<p>Son's future college will only let him apply outside scholarships to his work study. That is their rule. I understand that no scholarship will reduce our EFC or his student contribution and anything over the $3K work study amount will reduce his grants. </p>
<p>My question is I've read about some outside scholarships that are given to kids as "cash" or don't have any kind of "use" tied to them, like "for tuition only," so I want to know what to look for if he gets any scholarships to see if they are flexible in this way. DS needs a computer, for example, that is not part of the cost of attendance in his financial aid package so will a scholarship say "can be used for a computer" and then that is a different thing than a scholarship we have to report to the school and count against his work study? If he gets a check can he use it for airfare? </p>
<p>Are there specific terms used for different kinds of scholarships? What terms are key to identify if a scholarship is flexible or won't go directly to the school? Will we know by looking at it that it will have to go towards tuition? Are some scholarships ever negotiable in the sense that it was meant for tuition but the awarding party will let us put it to the computer or travel or books?</p>
<p>How successful have people been in using outside scholarships for outside expenses? I'm pretty sure that DS will be awarded some kind of scholarship at the awards night this week and we don't know a thing about how it all works. These are local, community scholarships and he is interviewing right now for another state scholarship so that will probably be different than a local one, right?</p>
<p>Thanks in advance for any help!</p>
<p>Did you ask the financial aid office about using a one time outside scholarship for the purchase of a computer. Keep in mind, at the any of the day all scholarship monies over the cost of tuition and books are taxable income on to your school.</p>
<p>In addition, he would still have to report the outside scholarships to the school</p>
<p>D1 received a check for part of her outside scholarships (NMS & Byrd) from her college, but that was only because she already had an Institutional merit scholarship that covered full tuition, R&B. The scholarship money went directly to the college, she had a few charges for miscellaneous things during the year, and the overage was refunded to her at the end of the year.</p>
<p>Oh, okay, so no matter what form a scholarship comes in, it MUST be reported to the college and will take away from the work study unless I can convince the college to raise the cost of attendance ONE time for a computer. Too bad I can’t find any policy in place for his school like so many others have written in their financial aid pages. </p>
<p>For some reason, I thought that if he got a certain type of scholarship, like the local cash ones, he could just keep it as spending money. Apparently the only real benefit of it taking away from w/s is that he can get a “better” higher paying job. Whatever little scholarship he wins will never exceed the cost of attendance so getting a refund is not a possibility.</p>
<p>Thank you for your replies!</p>
<p>Whether they take away his w/s eligibility or not, he is still free to get a non-w/s job if he can find one that is “better”. The benefit of reducing his self-help obligation (which is what is happening when they take the w/s out of the package) is that the income from the job is no longer going toward meeting need, so it can go toward expenses included in EFC. </p>
<p>For example, we expect our son to pay his incidental expenses out of his non-w/s job, on top of his student contribution included in EFC (which goes toward tuition). So that reduces our parent contribution. </p>
<p>As long as it’s not difficult at his school for non-w/s students to find a job, it’s really a wash whether the w/s income goes toward meeting need and the cash scholarship goes toward the family contribution (for things like travel or books), or whether the scholarship reduces need and he can use the job income toward things like travel or books.</p>
<p>Yes, thank you mathmomvt. I found some old posts where kids reported that the non work study jobs paid a great deal more in NYC so that’s a good thing because our travel costs are going to be high. </p>
<p>The ceremony is tomorrow night so I’m excited for him to just be honored and hope his group gets some good awards. Some of his friends did not get very good aid packages because there were a LOT of loans so I hope those kids get big $!</p>
<p>You have to check with the school specifically as to how they will work with you on outside scholarships for specific things. Also some scholarship agencies are flexible on how they award the scholarships as they so resent how schools integrate their awards. So between the two, you might be able to work out something, using your judgement as well.</p>
