Off Campus HELP

College Life
1

Hi!

So I am currently a Junior at Ferrum College (private liberal arts college in Virginia). Ferrum requires full time students to live on campus all 4 years unless they can get a waiver. Well one of my really good friends has an open room in his apartment and the price is perfect (300 including utilities). I live in one of the nicer dorms so it is about 1k more than the pricing of housing they put on the COA (my dorm costs roughly 10k a year or 5k a semester). I would be saving a ton of money by moving off campus and to be quite honest off campus is much better for me I have ADHD (will provide a doctors note) and I am an athlete so being in a dorm where people do not respect quiet hours (especially during finals) is miserable. Ferrum is completely anti off campus living because they lose so much money from it, they often threaten students saying they will lose their scholarships (which confuses me because if it is an academic scholarship and if the student is in good standings then why would that change?), but people that I know that have successfully moved off campus say that their aid has not been affected and it is just a scare tactic. Some have even said they have to threaten leaving the school or hiring a lawyer for the school to finally give in. On Ferrum’s website there are sections for COA; Residential/Off-Campus and Commuter/living with parent. So basically none of aid should be allowed to change because housing for residential and off campus are under the same category, am I right?

http://www.ferrum.edu/student_links/financial_aid/1415%20FA%20Budget.pdf
The COA budget itself ^^^^

I guess my question is can they actually change any of my aid? I mean they have residential and off campus under the same category so essentially they’d have to refund me the money for the dorm (5k) and I can use that towards my rent and save the rest. Any advice is much appreciated!

Thank you!

2

Do you have a scholarship? If so, you need to read the terms of the scholarship. Since the scholarship comes from the school, they can set any terms they want. When you accepted the scholarship, you agree to met the terms of the scholarship. You should have gotten a letter of some sort that spelled out what the scholarship covers and what the requirements are to continuing to receive the scholarship. Short answers: they can change the financial aid if you do not met the requirements. One requirement could be that you live on campus.

If you do not have a scholarship, then the school is free to do what they want with the aid. Most try to be consistent but might increase the expected student contribution each year.