You can’t afford UM if your EFC is 0. It’s not a good idea to borrow $30k or more/year for school. Don’t let your Mom do that. With a 0 EFC you’ll qualify for a Pell grant of ~$5k/year. You can borrow ~$5500/year on your own and you can earn ~$3k/year if you work summers. That gives you a budget of $13k/year – maybe a little more if your state offers grants to low income students. Do you have any affordable colleges on your list? What are your stats? Do you qualify for merit anywhere?
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Tuition is going to be steep for UM. I have applied for scholarships and I’m expected to get a good amount of money form FAFSA since my family contribution is at 0
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FAFSA is an app for federal aid and federal aid is NOT much money. At most you’ll get about $5,700 in free money, so any expectation of getting a good amount of money from the federal gov’t isn’t right.
Is Miami a CSS Profile school? If so, did you submit that?
Do you have a non-custodial parent?
Miami may give you some aid of their own.
Perhaps, since you’d be commuting, that between institutional aid and fed aid, you might have enough aid to pay for tuition and books.
How many dual enrollment credits would you be able to apply toward a degree program at U of Miami? Are there enough to save you a year (or more) of tuition there?
Will you finish your associates degree this spring at MDC or would you need a couple more semesters to do that? Find out how staying there to finish your AA or AS and then transferring to one of the FL publics will affect financial aid. Doing that will keep you at home a bit longer which might make your mom happier.