<p>I know a student who has a merit scholarship which covers tuition & fees. His parents pay room & board and he is not eligible for any additional aid based on their income. If he were to get married (for love, not for financial reasons!), I know that he would be considered independent on the FAFSA. Since his scholarship covers tuition & fees, would he be eligible for aid to help with housing and food or does college financial aid only apply to educational expenses?</p>
<p>FA only applies to his educational expenses. He must also keep in mind that with a wife he may not be able to get housing on campus so how is he going to pay the rent? </p>
<p>Even though theoretically he would be an independent student policies vary from school to school. Remember the FAFSA is only to determine your EFC regarding federal aid (pell grants and loans). </p>
<p>If he is getting a scholarship that covers tuition and fees, those are institutional funds and the school determines how they give out their money Some schools may request the he show how he is supporting his self and his wife. Others require that you show that you have been self sufficient for atleast 2 years. </p>
<p>If she is supporting the 2 of them then her income is probably going to be the new basis of his FA. if possible he should hold off the marriage thing and wait until he finishes school, and has some sort of financial stabilty to offer someone.</p>
<p>the marriage thing is really something to watch out for! they are beginning to suspect that some people are marrying just to get the independent status.</p>
<p>Where I go to school, you have to have been married for 12 months and you and your wife have to be self-supporting for that period of time to meet the independent status requirements. The exception to that is if you are married and have a child you have supported for 12 months.</p>
<p>And, yes, your spouse is expected to contribute towards your support. There income and assets will be tapped at a much, much higher percentage than a parents -- I believe it is considered just like a student's assets and income.</p>
<p>Bump......................</p>
<p>Also keep in mind that some schools will not change your Financial aid status. If you enroll as a dependent student, you will be a dependent student as long as you are an undergrad at the school</p>
<p>do any of the ff. schools do that?</p>
<p>upenn
yale
carnegie mellon
stanford
northwestern
notre dame
johns hopkins
columbia</p>
<p>some ivies don't let you change your FA status. Think about it... If it were as easy as getting married every family who pays full freight would have married their kids off and saved the close to 200k for 4 years at the schools you mentioned.</p>
<p>Yale states:</p>
<p>
[quote]
If a student is admitted to Yale as a dependent, and the student's parents discontinue support at a later time, the student cannot expect that the University will replace the expected parental contribution with Yale funds.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>
[quote]
A married student should not expect to receive more gift aid than he or she would receive as a single student.</p>
<p>
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Instead of asking well meaning, but possibly uninformed, strangers specific questions about colleges that interest you, you'd be better off asking the college's financial aid offices and seeng if their web sites answer the question. I'm sure that you can anonymously ask the question.</p>
<p>Dartmouth is very specific (and I would not be suprised if Dartmouth peer schools were not following suit)</p>
<p>page 8</p>
<p>
[quote]
</p>
<p>Independent Students</p>
<p>“How can I be declared independent?”</p>
<p>It isn’t easy.</p>
<p>In most cases, if you enter as a dependent student, you will graduate as a dependent student.</p>
<p>(Remember: the sources of Dartmouth’s scholarship funds are tuition income, the Alumni Fund, and other gifts to the College. In short, some of the money comes from other parents. Each time the College treats a student as “self-supporting,” we are in effect asking someone else’s parents to assume the financial responsibility normally expected of that student’s parents.)</p>
<p>Only in rare cases in which students can meet all federal tests for independence and/or have extreme extenuating circumstances will they be considered independent for Dartmouth scholarship eligibility. All of these cases are reviewed by the Financial Aid Committee.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>northstarmom- yeah i'll check on their websites..calling will be a little suspect.." i was wondering..are married students considered dependants?''..I wouldn't wan't to be the reason why they change their policies.</p>
<p>It's a shame yale doesn't consider married students independent...I really love everything about that school(second choice after penn) but i guess i'll have to scratch that school off my list.....</p>
<p>sybbie719- just curious...did you already check the policies of penn, stanford and the other schools i listed?</p>
<p>No,</p>
<p>I have every confidence that you are quite capable of looking up this information for yourself</p>
<p>calm down man....at the time, I was cooking something on the stove and only had enough time to make my previous post.....</p>
<p>actually, if you had not written your last sentence to sybbie you would have more time looking at whtever you were cooking.</p>
<p>Your post did come out as expecting other people to do your work.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Your post did come out as expecting other people to do your work.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>well that's your opinion and seriously, it's absolutely none of your business.</p>
<p>"it's absolutely none of your business."</p>
<p>well it is. When you blabber on public forum any one can make it their own business.</p>
<p>OP,
There are plenty of very nice, informed people who can be very helpful to people who also are helping themselves. </p>
<p>The board members here have long memories, and people who are rude tend to be ignored particularly by the longtime adult posters who have the most information.</p>
<p>I do suggest that you have the courtesy to post an apology to Simba and Sybbie, (both longtime posters known for being very helpful to many) who had even taken the time to look up some info for you. Your response to them was unspeakably rude. </p>
<p>If what you really want is for others to find out information for you while you cook and do other things, then pay for College Confidential's counseling service.</p>
<p>Umm. raccna and timely are the same person? Because I don't see the OP making a second post here...</p>
<p>i'm not timely. i just bumped a thread that was created a long time ago.
Lol i'm definitely not apologizing to anyone(are you kidding me......the parents here crack me up sometimes). And that wasn't rude- what was rude was someone coming at me basically implying that i'm lazy-(far from it!)...i just couldn't look up that info at that specific time..the last thing i needed was his ' No. i'm more than confident that you can look up that information yourself'. now THAT's jus't plain mean. Cheer up guys..it ain't that deep:</p>
<p>The power of wrtten words</p>
<p>which one do you think is better</p>
<p>"sybbie719- just curious...DID YOU ALREADY CHECK the policies of penn, stanford and the other schools i listed?"</p>
<p>OR</p>
<p>"sybbie719- just curious...ARE YOU AWARE OF the policies of penn, stanford and the other schools i listed?</p>
<p>I admit the second one would have avoided this whole kafuffle. But he had posted policies for two ivy leagues and i assumed he had checked the others and already ascertained that their policies weren't strict- so i was just checking to make sure. It wasn't like i was demanding that he go to the websites and check....And If i were to go through all your past posts i could EASILY fix every single one of them and make them sound more polite. you know?-- let's let it go please.....</p>