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Has Achieved Nirvana |
https://chicago.suntimes.com/2...-university-illinois
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| Techno-Stud Minor Deity  |
This is hardly news. It was pretty common back when I was in college. The financial aid available to an emancipated student far outweighed the financial hit of one fewer dependent at tax time. So prevalent was it that financial aid counselors actually suggested it routinely.
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| Pinta & the Santa Maria Has Achieved Nirvana  |
This generated a few thoughts from me. We (as a society) tend to go a bit crazy when it involves our kids and college admissions--especially elite college admissions. The VAST majority of happily and successfully employed students in the USA graduates from public universities. A minority of graduates from elite colleges will occupy the corner office. If you can't afford a 4 year college, start at a 2 year college. Work your butt off, and get a scholarship to transfer and finish your degree at a 4-year. (Note: this is almost exclusively a public school path, since few private colleges will accept much in the way of transfer credits from a 2-year.) As a society, we need to stop looking down our noses at trade schools. This is a great option for many students who will flounder in a more traditional liberal arts school, and they will end up being able to support themselves. There are scholarships and federal grants (Pell, etc.) for vocational/trade schools, just like for 4-year colleges. | |||
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Minor Deity |
Schools are free to set their own guidelines for financial aid. I am surprised they would go along with this. Matt, the article suggests the students actually take on a new legal guardian with a lower income. It isn’t just a matter of emancipation. As a parent who paid full cost for two kids, the third going to a school without tuition, this kind of stuff pisses me off. Jf
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| "I've got morons on my team." Mitt Romney Minor Deity  |
This isn't what they're talking about. It's not about giving up the tax deduction. In order for a student to be able to fill out a FAFSA without providing parental income information, the family must formally give the student up to another guardian. This is a significant legal process. A student cannot simply declare themselves financially independent. Here are the rules: Federal Definition of Independent Student You have to be over 23 to be considered independent unless one of a number of very special circumstances apply. One of those is having someone other than your parents as your legal guardian. | |||
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| "I've got morons on my team." Mitt Romney Minor Deity |
Universities are on the lookout for this kind of stuff. Actually, I'll bet that internal discovery by the University of Illinois is what brought this to light. Admissions offices are always looking for red flags and inconsistencies. I think I've mentioned the GoogleEarth checks that many (most) schools use when they smell a rat, i.e. a family from a wealthy zip code whose darling is getting a Pell Grant. They examine the family home. When they discover that little Jill who is Pell eligible lives in a $1.5 million suburban mansion, the school declines to offer ANY institutional aid as part of the package, leaving the student with a very big amount of unmet "need" according to the federal formula. Schools aren't powerless. They have tools. The game is on federal and state policies that opened the small loophole. | |||
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| Pinta & the Santa Maria Has Achieved Nirvana |
I'd not heard of schools using GoogleEarth to snoop around. But I'm confused--how would they know that little darling's family lives in a multi-million dollar manse if they aren't listed in the FAFSA as their guardians? Perhaps I'm forgetting the whole god-awful FAFSA process, but I don't recall a question where they asked for your biological parents' information in addition to their guardian's information. What might be a dead givaway, however, is the zip code and general stats for the kid's high school. I'm glad to know that at least some schools are trying to catch this sort of stuff. | |||
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| "I've got morons on my team." Mitt Romney Minor Deity |
The GoogleEarth check is for a different issue (not the guardian scam). We get applicants from families that have a low enough "income" that they get Pell grants, and the FAFSA reports a low EFC for them. That means we would have to kick in a substantial amount of institutional aid to "meet all demonstrated need." When such a kid comes from an odd zip code, admissions looks at the family home. When they see obvious wealth, they decline to meet all the family's "demonstrated need." In fact, they decline to meet any of it.  Families of this sort don't usually complain, which is another flag that we have correctly identified a cheater. These are families that have managed to arrange their finances so that their income isn't reported as income on their 1040, and they are probably lying about their assets. Remember, the family's main residence isn't considered an asset when EFC is calculated. So you can pour as much money as you want into the family homed and still seem poor on the FAFSA. This is not a large number of people, but it's significant enough that schools want to preserve their aid budget for truly needy families. Hence the GoogleEarth check and the reliance on other forms besides the FAFSA. The downside of all this is that the aid process becomes even more complex and off-putting to low income and 1st generation students. | |||
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well-temperedforum.groupee.net The Well-Tempered Forum Off Key Parents give up custody of kids in order to get college financial aid