<p>After an informal discussion with a financial aid counselor at UC Davis, it was brought to my attention that because I have casually taken community college classes for several years while working (and paid every cent out of pocket with no aid drawn, no BOG fee waivers, ect ect) that because the state subsidizes tuition per student at the CC, my blue and gold plan could run out due to exceeding the expected date of completion which is compounded from ALL the time spent at community college in consistent enrollment of part time status or higher. UCD financial aid took the stance that I should just enroll and we will worry about it when I am refused aid down the line and confirmed it will eventually happen before completing my degree.</p>
<p>This is completely discomforting news, in that with an EFC of 0 my financial aid will run out completely sometime during the 5-6 quarters (UCD Financial aid says they cannot say specifically when) that it will take to graduate after transfer. Does anyone know about this situation from experience???? </p>
<p>I suppose in alternative I could possibly qualify for private loans to finish but if this happens at the second quarter after transferring what can I do, when in this situation with drawing private aid I would need to draw around 30k to finish school and being a single adult student (ineligible for CalGrants due to age) with no support of any kind and leaving my employment (motion picture industry freelance) work will dry up for me compared to being slightly sustainable currently and I will be unemployable in Davis. </p>
<p>Can anyone confirm this, or provide a possible solution? </p>
<p>I know there has to be some working adults out there who are returning to university full time and not settling on a CSU who have a lot of CC hours built up before they were at a point in their lives to transfer? Should I pass on my UC TAG’s and settle into the CSU since I can go part-time and pay a good portion out of pocket in worst case scenario. I actually started looking at WISCHE schools like NM Tech and UNM out of panic thinking it will be really affordable to live there and if I had to work while in school I could go part time and finance most the tuition on cards and with income (would be close to CSU costs to be doable). </p>
<p>Help and suggestions are much needed!</p>
<p>Ps: I have around 160 units of CC work accumulated over the years and multiple AA degrees. Long Term goal is to get into a respectable MFA/MBA joint program pursuing Art Administration and Museum Education</p>
<p>Correct, over four years and my enrollment was consistent of at least part time. I started taking courses for personal interest at night and it just compounded over the years. The field of museum education is much more fulfilling then my current work and it’s new and consistent with museum models of the future so it is certainly the place I want to plant roots. The joint MFA/MBA should allow for lots of portability in the field. I just need to finish the BA/BFA asap and have SOME support through aid to make it possible at the UC’s I had applied to. Otherwise it would be down to plan B at this point unless there are other suggestions. </p>
<p>That makes absolutely no sense what the financial aid officer told you. You will not lose eligibility for Blue and Gold by “staying too long at a community college.”</p>
<p>Directly from the UC Blue and Gold website:
</p>
<p>You will be eligible for Blue and Gold your first two years at a UC as a transfer. Perhaps this is what the financial aid officer meant, but poorly worded it to you? Maybe it was only meant you could not get the full four years as you would if you entered as a freshman.</p>
<p>You could spend 20 years at a community college, transfer to a UC, and you would still have Blue and Gold for your first two years assuming it still existed and you qualified financially.</p>
<p>EDIT: The only issue I might see is not being eligible for Cal Grant now that I think about it. Although it merely says to have applied for. It doesn’t mention qualifying for. I would ask for clarification because on first glance, it makes no sense.</p>
<p>Based on her explanation Blue and Gold and Financial Aid in general is compounded into an allocation period, I was taking classes for several semesters so those are calculated into the expected date of graduation and then requirement for completion of the BA which I believe is 18/20 Quarters. If semester aid (even though I required none for the CC I attended starts at last continuous enrollment and I attended for 10 semesters x 1.5 = 15 quarters of aid have been allocated to me. Which means I get the need based blue and gold plan for 3/5 quarters. After that she explained I do not qualify for state or federal aid because I exceed the point of expected completion and can only hope to qualify for private aid or grants to finance my education through the BA/BFA. I am really hoping she is wrong, but I have to go on this since I have lots of friends who had funding pulled during their dissertations for exceeding the expected date of graduation. I just have never heard of it in this context. I REALLY hope the adviser I spoke with is wrong but in these trying times, it seems plausible they would not want to allocate aid in what they would consider to be excess of the period of degree completion. The logical conflict exists in me having a couple AA’s and those being completely separate degrees from the BA with the exceptions of some unit overlap being used to fulfill prerequisites and general ed. Perhaps IGETC documents those units as being - above and beyond coursework for just an AA. </p>
<p>I went from working full time while attending CC part time, to attending UC full time. Like you, I took absolutely no aid during CC years and paid for everything out of my own pocket. </p>
<p>I have no idea how you would have EFC = 0 unless you were unemployed or had dismal income (or maybe not claiming income) for 2009. Mine was really high my first year at UC because I am an independent student and earned enough money to live in my own market-rate studio in San Francisco. (ie not much, but enough to get by and vacation sometimes) Anyway…</p>
<p>I did not qualify for Cal Grant for various reasons. I didn’t qualify for Pell Grant. My earned income fell under the cap for Blue and Gold, but that didn’t exist yet. But as far as I can tell, I didn’t get it this academic year, either. Cal only gave me unsubsidized loans for the first year I was there, and I took the max. They made up the rest of my need with a UC Berkeley Scholarship, plus I won two small scholarships through my CC (which reduced my Cal scholarship, not my loans). I appealed my financial aid offer since I had started working part time, and they gave me a bit more in Scholarship money.</p>