<p>I agree with Mathmom about the work study job. At a lot of school, students can find outside jobs. I know at my sons’ colleges, that was not an issue at all. In fact, my kids worked jobs with work study kids, in school jobs, but they were simply not paid work study funds, as they did not qualify. Also, my SIL’s niece worked a non work study job her first year rather than taking a work study position because she didn’t like what was offered on the WS slate. WS just allows your student to check out what jobs the school has with funding for the program, and he has to find one that fits his schedule and work it before he sees dollar one of that money. He’s paid pretty much like a regular job with pay checks as he puts in the time. I find it’s really not a whole lot of help when that is expected to meet the need since it’s not guaranteed and it’s earn as you go, and it takes away from the kid’s ability to reduce the EFC. So any scholarship money that reduces work study, is money going directly towards the college bill, and then the kid can still work and use his earnings towards that required student contribution and/or family EFC. </p>
<p>Now if the school is one where finding a job is nearly impossible, this would be an issue.</p>
<p>Thanks for your reply, cptofthehouse. The work study award was not a “billed” amount in his package. It was to be applied to the unbilled expenses of books and personal supplies so in that sense, it IS money in his pocket. I don’t know how it works yet because if he has to have the money sent to the school and then they pay him back, that seems silly because he won’t have it as upfront money to pay for the books and personal supplies. We don’t even know how much it is yet! It might just be a token amount but I was trying to jump the gun so I would know how it all works and if put on the spot tomorrow and asked how we want to handle it, I wanted to be prepared to say send it to the school or the kid or what. I really did think that there were specific “types” of awards that didn’t count and didn’t have to be reported which is why I was asking what terminology was used for different types of scholarships. </p>
<p>Once I see what he wins, I’ll ask here again about how exactly to approach both the school and the scholarship agency to learn how to best apply the $. I’ve searched on the college website and there is no information about computers or any other policy other than reducing w/s. </p>
<p>The truth is that when I look at the whole picture of what “we” have to pay, meaning our EFC or the parent share, the student share and the work study amount, it’s all the same in my book so any reduction of those 3 things, means less for us to pay. </p>
<p>The whole financial aid package is still not exactly clear to me. I know that most of you have been dealing with financial aid packages for years but for a newby, I really still don’t understand it. I find it odd that those things are considered separate when to me, they are all the same thing-money we have to come up with. The only actual billed amount is our EFC part and the student contribution and the rest is unbilled so I am still unclear on how it all works and comes together. The “unbilled” expenses just seem like some made up number that really doesn’t represent what our actual costs will be and the work study part is thrown into that “obscure” accounting. I know that it is just an estimate but we realize that the travel part is low because we are on the other side of the country and the book figure is low and I think the “personal” expense figure is low, too. Their figure is $1858 for personal expenses and I don’t even understand what that is supposed to represent. Maybe it’s just hard for me to understand because everything costs so much where I live anyway but $900 per semester can’t go very far in my opinion. Geez, just setting up the dorm room eats a lot of that pittance up, doesn’t it? </p>
<p>**So basically if the scholarship people give us an option of where to send the money, I think I should say to send it to son, right? If it goes to w/s, then we report it to the school and they take away the w/s but he’ll have the money to buy books and stuff before school starts. If it’s in excess of the w/s amount, then what do we do? </p>
<p>Thanks again for your help!</p>
<p>You are right that the amounts for travel, books and incidentals included in COA are averages or estimates. If you can document that your son’s expenses are higher, you may be able to get COA increased to cover those things and the school may then let you apply your son’s outside scholarships toward those expenses before reducing their grant aid. If your son gets enough scholarships that you’re looking at his grant aid being reduced, definitely try exploring that (as well as the option to increase COA to cover the cost of a computer first year).</p>
<p>I think we spend under $100 on “setting up the dorm room”. What do they really need beyond a set of twin XL sheets? My kid took older blankets and towels from home. We bought a set of cheap plastic shelves and some power strips when he got there. Oh actually $200 – we did buy him a dorm room fridge too (that his brother will use when he’s done with it). Don’t get sucked in to the idea that they need hundreds of dollars worth of special dorm supplies. My DS is quite frugal and spends very little on personal incidental expenses – gym membership, cheap cell phone plan (we paid the first year) and a few video games, plus the basics like shampoo and such. He spends well under $1800/year. But he doesn’t go out to eat or order pizza much – he eats the food we’ve already paid for in his meal plan. he has “dining dollars” built into his meal plan that cover some vending machine purchases and other snacks.</p>
