Private Student Loans & No Cosigner?

August 27, 2010

Sarah’s almost done with school, but senior year is going to be brutal. Private student loans may be the answer, but she’s lacking a cosigner. I’ll let her tell the rest. I’m an undergrad college student, going into my senior year. I graduate next May & start applying to grad schools in December! Congrats! Up [...]

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Claiming Independent On FAFSA: Can Anyone Do It?

August 26, 2010

Krista’s firmly in the financial aid dead zone. You might be there, too. Hey Josh, thanks for your blog! It has been the MOST helpful resource I’ve found. Thanks! I mean, you’re welcome! I am currently a senior in high school, and taking 2 classes at the local community college for dual credit. I want [...]

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Private Student Loans: Should You Use Them?

August 25, 2010

All right, hombres y mujeres — today we’re going to talk about private student loans a little bit, since I promised you yesterday that we would. We left off yesterday with Marissa’s story of telling us about her college cutting her off from student loans because she’d already funded her cost of attendance. I advised [...]

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Cost of Attendance: Can Your School Cut Off Your Student Loans?

August 24, 2010

Marissa’s a smart gal. She’s done her student loans homework and she knows how much she’s allowed to borrow from the federal government each year. She’s got kids to feed and bills to pay, and she’s counting on using those loans to do so. Problem is, well before she reached that point, her school has [...]

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Outlaw Student: Getting Around The New Site

August 23, 2010

Welcome to the first post on the new site! I’m going to keep it brief today and give you a quick rundown on what’s new and how to get around, and then I’ll get back to my regular posting schedule tomorrow. 1) I decided to name the site OutlawStudent.com because I think it fits the [...]

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Rejected From College: Why?

August 18, 2010

Parent Month continues! Today I’m actually answering a parent, Jim, whose daughter was rejected from college. He wants to know why. My daughter graduated with distinguished honor (3.80 or over) (top 10% of the class) from high school in June. The college application process was grueling. Ain’t it, though? I’m not looking forward to it [...]

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Parents’ Aspirations vs. Your Aspirations

August 17, 2010

Boy, parents cannot catch a break around these parts lately, eh? Seems like every other day this past month I’m writing about unsupportive parents or parents who give bad advice or some other way that parents screw up their kids en route to college. Today we’ll continue our gentle constructive criticism of misguided parents, but [...]

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How Do Student Loans Affect Your Credit Score?

August 16, 2010

Welcome back, everyone! I guess it’s more appropriate to say welcome back to myself, since I’m the one who took off for a week on a family vacation to Wisconsin Dells, WI. Five days in an outdoor water park left me rested and ready to attack the fresh pile of your questions that accumulated. It [...]

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Parent PLUS Loans: Should You Pay Your Parents Back?

August 6, 2010

T’errah is like lots of us: She feels guilty about all the money her parents are taking out in loans to send her to school. T’errah feels especially guilty because her school is very expensive. But she’s loving it to death. I am a rising sophomore in college. I am in a huge dilemma right [...]

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Fashion School: Just Go Already, Courtney!

August 5, 2010

Courtney listens to other people too much, and herself not enough. There you go — that’s the one-sentence summary of today’s post for all you ADHD types out there. Read on if you want the details on Courtney’s situation, which is both cautionary and inspirational. She dearly loves fashion design, but reasons NOT to pursue [...]

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Perkins Loans vs Stafford Loans

August 4, 2010

It’s a busy day around here, so I’m picking a short question today because it has a short answer. Nina wants to know what I think of paying off student loans with other student loans. Not a common question, but not unprecedented, either. I’m a senior in college and I have completely reached my limit [...]

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Scholarship Essays For People Who Can’t Write

August 3, 2010

Rachel’s a 4.0 student, but she doesn’t think she’s a good enough writer to pull out victories in a lot of newer scholarship essay contests with really creative questions. So she doesn’t know whether it’s worth it to bother. I’m currently going into my sophomore year in college at a small, private college, which is [...]

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NYU Financial Aid: Another One Bites the Dust

August 2, 2010

If you read these pages often enough, you might begin to pick up on what seems like an anti-private school bias. I end up advising lots of students to go to community colleges or cheaper state schools over private schools. But it’s not that I have anything against private schools per se; I’m just concerned [...]

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Mom Returning To School: Got What It Takes?

July 30, 2010

Margie’s a wife and mother who’s about to transfer into a four-year school, but she’s not sure she’s got a good enough resume to impress the big boys. Greetings Judge Josh! I have been an avid reader of your site for a while now and have found your candor to be refreshing and many of [...]

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Paying For College: The Broke Family’s 2-Step Guide

July 29, 2010

If you’re reading this blog, there’s a damned fine chance you’re in the same spot as Amia: you’re ready to go to college, except you’re broke and so is your family, so paying for college is a giant question mark. And even if “broke” isn’t exactly the right word, you still don’t have anywhere near [...]