<p>For 2009-2010, my EFC was still a bit high because I did work full time during some of 2008. However, since I am now earning less than half what I was before, I again appealed my financial aid for this year, and Cal’s FA office adjusted my EFC, split my loans between subsidized and unsubsidized, and gave me substantially more money in my UC Berkeley Scholarship. As I said, I have no idea if any of that came out of Blue and Gold.</p>
<p>I don’t know if the UC Berkeley Scholarship is merit based in any way, but I have a high GPA, so maybe it is. Or maybe it is what they use to make up a gap in FA money that a student in our situation would need, but wouldn’t get from Cal Grant or Pell Grant. So I wouldn’t worry about it too much if I were you. It sounds like UC Davis is going to figure out a way to cover at least your tuition, which is all the Blue and Gold covers anyway. I’m sure that through FA appeals and working with their office you will come out OK, even if in a bit of debt through taking out unsubsidized Stafford loans.</p>
<p>mino74ur: Yeah, that is incredibly confusing. I technically transferred to UCSC with around 183 quarter units (all from California Community Colleges), around 170-175 of which were UC transferable. Granted, only 105 max could officially be kept as unit credit after I transferred, but I still received subject credit for the other units I took. I took seven semesters and seven quarters (not counting high school concurrent enrollment years and summer sessions). Yet I still qualify for Blue and Gold as well as state and federal aid. I have not exceeded my use of them.</p>
<p>You can only “exceed state and federal aid” by using it. Cal Grant allows for two years (4 semesters/6 quarters) for transfer students. Pell grant has some quite high number that far exceeds that, but I cannot seem to find a link to get a definite number. I do remember it being more than 5 years worth of semesters. I know the financial aid officers in the financial aid forum have mentioned it, though.</p>
<p>I strongly encourage you to pose your question in the financial aid forum rather than here. There are some very well informed financial aid officers that post there and perhaps they will be able to make sense of what this person told you. Because it certainly is nothing I’ve ever heard of and I can find nothing on the Blue and Gold website that says “If you stay at community college too long, you lose eligibility.” The whole situation just seems odd and as if there is a very important piece of information missing.</p>
<p>You could definitely have a problem. Schools have to have a Satisfactory Academic Progress (SAP) to determine financial aid eligibility. It usually includes things like grades, passing a certain % of classes that you have attempted, not going over a certain % of credits required for your degree. For instance at my daughter’s school the SAP requires that a student has successfully completed 75% of all classes attempted (ever, at at any college), have a GPA of 2.0 and not exceed 150% of the credit hours (that includes all hours attempted at any college, including withdrawals etc) required for the degree. For instance if the degree requires 120 credits then once a student goes over 180 hours attempted they are ineligible for aid. These rules applies to all federal aid including federal loans. According to the UC Davis financial aid page you must meet SAP for the Blue and Gold plan also.</p>
<p>My son actually ran into this when he returned to college (a CC) after a couple of years break, even though we had never applied for aid when he first went. He did not exceed the maximum hours but had dropped out midway through his 3rd semester and dropped all the classes. Because of this he was initially denied aid, but was able to appeal and was awarded aid in the end. He also went slightly over the maximum credit hours allowed, but was allowed aid because he had completely changed degrees. </p>
<p>These rules applies to all federal aid including federal loans. According to the UC Davis financial aid page you must meet SAP for the Blue and Gold plan also.</p>
<p>Thank you for sharing your experiences with the aid process and I would imagine they certainly wouldn’t bring up the idea of appeals but it is certainly a process I will familiarize myself with ASAP.I am certainly employed but have an EFC of 0 on my 2010 FAFSA for several reasons which shouldn’t require disclosure here since it is above and beyond this discussion. Thank you for the well thought out reply and sharing your experiences. </p>
<p>@ Kender</p>
<p>The link would be outstanding but it is not to difficult to imagine it being higher then the states limit. I will certainly hop over to the financial aid forms and your advice is certainly encouraging in that we share quite similar circumstances. I agree in that the situation seems odd, I socialize with lots of grad students who are constantly on the teeter totter of aid and funding perhaps too much is rubbing off on me for my own good. </p>
<p>@ Swimcatsmom </p>
<p>Your information and experiences are much more consistent with what I was told from UCD and hence why I post here to begin with. I was actually hoping you wouldn’t confirm this. As for my SAP my personal transfer GPA is solid, I have few to no withdraws but excess of units is certainly the pinnacle of my concern. Since I have 16.3 terms based on their calculation ratio in the link you sent, out of an 18 term capacity. <em>cringe</em> Thanks for taking a moment to send along the link. </p>
<p>I just really dislike reading…</p>
<p>“The Financial Aid Office calculates the equivalent total number of terms completed (whether or not you received financial aid during that time) and then determines the quarters remaining for completion of the educational objective within the maximum timeframe.”</p>
<p>So unfortunately it seems like I will be in a lot of appelic limbo unless I can get some confirmation it is only based on number of UC units transferred. If so, I may stand a chance at making it through with aid. </p>
<p>My roommate just told me that he was informed by SF State (or maybe it was CCSF? he takes classes at both colleges) that he would be getting a CalGrant this year. However, he already holds a BA from an out of state college. He’s been told that he is eligible for it as a post-bac working on a second degree or taking classes to qualify for his post-graduate program (nursing or dentistry). Even though he is poor, I truly don’t see how it is fair for him to be given a CalGrant when many people who are working towards their FIRST BA who never took a dime of financial aid for their CCC classes are not eligible due to various reasons (age, didn’t graduate from a CA high school, took too long to finish the first 2 years, whatever they deem as ineligible). </p>