It looks like I can't afford college. What do I do?

Paying for College
21

<p>Why can’t you solve this problem by planning to work at least 20 hours at a part-time, minimum wage job while in school at UF? Working full-time during your breaks would make this even more doable. If your high school has prepared you so well, then you could probably get a higher-paying part-time job. If you want to go to UF with all of your friends, you are going to need to work. I think all college students should work while they are in school - when did we start telling college kids that they could go to school and finance it entirely with loans or their parents’ retirement accounts and would not be expected to work to earn the money to go to college? Besides, when you are paying for your college, you answer to yourself, not your parents, and as someone who paid my way through, that was a wonderful feeling.</p>

<p>If you have been admitted to UF and you want to go there, then make it happen. If you really worked so hard as a student, then you are up for the challenge of going to UF and working part-time and cash-flowing your education without racking up so much debt.</p>

<p>As far as your high school, just so you know - where you went to high school is hardly going to matter from this point on. No employer is going to care whether USNews has ranked your high school as number 60 in the nation. And the rankings are suspect anyway. My kids attended high school in Florida at a school consistently ranked in the top 50 in the nation - and they were bored silly all the time. I attended an average, middle class high school in California in the 80s and my high school experience was as if I had completed two or three years in college compared to what my kids experienced at a top 50 Florida high school. My husband attended a small, podunk high school in the southeast, and then a state university out West, and no one cared about his high school - they cared about his college work, and then his professional work and his work ethic.</p>

<p>Start making decisions for yourself without regard to whether you are upholding some reputation for some supposedly outstanding high school. That is not your job. Your job now is to take what you learned and carve out a life for yourself. Free yourself from all of that high school status stuff. Don’t live your life as an adult worrying about whether somebody else approves of your choices. A sure sign of maturity is to do what you know is best for you, and to pursue your dreams with determination and a willingness to sacrifice. If you are willing to live the starving student life while you get the opportunity to attend your first choice school, then go for it. If you can come to the understanding that attending USF or UCF is not beneath you, but will provide you with wonderful opportunities and allow you to breath a bit easier, then follow that path. Pursue the path of your choice, but do so without regard to what the kids in your high school class may think. Five years from now, you won’t care (I hope) about what they think. Don’t get trapped in that way of thinking as this stage in your life. If you do, then you can look forward to a life of real, opportunity-stifling debt because you will always be striving to please other people and living a life you cannot afford.</p>

22

<p>Hate to break it to you, OP, but I think you have been brainwashed into a false sense of pride over your high school ranking. Look, no one ever brings up any schools in Florida as being role models in education for the rest of the country…far from it. There are many states whose students test higher and go on to do much better than Florida students. Do a bit of research about the US education system, and state rankings for education.
Anyway, it also sounds like you have champagne taste on a beer budget. Could be hereditary, and part of why your parents are unable/unwilling to help you. The hard fact of life is that you can only attend a school that is affordable, because eventually any school is going to want bills paid, and if you come up short, you are out the door quickly. All schools graduate students who go on to get jobs or go to grad school. If they didn’t, they would have been forced to shut down years ago. Look at your viable options, choose one, focus on earning as much as you can this summer, and making the most of the school you attend. That is what makes someone accomplished.</p>

23

<p>OP: You can go, but as mentioned you need to work. Pound it during the summer then find a 12 hours a week job and go live your dream. It’s all there for you. All you have to do is work through the problems and grab it. Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t. GL.</p>

24

<p>I am not living in Florida, but I do fair amount of job recruiting in St. Pete, our regional head quarters. I don’t really care if it’s UF or USF or UCF or FIU. As long as it’s has a U, along with a respectable GPA and an internship, that’s good enough for us to consider. Whether we hire the person, it’s another story. And I can tell you that attitude goes a long way in the hiring process.</p>

25

<p>Wow, some really great advice here. Hope OP sees it and thinks about what is being said.</p>

26

<p>USF doesn’t want you anyways, OP. ;)</p>

<p>You may think you’re better than USF, but you are no better than some of the students that attend USF. You will let opportunities pass with an attitude like that. If you really want to go to UF, work for it. </p>

<p>In the meantime…GO BULLS!</p>

27

<p>im curious: where did you end up, OP? What happened?</p>