Very worth noting this is primarily a community college issue, due to more open admissions requirements, lower costs meaning the potential for aid refunds, and often residential requirements that...
Very worth noting this is primarily a community college issue, due to more open admissions requirements, lower costs meaning the potential for aid refunds, and often residential requirements that make funding someone in person key. It's interesting how it's not just about the money though.
I had a student who showed up, paid nothing, disappeared at midterms with a completely unpaid bill but got...8 weeks ish of housing I guess? There were some untreated mental health things going on too. But you don't typically end up with much money left over from financial aid at a 4 year school. Not without a lot more fraud I suppose
Because the "excess" covers your housing, food, books, transportation, etc. it rarely fully covers those things either. Aid is paid to the institution first though.
Because the "excess" covers your housing, food, books, transportation, etc. it rarely fully covers those things either.
And while I acknowledge that those things need to be covered, financial aid is the wrong tool for the job. Frankly books should just come free with the course. A proper minimum wage would be a...
And while I acknowledge that those things need to be covered, financial aid is the wrong tool for the job. Frankly books should just come free with the course. A proper minimum wage would be a good start, and a basic income would be more ideal.
This is part of the reason I'm 100% behind full housing on university campuses for students. Means they don't need to pay out for those things, it can all just transfer via credits.
(and acknowledging this is not the current state of affairs, but rather a target).
Yeah I'm talking about how to function in the current state of things. We can't house our entire student population and the cost of doing so would be quite a lot. Something people also tend to...
Yeah I'm talking about how to function in the current state of things. We can't house our entire student population and the cost of doing so would be quite a lot. Something people also tend to oppose. Books are a much easier fix. But transportation and food aren't.
But especially community colleges are almost entirely not designed for residential living and many more nontraditional students for whom residential requirements wouldn't be beneficial.
Wasn't even talking crisis, we house less than a third of a student population and that's at our fullest possible capacity. The community is in a housing crisis but that's separate from the...
Wasn't even talking crisis, we house less than a third of a student population and that's at our fullest possible capacity.
The community is in a housing crisis but that's separate from the on-campus housing situation.
And none of that touches the non-traditional and grad students, who are married and with families, something we don't have the apartments for ourselves anymore.
I get dreaming, but it will never be practical to mandate living on campus for everyone at every level. Sure if everyone is living off campus with subsidies that would be great too, but if we're changing the entire way the world works, we gotta be up front about that. And in the meantime, this is still a current issue and students need their financial aid refunds before they graduate
From my understanding, many institutions are requiring in-person verification of credentials which certainly wastes a lot of time but this is the funny part to me Ineligible students here means...
From my understanding, many institutions are requiring in-person verification of credentials which certainly wastes a lot of time but this is the funny part to me
The DOE found $90 million had been disbursed to ineligible students, including $30 million that went to stolen identities of deceased individuals.
Ineligible students here means "Math-1324 actually wasn't on your degree plan so it doesn't qualify for financial aid," and when these institutions run audits they catch these mistakes... Two semesters later. Imagine going to school for a year and when it comes time to re-enroll for the fall your school says "Oh, yeah, you owe us five grand for that math you took." Some of those are "You have a .5 GPA," and plenty are "You've taken 120 hours and don't have your associates yet."
Yes, ghost students waste staff time and resources (I saw reporting that a school near me has denied over 3,000 applicants during the off-peak season, I can only imagine their fall numbers) but a large majority of the DOEs funding appears to be lost to ineligible students. Which is equally hilarious considering -
Admissions and faculty are mostly focused on educating students and getting them into the right classes for their career path.
It is sad though, schools needing to create barriers for real students to jump through because of all the fraud.
This is legit a recurring nightmare for me; that somewhere along my schooling something didn't match up and suddenly my credentials are gone until I need to pay up or retest.
Blockquote Ineligible students here means "Math-1324 actually wasn't on your degree plan so it doesn't qualify for financial aid," and when these institutions run audits they catch these mistakes... Two semesters later. Imagine going to school for a year and when it comes time to re-enroll for the fall your school says "Oh, yeah, you owe us five grand for that math you took." Some of those are "You have a .5 GPA," and plenty are "You've taken 120 hours and don't have your associates yet."
This is legit a recurring nightmare for me; that somewhere along my schooling something didn't match up and suddenly my credentials are gone until I need to pay up or retest.
Well, this is a new level of distopian hell I never thought about. We might be heading to the day where having to register in person becomes a requirement.
Well, this is a new level of distopian hell I never thought about. We might be heading to the day where having to register in person becomes a requirement.
Those discounts virtually never fall under the line of "not profitable." The real travesty is that the edu price isn't just the price for everybody. The actual harm for everything except the...