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How To Deal With Unsupportive Parents

July 28, 2010

My parents were always good to me when I was growing up, and it’s hard to imagine how differently my life may have turned out if they hadn’t been. They were good to me when I was in college, also. They didn’t have much money to contribute to my tuition, but they called every Sunday [...]

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Online Degrees: Are They a Mistake?

July 27, 2010

Lindsay lives in Alaska, and in addition to lacking warmth, daylight and tons of human companionship, she also lacks a wide variety of colleges from which to choose. So she’s doing an online degree program, and her friends’ reaction has got her in a state. Okay, here’s the deal- I am a recent high school [...]

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Student Loans With Bad Credit?

July 26, 2010

Every time I get a note from someone like Frances, I’m assured that this site will be in business for a long time. Unfortunately for Frances and the millions like her out there, the process of getting financial aid dollars is difficult to navigate and it seems there’s no good one-stop source for answers to [...]

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Can a Brilliant Illegal Alien Go To College in the U.S.?

July 22, 2010

Juan is an illegal alien who’s been in the U.S. since age 7. A really, really smart one, apparently, because he’s been accepted to some really tough colleges and been offered big scholarships. Problem is, he can’t take any government money because he’s not an American citizen. Thus, he’s in quite the pickle. Hello Judge [...]

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Grad Students: Kiss Your Parents Goodbye

July 21, 2010

Ashley’s off to grad school and is afraid her parents’ high incomes will hurt her when it comes to financial aid. She’s even thinking maybe they should divorce to make them look poorer on paper. Hold your horses, Ashley! There’s an easier solution which allows for, among other things, Mom and Dad to stay hitched. [...]

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Studying Multiple Languages: What’s the Point?

July 20, 2010

Laoi is a girl after my own heart. Or, possibly, a boy after my own heart — the name is not a dead giveaway in terms of gender. Anyhow, Laoi loves foreign languages and wants to study tons of them. I was, and still am, the same way. If you speak foreign languages competently, you’ve [...]

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Honors Programs: Are They Worth The Hassle?

July 19, 2010

Honors programs — lots of schools have them, but are they worth the extra work you have to put in for the designation? My answer is the usual — “it depends.” Depends on what you want to do with your life and what you expect the honors programs to actually do for you. Mike’s wondering [...]

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Two Years Abroad: Overkill?

July 16, 2010

We’ve been talking a lot lately about studying abroad, but I haven’t had anyone ask me about spending two years out of the country until today. Michelle’s eager to spend that second year abroad, but she’s worried that the American college that’s interested in her won’t wait around forever. Dear Mr. Judge Josh, Hello my [...]

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No Post Today. Sick Daughter.

July 15, 2010

Hello, my good friends. Just a quick note to tell you that I will not be doing my regular post today because I’m home with a sick daughter who’s spiking a 104+ fever. Be back at you tomorrow. Study hard, eat your vegetables, etc. Your pal, Judge Josh

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Take the Loan, Single Moms

July 14, 2010

Most of the time on this site, I devote a lot of my space to discouraging you guys from taking student loans — at least the ones you don’t really need. On rare occasion, though, I’ll run into a situation where I wholeheartedly advise someone to take out more loans than they’re even considering. For [...]

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Call Me Katie or Catherine?

July 13, 2010

It’s a good day for an odd question. Judge Josh, first allow me to indulge in some brief flattery: I love that your humor amplifies the impressions that your insights leave on me in my scholarship pursuits! Oh…go on. Now to the context of my inquiry: I’ll be going away to college (first in my [...]

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Should You Risk a Lower GPA For More Outside Activities?

July 12, 2010

Meg Hey there Josh, I’m here to fret about my GPA (shocking, yes?) No! I’m about to begin my third year in college and I’ve maintained a pretty decent GPA. After three semesters, I was carried a 3.9. Agreed, that is exceedingly decent. In my fourth semester however, my school work became slightly less of [...]

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Abandon Your Passions For Boredom & Safety?

July 9, 2010

Rachel’s the kind of girl I started this site for — someone who’s getting rotten advice from the people close to her. And so, loyal fans, today I spring into action on her and your behalf. Behalves. Whatever. Hi Josh, This fall, I’m going to be a Junior in college. My declared major at present [...]

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Should You Keep Your Religion To Yourself?

July 8, 2010

Of the 200+ scholarship help articles I’ve written in the last year or so, the one that’s gotten me the second-largest amount of hate mail is the one about thrusting your politics and religion upon scholarship judges. (It’s a distant second, mind you — the top spot is still held solidly by the admittedly inflammatory [...]

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Working For Money vs. Research & Learning

July 7, 2010

After you get past your freshman year of college and you’ve got a good handle on what kind of time demands your coursework is going to require, you may run into this extremely common dilemma about how you should spend your “free” (non-studying) time: Should I use my spare hours for academic pursuits/personal growth, or [...]

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