UC's w/ dorm = TOO EXPENSIVE?

Transfer Students UC Transfers
1

<p>I'm an in-state student. This means my parents' taxes have been used to pay for our state's public schools.</p>

<p>I'm a transfer student. This means I've spent two years attending a dull, lifeless community college in order to save my parents' money, hoping it would pay off for my last two years of college.</p>

<p>And now, with my junior year coming up this next fall, my mother is telling me that UC Santa Barbara is just too expensive. She insists that I attend UC Irvine so I can continue to live at home for two more years. In other words, I'll have graduated from college without ever having once gotten the chance to live in a dorm, not to mention getting an actual "college experience".</p>

<p>Am I the only one who isn't allowed to attend two years of a state college of my choice?</p>

<p>I mean, some kids get to attend expensive private schools straight out of high school, and I can't even attend a public school for two freakin' years.</p>

<p>I just can't help but read these threads on CC about high school kids and their parents deciding between private schools and LAC's that total $40k-$50k a year, for four years, and here I am not even able to enjoy a measly two years of UCSB.</p>

<p>I know that "life's not fair" and that there are "starving kids in Africa", but I can't help but get annoyed by this massive disparity between my college experience and those of my peers. Sure, it's petty, but hell, I haven't asked for anything else, and I don't even have a car or a cell phone. This is the <em>one</em> thing I'm asking for, and apparently, 19 years wasn't enough time for them to save up enough for two years of public school w/ dorm. -_-</p>

<p>I mean, the opportunity to get a "college experience" only happens once in a lifetime, and to have lived at home for all four of those years just seems like an awful waste of a valuable life experience.</p>

2

<p>I am one of those kids who attended a private school straight out of high school…and let me say, I wouldn’t change the experience for the world. Although now I had a loan under my name…but that’s not too bad. </p>

<p>…WTH? No cell phone?! Are you insane?! Omg. -.-;; </p>

<p>Thankfully, my parents don’t have to pay diddly for my education (at least for this and the next two years), I saved up this year, and with my gift aid, currently, I don’t have to pay for anything…thank goodness. </p>

<p>Talk with parents. That’s just…not fair. Seriously. </p>

<p>Best of luck! [:</p>

3

<p>Well some parents don’t pay for their kids educations at all. You’re lucky to have someone pay for your education. I dormed in my first year at UCSB before i transferred and i can attest to the life changing experience of meeting new people and being thrown out and forced to adapt to new enviornments. However, i think that getting an apartment in IV with some strangers would be much cheaper and you’d still be “forced to meet new people”. It really is what you make of it.</p>

4

<p>Hi. I would say get loans, and go to UCSB, if that’s what you want.
My parents are not paying any money for me no matter whichever UC I go. They tell my that it’s my responsibility to pay for my own education, and they expect me to pay back my loans once I graduate and get a job.
So, in your case, maybe you can try to ask your parents to pay for whatever they were willing to pay as if you are attending UCI, and get loans to pay the remaining portion.</p>

5

<p>I’m in the same boat as you. I got $17,566 from UCLA but still not going. Parents still pushing me to commute at home and go to UCI because UCLA will still cost about 9k a year after the aid. At UCI they are offering me about 14k, and tuition+books cost about 10k so I’ll have an excess of 4k living at home.</p>

<p>But I don’t mind their decision though. It would put less of a burden for my parents. If I went to UCLA, they would have to get out loan just for me to go to school and I wouldn’t want that. Going to UCI I get a full ride and more. I can say I got my degree on my own at the end. Plus by the time I get my bs degree, I would have saved up about 50k from my part time job and financial aid. Which is a good start on the debt from med school.</p>

6

<p>

I never asked for a cell phone (among other things) because I thought it’d give me leverage when I eventually really needed something. Turns out I miscalculated. :x</p>

<p>

That’s exactly what I requested of my mom, but she rejected. I’d have to take all $23,000 in loans, with interest, for two years. I can’t stand the idea of paying interest on money that my parents already have. In response to post #3, I guess what really irritates me is that my mother had always denied me things as a child, telling me she was “saving it for my college”. A load of BS that turned out to be…</p>

<p>

Mmm, the funny thing (well, not funny; more like aggravating) is that I actually got more financial aid from UCSB. In fact, UCSB would only cost about $3,000-$4,000 more per year. All the money I saved them by being a non-needy child who rarely asked for anything, and now they can’t even afford *that<a href=“well,%20I%20guess%20what’s%20even%20worse%20is%20that%20they%20%5Bi%5Dcan%5B/i%5D%20afford%20it”>/i</a>.</p>

7

<p>did u apply for fafsa?</p>

8

<p>^ Yeah. Didn’t get much financial aid, though. $333 from UCI (yes, that’s in the hundreds) and $4k from UCSB.</p>

9

<p>so ur parents made enough to pay for ur education but they said they couldnt? damn!!!</p>

