 Getting
college aid for daughter
|  Dear
Dr. Don,
I am a single mother of five children.
My oldest daughter has graduated from high school and just gone off to college.
I am having a difficult time paying off the rest of the balance for her college
expenses of $7,000.
I am crying and nervous, because my daughter and I
have been through a lot, and I don't want this to be a burden on
her. I work 40-plus hours per week and still can't find how I can
get the help I need to get my daughter through two years in college.
I am hoping that you can e-mail me with more information on who
I can call for help.
-- Desperate Diana
 Dear
Diana,
If you haven't done so already, you and your
daughter should be working with the college's financial aid office
to determine her eligibility for aid, which could include grants,
loans and work-study opportunities. Financial aid for college looks
forward, not backward, so there's not much that can be changed about
the current semester's finances.
If you're obligated to fund an additional $7,000 in
college expenses, and you don't have the money available, you need
to look into a Parent Loan for Undergraduate Student, or PLUS, loan.
The Department of Education's student aid Web
site discusses these loans in greater detail. The site describes
the two different PLUS loan programs -- the Direct
PLUS loan and the FFEL PLUS loan. Here's an excerpt of what the
site says about the two types of PLUS loans:
Parents can borrow a PLUS loan to help pay your education
expenses if you are a dependent undergraduate student enrolled at
least half time in an eligible program at an eligible school. PLUS
loans are available through the Federal Family Education Loan, or
FFEL, program and the William D. Ford Federal Direct Loan, or Direct
Loan, program. Parents can get either loan, but not both, for a
student during the same enrollment period. But parents must have
an acceptable credit history.
The
financial aid office at your daughter's college is your first stop in solving
this problem.
Once you get this semester's finances settled, and
the financial aid office has given you some direction about what
you need to do and what you can expect for next semester's financial
aid, you need to take a breath and look at the bigger picture. A
single mother of five shouldn't go knee deep in debt to finance
her oldest daughter's college education.
There may be some extenuating circumstances that I'm
not aware of, like you promised to fund her college in exchange
for watching her siblings after school while you were at work. But
absent that kind of arrangement, your daughter should be taking
out the loans to finance her school expenses with you assisting
her as much as you can without swamping yourself in debt. You still
have a household to run and other children that are depending on
you, too.
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