A simple email address that ends in .edu allows for discounts on laptops, software, music streaming services and, critically, allows the scammers to use those student identities to fraudulently apply for jobs at companies.
Those discounts virtually never fall under the line of "not profitable." The real travesty is that the edu price isn't just the price for everybody. The actual harm for everything except the applying for jobs is 0.
Even then, there are often systems in place to validate with the school at purchase time that the account is still eligible, because often discounts are limited to subsets of a population, like verified faculty.
Speaking from experience, I'd wager if you email help@whateverschool.edu from a reputable company domain asking to validate the status of a given email, there is a 90% chance it gets routed to somebody that will, at a minimum, point to a resource that can provide that.
IMO this piece reads more like a way of manufacturing consent for adding even more arbitrary hurtles for granting aid rather than any genuine concern.
Very worth noting this is primarily a community college issue, due to more open admissions requirements, lower costs meaning the potential for aid refunds, and often residential requirements that make funding someone in person key. It's interesting how it's not just about the money though.
I had a student who showed up, paid nothing, disappeared at midterms with a completely unpaid bill but got...8 weeks ish of housing I guess? There were some untreated mental health things going on too. But you don't typically end up with much money left over from financial aid at a 4 year school. Not without a lot more fraud I suppose
I'm not sure why we don't just mandate financial aid only payable direct to the college, and excess refunds only get disbursed at graduation.
Because the "excess" covers your housing, food, books, transportation, etc. it rarely fully covers those things either.
Aid is paid to the institution first though.
And while I acknowledge that those things need to be covered, financial aid is the wrong tool for the job. Frankly books should just come free with the course. A proper minimum wage would be a good start, and a basic income would be more ideal.
This is part of the reason I'm 100% behind full housing on university campuses for students. Means they don't need to pay out for those things, it can all just transfer via credits.
(and acknowledging this is not the current state of affairs, but rather a target).
Yeah I'm talking about how to function in the current state of things. We can't house our entire student population and the cost of doing so would be quite a lot. Something people also tend to oppose. Books are a much easier fix. But transportation and food aren't.
But especially community colleges are almost entirely not designed for residential living and many more nontraditional students for whom residential requirements wouldn't be beneficial.
Something something housing crisis subsidies.
I'm a dreamer.
Wasn't even talking crisis, we house less than a third of a student population and that's at our fullest possible capacity.
The community is in a housing crisis but that's separate from the on-campus housing situation.
And none of that touches the non-traditional and grad students, who are married and with families, something we don't have the apartments for ourselves anymore.
I get dreaming, but it will never be practical to mandate living on campus for everyone at every level. Sure if everyone is living off campus with subsidies that would be great too, but if we're changing the entire way the world works, we gotta be up front about that. And in the meantime, this is still a current issue and students need their financial aid refunds before they graduate
From my understanding, many institutions are requiring in-person verification of credentials which certainly wastes a lot of time but this is the funny part to me
Ineligible students here means "Math-1324 actually wasn't on your degree plan so it doesn't qualify for financial aid," and when these institutions run audits they catch these mistakes... Two semesters later. Imagine going to school for a year and when it comes time to re-enroll for the fall your school says "Oh, yeah, you owe us five grand for that math you took." Some of those are "You have a .5 GPA," and plenty are "You've taken 120 hours and don't have your associates yet."
Yes, ghost students waste staff time and resources (I saw reporting that a school near me has denied over 3,000 applicants during the off-peak season, I can only imagine their fall numbers) but a large majority of the DOEs funding appears to be lost to ineligible students. Which is equally hilarious considering -
It is sad though, schools needing to create barriers for real students to jump through because of all the fraud.
This is legit a recurring nightmare for me; that somewhere along my schooling something didn't match up and suddenly my credentials are gone until I need to pay up or retest.
Well, this is a new level of distopian hell I never thought about. We might be heading to the day where having to register in person becomes a requirement.
Those discounts virtually never fall under the line of "not profitable." The real travesty is that the edu price isn't just the price for everybody. The actual harm for everything except the applying for jobs is 0.
Even then, there are often systems in place to validate with the school at purchase time that the account is still eligible, because often discounts are limited to subsets of a population, like verified faculty.
And if an employer can't be bothered to verify that an email address does not equal association, does it really matter? There are plenty of cheap services available to help.
Speaking from experience, I'd wager if you email help@whateverschool.edu from a reputable company domain asking to validate the status of a given email, there is a 90% chance it gets routed to somebody that will, at a minimum, point to a resource that can provide that.
IMO this piece reads more like a way of manufacturing consent for adding even more arbitrary hurtles for granting aid rather than any genuine concern.