. If some of you can take buses to wherever you need to go, or if you can schedule the use of the family’s car(s) carefully, it might still be possible for you to start college this fall at UTA.
You might also want to ask your parents whether it would make sense for you to wait a year before starting college and get a job instead. But if you get a job, even a full-time one, you’re not likely to have enough money to get a car of your own right away, so your family would still need to think about transportation.
Is there a reason why your sister could not walk 30 minutes to work? That’s how long I had to walk to get home from my high school, every single day for 4 years…it really was not a big deal.
Unless your sister’s work shift starts less than 30 minutes after the end of school or she would have to walk through a dangerous neighborhood, I think she could walk.
Get a job NOW locally and start school in the spring at a CC. When you start school in the spring, you could go to class on MWF and work the other days.
There are companies that even help with tuition costs…Home Depot, Starbucks, Walmart and others.
or…ask your school if you can defer for a year and just work this next year. Hopefully, your dad will have found another job by then.
[quote]
Also their credit is low because they don’t have enough money to pay the bills on time every month.{/quote]If they apply for the Parent PLUS Loans and get denied; you could borrow extra $4000 from Direct Loans. I think that would be enough to buy an used car for you to commute to school.
30-40 minutes is too far for the bus? Like I said, we live 30 minutes without traffic from my son’s high school. He takes the bus and trolley home. Yes, it takes over an hour but it’s over an hour if I pick him up and battle traffic the whole way home too. Is it ideal? No, but he’s grateful he has the option of a different school from the one in walking distance from us. If it’s really impossible for you to take transit, how about your sister. 30 minute walk from high school would be far less on the bus to work.
If you really want it to work, you’re going to have to make some compromises and do some things that sorta suck. Scheduling classes only 2 or 3 days a week would help. Figuring out public transit for either the whole or from more convenient places would help. Finding a job now and saving, deferring a year and saving, that would help.
Many kids who flat out don’t have the money work and just take a couple community college classes per semester. Yes, it takes them longer but they know going slow is better than not going at all.
Right now, it probably makes most sense for you to defer enrollment for a year, and get a job. If your dad finds work before the second semester starts, you could contact the university and arrange to start in January. Meanwhile you will make some money that will allow you to help out the family and/or save for college, and you will get some job skills so that your next job will be a better one.
Try deferring for a year and work at a local place nearby your house so the commute won’t be a strain. Save up the money for college or put it towards paying the bills, help out your family.
Get a job now. Save the money to get a car in the Spring.
Wait, why can’t your father drop you off? Plan to spend the whole day on campus. He drops you off in the morning, picks you up whenever he can in the evening.
Second solution, your sister walks the days you can’t take her but can’t friends drop her off? That’s just be about 5-10mn in a car if it’s 30mn to walk (and a 30mn walk is actually below the recommended daily amount of exercise for healthy living.) I assume that your mother will be done with teaching when your sister finishes her shift, and will be able to pick her up.
I agree you need a family meeting about car sharing and transportation.
If your parents are turned down from Parent PLUS loans, you’re eligible for $4,000 extra. You could borrow them to buy a used car, then pay for gas off a part time job you’d have on weekends/around work study.
I don’t think it’s a good idea for the plan to include dad dropping off and picking up every day.
First of all, dad is supposed to be looking for a job. Hopefully, he’ll have one within a few months. If that were to happen, he’d no longer be available to drop off and pick up. Then what?? Is this kid supposed to drop out mid semester??? What about the money he’d then owe the school?? What about “satisfactory progress issues”?
Secondly, I highly doubt that the dad is going to spend 2-3 hours of his day everyday dropping off and picking up a kid from college. And then there’s the gasoline issue. This family already can’t afford its bills. It can’t afford an increase in gas costs. There’s more to doing this then just the actual “drive time”.
Really, the best thing to do is defer for a year and work in the meantime. Save your money, but also agree to pay for “something” each month for the household…maybe the water bill? maybe the cable bill? Something that helps relieve their situation.
Is there any way you could get rides with other commuting students from your area? My kids have done this before when they didn’t have cars and the other driver was happy to have some gas money. Also, sometimes you can find an older used car pretty cheap. Sometimes church groups can help find a free car for someone in need. You will still have to get a job to pay gas and insurance, but put the word out there. I wouldn’t recommend that your sister walk to work–it could be dangerous if she is walking alone. Maybe you could find a place to live within walking/biking distance of the campus. I live near a CC and sometimes people rent out rooms in their homes to students for much cheaper than dorms/apartments. Sometimes older people will give a room in exchange for house/yard work. I’ve known 18/19 yo students who were on their own, making it work like this with part-time jobs. Not easy, but keep looking at different ways to make it work. If you can’t get it to work out this year, then take a year off and work/save as much as you can.