<p>The W/S thing always has a cash-flow problem built in. Your son can earn $3K over the course of the year to cover some of your non-billed expenses like travel and books and such, but he has to pay a fair bit of that up front for getting to school first semester, and buying textbooks and supplies for first semester and so on. Our S had some savings that he was able to use to “bootstrap” that process, but if your S has no savings of his own, you’re probably going to have to help him out there. (Or if he doesn’t already have federal loans in his financial aid package, he could take a small loan.)</p>
<p>I think it’s fine to have any small scholarships your son may win sent directly to him, as long as he reports it all to the school.</p>
<p>If your son earns scholarships in excess of the w/s amount, and the school won’t increase COA but instead decreases his grants, then they’re going to bill you more for your family share of tuition, and you’ll use the excess scholarship funds to pay them.</p>
<p>Thank you for this idea: “If you can document that your son’s expenses are higher, you may be able to get COA increased to cover those things and the school may then let you apply your son’s outside scholarships toward those expenses before reducing their grant aid.” I didn’t know that might be possible.</p>
<p>Also, thanks for the accounting of your kid’s spending. DS is also frugal and doesn’t normally spend much money and some other parents here have given me good estimates of what to shoot for in a monthly allowance so I think we will be fine on all fronts as long as the plane tickets don’t kill me-lol! I did find out some “hidden” costs that I didn’t think about like summer storage but if we don’t go overboard, he should be able to bring everything home. He doesn’t seem to think he needs a fridge so we’ll just wait on that and see when he gets there. Personally, I can’t imagine NOT having one so I’ve looked into the rental fee vs. buying and storing and it’s a wash if he doesn’t have to store anything else. I already got the sheets and towels so I think I am done buying anything else other than the actual school supplies stuff but we don’t want to ship paper so he’ll just get that there. </p>
<p>Thanks, too, for the heads up about them billing more if the scholarship is $. I get now that that is what it will look like in order to reduce the grant aid. It’s all SO tricky-lol!</p>
<p>Some scholarships have to be sent to the school. In that case, they will just be treated as a payment towards your account, up to the work study limits, and his hours will be reduced for work study until he has none at all. Remember he has to get his schedule for school, go to the fin aid/ws office, find a job that he can fit into his schedule, apply for it, get it, work it, and wait for a paycheck before he gets penny one from WS. He might not even find anything he can do or wants to do at WS or not enough hours. So you and he need to come up with that WS amount anyways for things he needs up front, like airline tickets, sheets for the room, some pocket money, books, etc. The only things firm in a COA are the required tution, fees, room and board charges. The books, transportation, sundries, toiletries, room supplies, laundry money, cell phone bills, snack money, will vary from one student to another but the COA averages them. You can go above that COA. The question comes to whether the fin aid office will recognize that or not, and adjust the COA so that you can keep some of the outside money.</p>
<p>Some places might sent the check directly to the student, and it is up to him to let financial aid know, so that adjustments to the ws and grants can be made accordingly. In such cases, he can just cash the checks if made out to him (or has to deposit the to the school if made out to the school) and apply the fund whereever he pleases. But when the school gets the report of that amount that your student directly cashes, and it’s over the WS amounts, then the grants that are applied to charges are accordly reduced and can result in a larger bill to you.</p>
<p>As far as the cash flow problem… If the scholarships are enough to cover the w/s amount and that is being sent directly to the school, you could see if you can pay your contribution minus the scholarship/ w-s amount (whichever is less) and give your son that money directly in lieu of his earning it; that would avoid having to wait for a refund.</p>
<p>What are “tuition-related expenses?”
My daughter can apply for a scholarship for the above. Is this just tuition and fees or do you think room and board also count as tuition related expenses for a scholarship funder?</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Room and board are not tuition related expenses. In fact any scholarship that your child receives over tuition/books is considered taxable income and must be reported on the FAFSA</p>
<p>Generally I would say no, you can’t use a “tuition-related expenses” scholarship for room and board, but you could certainly call the funder and ask.</p>
<p>Thanks I read further on the website and they said they would not consider housing expenses. I guess tuition related means all those fees student life fees, labs fees…required health fees?
I would call but it is sponsored by a big corporation and they give no number or department in charge on the website.
Oh well, I guess just apply and if she gets it , see what they cover.</p>