Last year I got accepted to the only school I wanted to go to: NYU. It was hard to get into, but I had NO WAY to pay for it. Even with grants and the basic stafford laons, etc, we still had to pay 16 thousand. My parents BOTH have bad credit and they don't OWN a home. I have no credit of my own and barely have a car and can't find a job. Now it's one year later, and I've been accepted to SVA and my dad 's credit is still a mess. My family has no assets and no way to get a loan. I'm so depressed. Does anyone know any last ditch efforts or any way I can get a charity type of thing or a loan with high interest? I'm at my ropes end here.

Talk to the financial aid department at the school. They should have other resources.

They told me the only thing I can do is apply for the Merit Scholarship, which is a 10,000 dollar scholarship given to kids who need money, like in my positions, but only a limited amount of kids get it, so it's kind of a longshot.

Please someone help me

I dont think anyone here has an answers for you. Private schools are nice but sometimes the costs do not justify the expense. Have you looked at other affordable school options???

I tried one last year and they literally lost all of my financial aid forms and expecte dme to pay 4000 upfront. Plus the staff barely gave a &&&&, the place was a joke. I was just trying to go to a school that meets my standards of work ethic and actually involving me in my field. You get what you pay for, and I guess the whole "No Child Left Behind" thing isn't true. I'll have to lower my standards A LOT. This is depressing.



Lupin, watch your language; this is a family channel.

I believe that the "No Child Left Behind" only applies to K-12 education and let's face it...you are an adult. There are a lot of great public schools out there if you just look without lowering your standards. Others do their general education and intro courses at community colleges and then transfer to the school of their choice. It saves money plus it gives you the chance to work and put away some money to pay for school.

Where can I find a financial aid consultant in California? I need to get the information for my daughter.

thank you

What information are you looking for?? Has she done a FAFSA??

Every school has a financial aid department with FA officers. Call them or check out the schools website.

Lupin - what about private loans? Since NYU is VERY expensive, there must be other students who are in your situation. Did you qualify for Work Study? Is part-time an option?

Try to be patient with the FA people, I know they are very frustrating to work with, but you need them on your side.


Is this for an undergraduate or graduate degree? If it is for an undergraduate degree it makes ALOT of financial sense to go to the junior college for two years and transfer to a public university. Going to a private school DOES NOT mean that you get a better education or that you will have an easier time finding a job when you graduate.

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Co-sign. ^^^^^^^^^^^^

I owe so much money for school. I wish someone would have talked me out of going to an expensive school. You see, I did not want to go to a public school or a community college. Yes the university gave me money for the first two years but no extra money the following years. This is called a bait-and- switch tatic, they do this to a lot of students. My undergrad tuition was 25,000.00 a year. I could only get 18,500 in loans, but the school paid for the rest. I lived at home. Imagine if I had to pay for room and board!

In my opinion it was not worth it. I struggled to find a good job and now I am struggling to pay back all of these loans. I regret getting my degree from this school. I should have went to a public school.

I hope this is graduate school that you are investing this money into. NYU is a great school, but if you cannot afford to go there..then you just can't. As far as dealing with FinAid, frankly it is sometimes who you know. Yes people don't want to hear that. But it is true. Look around and see people in the same predicament as you who have a free ride.

Life is not fair. You should not owe what amounts to a small house when you graduate from college.

I wish you the best of luck.

I wish you the best of luck.

Actually that is not entirely true. While many public colleges are good, the statistics show starting salaries are higher for grads of private institutions.

Please provide a link for your statistics.

Actually, even if there are statistics that say that, it doesn't mean at all that the private school education led you to get a better job. There are many reasons why salaries might be lower coming out of a public school than a private one, none of which have anything to do with the quality of education. First, many more people coming out of private school have a MUCH higher debt load than those coming out of a public school. This means that you're more likely to go after the higher paying jobs because you have to get them in order to pay off your loan -- because your SL payments are high, you're probably not any better off than if you had a lower SL payment and a lower-paying job and some broader choices in what you want to do with your life. Also, many people go to public schools with the plan that they will go into public sector/interest jobs (translation -- lower paying!), so they don't want to pay as much knowing this already. Law school is a HUGE example of this. The average starting salary for a public sector legal job (state's attorney, public defender, etc.) is only about 1/3 of that of a private law firm starting salary at best (and public interest law is even lower than that). Unless you plan on staying a VERY short time or you have some other way of paying back the loans, it's much easier to just go to a public school right off the bat. Some do, but do most people go to Harvard or Yale looking to become a public school teacher? Probably not. But, at my state school, a good chunk of the of the campus (probably about 1/4) was studying to be a teacher.

I will say that I walked out of my public school with an education that allowed me to be accepted to a law school ranked one of the top 5 in the nation -- which I declined in order to go to a top 20 public school (yup, a public school that was highly ranked -- shock!!) for exactly this reason -- I knew I didn't want to work in a "traditional" legal job and wouldn't have the money for a private school debt load (heck, I barely have the money for a public school debt load, but that's a whole other story!! ). College is what you make of it, for better or worse, and where you go doesn't make as much of a difference as we all think at the beginning.

Lupin, good luck in whatever you decide. If nothing else, you may want to look at going to a junior college for the first two years and then transferring to NYU like other posters have said. Your diploma will still say you graduated from NYU, but you will have a couple of years to save some money, build up your credit report, and have two years at a MUCH cheaper tuition.

Also, I wouldn't read so much into "they lost my paperwork at the state school, so therefore all state schools are made up of lazy people who are beneath me." Would you say the same thing if NYU lost your paperwork? S&*% happens sometimes no matter where you are!

Well that school is notorious for doing that to everyone. They really don't care.



And you see, I'm majoring in film. I want to be a writer/director, and a big part of that field is luck. I don't care about the degree. A degree from NYU seriously won't get me anywhere in my field. But I craved the KNOWLEDGE and ENVIRONMENT. I don't know about your schools, but public schools around here are filled with students who don't care, they just want to get it over with, and teachers with the same attitude. They would talk to the students like idiots, because everyone saw it as a chore, like high school part 2.


Visiting NYU, everyone was so into it. The students were into learning, knowledge, expanding. The teachers were highly regarded, the facilities were top of the line. They strived for expansion and excellence and hard work. And it was in the middle of NYC, possible the biggest mesch of cultre in the world. I felt at home, and as a film maker and artist, it really is a place to grow, so I guess that's why I fought so hard for NYU and SVA. They were places for artists to really grow.

Whatever your reasons may be, if you can't afford the school, you just can't afford it. If it's really that important to you to attend NYU, then I would suggest you get a job and work your way through; it's the only way you'll be able to do it.

quite frankly, if I have financial problems, I would not go to a private school. I have graduate degree from a state school (it is ranked in many divisions) and it was pretty good and it has helped me in my career. I understand at your phase of life, you want to go to a school that you like and respect otherwise you will not interested in your classes and also will not do well exams. But trust me, non-private schools are great and very much respected. Pick one of them that is accredited.

THe other option is to work for one year and try to improve your credit/ financial situation; when things get better join the school next year. A lot schools accept students that were accepted in the past. Just keep a good rapport with a few professors. One year will fly very fast