Friday, August 12, 2005

Communication people, please!

So, my financial aid mess isn't over yet. I had a long talk with them today...

Effectively the validation paperwork I filed out had never been processed. I called this morning to check on the status of my financial aid paperwork, said I had reinstated my courses (since they had been dropped), submitted verification paperwork, jumped through all the hoops they've given me (realize that I still have to add and drop some independent study classes so I can get paid for research in October and be able to pay off debts), but no this isn't over yet.

These are the same people that gave me a hassle about not knowing that I was selected for verification, apparently I filled out the paperwork the wrong way, even though this is the same way I've been filling it out for the last 3 years. If someone who works at a financial aid department is reading this, please respond in the comments section about how I'm supposed to be rational about their behavior.

Well, I'm supposed to move in on Monday, but it doesn't look like that's going to happen. If I fax it over today they expect it to take 2 days to change the numbers and then they will process an award letter, hopefully. But school starts on Wednesday and I fear I will not be able to make it to my 8:15 am class in time for the first lecture of the semester. I will be e-mailing professors today to tell them all about the mess fin aid has created.

Being homeless is not the kind of life-style I'm looking forward to, and residence life might be forgiving in my case, or maybe not. Fin aid has a long list of mess-ups that have required students to take an extra year on because they couldn't attend one year or owe so much money they transferred. Do the higher-ups in university bureaucracy honestly believe that image is all a student thinks about when attending a university? I mean, I certainly think a student isn't going to attend a university they don't feel comfortable about, but if a student doesn't have any choice and will either owe $7,000 or go to a community college, guess where they are headed?

It's a no-brainer from the student poverty side of the argument, we're going to go where it is cheaper for us to go. Some people like private, heck I do because it offers me a more personal touch, forget the book fiasco, my profs are understanding. They know who I am, go out of their way to say "hello" and are, overall, just really great people. But financial aid goes and messes it all up by letting 2 people (at least 2, there may be more) go on vacation during this critical time of the school year. How can you be understaffed and still make a whole bunch of students financial aid packets go through?

Why aren't students validating? Maybe they don't have a financial aid packet to begin with, maybe that's why they can't do it because you won't let them until they jump through the olympic-sized hoops that you've created. Damn bureaucracy. Am I being unreasonable to ask, to think that, maybe they could tell students when something is wrong?

Either they have to tell us, or cut out the middle man and make the information available to us. Put up some sort of "status of student aid" link somewhere on the advisement system or something so students could know what the status of their financial aid is. Is it really that hard to get software that works? Or is it really that hard to look for more flexible workers that are willing to dedicate time to their job and not take time off during this particular season?

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