10

<p>Try this… I got accepted to UCD–which is where I wanted to go but my mom is angry because she had to pull out loans for me to go to school. I had to get 27,000 in loans, and I’m in state. I don’t qualify for financial aid and my mom is only willing to pay the minimum payment she has to for those loans until I graduate so she can transfer them into my name. Now she’s nagging about how I should have gone to a state school like her because undergraduate doesn’t matter and I’m wasting my money.</p>

11

<p>

Yep, pretty much.</p>

<p>

Erm…isn’t UCD a state school? o.O</p>

12

<p>sorry I meant a CSU. </p>

<p>She say’s it because I live 3 miles from one.</p>

13

<p>i think Mt19871212 meant cal state</p>

14

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<p>I’m not a needy child either. They offered me to buy me a new car but I turned it down. They were willing to pay for UCLA too if I REALLY wanted to go there but I turned it down too. My parents were immigrants coming to America. They started with nothing and now have something. They had to work 2 jobs during college just to pay for their bills. They didn’t have anyone to pay for their college like most ppl. I want to do the same.</p>

<p>Plus UCI ain’t that bad either, 2 of my uncles and 1 of my aunts went there for their undergrad and now 2 of em are successful doctors and 1 of em is a pharmacist.</p>

15

<p>

Yeah, my mom originally wanted me to attend CSUF’s Irvine campus (not even CSUF, but a ghetto extraneous campus…), but UCI is actually closer (plus, CSUF’s Irvine campus is pretty much dying from underfunding).</p>

<p>

It’s just that I’ve lived in Irvine since I was like 4 years old, and I can’t stand this place…</p>

<p>I seriously don’t want to go Seung-Hui-Cho on anyone, but if I have to stay in Irvine for two more years (and at home, no less), I just might. =/</p>

16

<p>aw yawn you make me laugh. I live right by CSU Bakersfield and they take anyone. Literally. That’s just an insult right there. But I know how you feel. I just want to get out of where I am at… and meet new people and get away from many other people that I know here.</p>

17

<p>yawn, why don’t you just go to UCSB because they give you the most aid, and instead of taking out loans for dorming, just room with students in a place on Isla Vista? Get a job so you can pay the monthly rent or whatever, which will be even cheaper than living in dorms, and then your parents will have no excuse.</p>

<p>i’m sick of living at home too, this **** can’t go on much longer.</p>

18

<p>

Not really sure why that would be considered substantially cheaper. Unless I rent a room with like four or five other students (I doubt I’m going to find anyone willing to do that), apartments in Santa Barbara aren’t particularly cheap.</p>

19

<p>My parents made me apply to davis, and if I got in i probably would have had to go there since it’s only a half hour(on a bad day) away. Hopefully UCSD(with tag) will come through by the 30th and I can go there, or else it’s ucsb(which is my backup…=/).</p>

20

<p>i’d first like to say that despite the triviality of your problem, it’s understandably REAL… and i empathize. </p>

<p>if you plan on going the grad school route, i’d say bite the bullet and take the loans… if your parents really do have the money and are just being cheap with it, maybe once they see how determined you are, they’ll come around… it’s a gamble, but if they’re at all like my parents, action is a far better method of getting through to them than mere reason… </p>

<p>i shared a room (with one other person) in a fairly spacious 3 bedroom duplex with a huge back yard, washer/dryer, decent sized kitchen and some prime green shag carpet for $550… with utilities, it came out to about $600. i lived with 4 other people on sueno… that’s about as cheap as it gets living in a house, but if you’re serious about this, look into Garden Court. through craigslist, i’d be willing to bet that you’ll be able to find a room to split pretty quickly at around $375 a month. the management there is ****ty, and the walls are paper thin, but it’s definitely habitable. add another $25 or so for utilities, making it 400 or so… that puts you at $3,600 for rent for the entire school year… plus $9,000 for tuition, $1,000 for books and supplies (you’ll have to shop around, but their estimated $1,500 is way high…), plus about $3,000 for food over the course of the year, $2,000 if all you eat is pasta, chicken breasts from costco, salad, cereal and broccoli (trust me…)</p>

<p>so, you’ll need about $17k just to live… if you live especially modestly (bottom barrel domestic beer, don’t leave IV / eat out EVER — both of which aren’t hard to do, i promise), you’ll need about another $2k for miscellaneous ish… </p>

<p>so $19k is a life… </p>

<p>$4k is taken care of by aid…</p>

<p>leaving you with $15k…</p>

<p>a part time job (20 hr/wk) at 9 an hour would pay about $6,500 before taxes</p>

<p>leaving you to come up with $8,500 in dreaded loans… </p>

<p>ain’t so bad, man… </p>

<p>then again, if you take out the full amount in loans, by the time you graduate, your earning capacity will be at least doubly high… just something to think about. </p>

<p>i really wish you luck, man.
if you really want it, it’s doable…</p>