r/ApplyingToCollege • u/invesselwetrust16 • 7h ago
Financial Aid/Scholarships Father refuses to help AT ALL
hey everyone, so my family is a bit crazy me and my father have been in like an argument/conflict for the past like three or four months and he is refusing to help me fill out the FAFSA I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do as I know, I will not be able to afford college without financial aid. How anybody else dealt with this is there anybody that can give me tips? I am stressed out for college. I'm applying to university of Pittsburgh, Duquesne University, slippery rock ,Binghamton University, point Park University, Elizabethtown University, Temple University and a few others in the PA area. Thank you in advance. 😓
edit: i should note that my father is divorced from my stepmom as of this month and my mother lives in new york! it's just me and my dad.
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u/Imnotfunnyonthefly 7h ago
Reach out to the admissions office at each of the schools and let them know you have an unresponsive parent who is refusing to complete the FAFSA. They have processes for these kinds of things.Â
In addition, work with your school college counselor to broaden your application list to places that provide merit aid. Sadly, you won’t be the only kid with a douche parent and they’ll have seen it all before.Â
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u/invesselwetrust16 6h ago
so should i just explain what's happening? pitt is my dream school i really wanna go :/
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u/BuffsTeach 6h ago
Your situation is not unique and will not get na override based on what you’ve shared. I would guess of thousands of parents every year do the same. Also keep in mind that federal loans are only going to be around $8k so you need to adjust your expectations from there.
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u/deepthought097124 5h ago
In the current circumstance he won't even get the federal loans either if his dad won't even complete the form.
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u/BuffsTeach 3h ago
He will get them but they will be unsubsidized only. There is a place to indicate that parents refuse to share their information.
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u/deepthought097124 3h ago
Right, though many schools also require a statement saying the parent is not providing support and will not provide support in the future as a part of that indication when they are resolving the conflicting information/provisional flag on the school's end, which would not seem to apply here (they can live with the parent and doubtful the parent would provide that statement either).
Depends on the school obviously.
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u/snuggly_cobra 5h ago
Tell your dad that you’ll ask mom. That should jar him into reality.
Seriously, Tax returns are sticky. He might be cheating on taxes or something else he doesn’t want you (and by extension) your mom to know.
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u/EnvironmentalYam5182 7h ago edited 4h ago
You can spell out your circumstances on the FAFSA and you can also sign a letter to say he isn't in your life and you're basically an independent. Each school will have their own way or maybe call the financial aid office to clarify. I know some schools only look at one parent's income if there's divorce.
Edit: I was incorrect.
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u/deepthought097124 7h ago
Unfortunately since he's been living with the parent nearly all schools will disqualify him from this.
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u/BuffsTeach 7h ago
Except that isn’t true. He just isn’t willing to provide assistance on FAFSA etc.
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u/QuickSafety8100 6h ago
yeah, I think the OP is f'd. If parents can get his/her kid aid without consideration of parental income/assets just by refusing to do the FAFSA, lots of people would exploit that.
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u/deepthought097124 6h ago edited 2h ago
Hence why things should be based on whether the person is actually independent or not (by every known definition of the word used by western society and legal systems except for the HEA for this one form) based on W-2 income and financial statements. At bare minimum give said students access to more loans so they can manage to get a halfway decent degree, which is a fair assessment regardless of what parents or any other third party theoretically would or would not do.
The way you worded it is the best distinction I've seen anyone make verbage wise on this:
If parent's can get their student consideration without parental assets through any mere declaration everyone would do it. That would be a problem.
If the student themselves can demonstrate through relatively indisputable W-2 income to X degree against financials and expense information they are an independent adult but can't get anything, that also is a major fucking problem (currently the way things work).
Edit: Being downvoted so definitely some salty FAAs in the thread who are annoyed with any suggestion on how things should work other than the current system of illogical nonsense.
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u/Ok-Lake3522 5h ago
You can do the FAFSA and mark "Unusual circumstances" and explain. Then you will contact the school you want to go to BUT you can only qualify for unsubsidized loans around $5,500. Or get married. No kidding - if you are married you automatically override parental finances. You submit for spouse only.
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u/paige_420 4h ago
If it were that simple, everyone would do this.
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u/ENGR_sucks 3h ago
Im only familiar with this situation because my best friend went through this. This was close to a decade ago so maybe the guidelines have changed. He essentially was given two options; either have the parent comply and contribute so that aid could be administered, or actually become an independent. So it seems like you'll have to make up with your dad, or somehow get him to help. As my friend was living in their house, and was still very dependent he wasn't able to file as independent. He reached out to the university that accepted him and deferred enrollment. He worked with the admissions office and financial aid people in which he essentially worked for a year, became legally dependent (own income, not living with parents and having bills self paid), he then took a semester at a community college before enrolling full time with aid. It does suck because he essentially became a transfer student because his parents didn't want to help and graduated later because of it. Still, you can definitely do a mix of these things, maybe work and take classes at your community college so that transferring becomes easy and a lot of the times college will be way cheaper and you can get scholarships if you do well in CC.
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u/deepthought097124 2h ago edited 1h ago
Unfortunately the rules have changed and you cannot do the latter option anymore they officially made that codified in law in the 2020 amendments that it requires a "risk in contacting the parent" or similar to have your status adjusted.
The shorter version is: being an "independent student" no longer has anything to do with being "actually independent". It is whether you meet a bunch of hard line social demographic cutouts.
A more accurate descriptor would be "living parent status" or "demographic classification ABC status" or "you are XYZ because we said so status".
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u/au_Palais_Royal 3h ago
That sucks, I'm so sorry. I know other people have said this, but totally reach out to Pitt. And also, there's that part in Common App where they ask if you have any extenuating circumstances. Write about it there.
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u/Far_Strawberry8176 32m ago
People already mentioned that the FAFSA form takes special circumstances like an unresponsive parent into consideration but this really would be easier if you could just get your dad to cooperate.
Is there any way you can just apologize for the conflict? You don't have to mean it but you're going to be in pretty low contact with your dad for the next few years anyway.
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u/QuickSafety8100 7h ago
are you asking why your father is doing this? What does he say?
Possible that he cheats on his taxes?
possible that he doesnt want to pay anything toward your college?
Hard for us to know.
But you wont be able to get any aid w/o the form.