FinAid living expences for online college

[xxx]

A friend of mine claimed to recieve finaid for living expences while enrolled in an online school. I find that hard to believe but he swears by it. Anyone else heard of that or done it?

[dcan]

The Post-9/11 GI Bill does that. Not aware of any other program though.

Beginning October 1, 2011 Students taking 100% of their courses online will be eligible for a monthly stipend equal to half of the national average stipend, which is $673.50 for 2011.

New Post-9/11 GI Bill Overview | Military.com

[nj593]

A friend of mine claimed to recieve finaid for living expences while enrolled in an online school. I find that hard to believe but he swears by it. Anyone else heard of that or done it?

If Im assuming correctly what your friend is doing is this.
Lets say tuition is 4500 per semester 2 semesters to the year. Thats 9k for the year. Fafsa,grants, scholarships gives her 8k she has 1k left. She then is taking out secured loans from the government. Financial aid usually does this for the student to help them because it gives a student less of a chance to back out. Which means the school has a cap they are allowed to ask for in loans. If there is 10k left the student gets it. What the student does it is up to them return or use. But they have to repay it.
Now for docs and law students its different they are allowed a larger portion of loans because for example law students are not allowed to work more than pt, some law schools do not allow work at all.

[rebel100]

NJ got it.

Put another way, lets say you receive a full PELL grant of around $5900/yr. You then enroll fully online at an inexpensive school like NMJC. 12+ hours at NMJC += about $1200 by going full time (12 hours per semester) that student receives half of their grant $2950 for that semester. The school will take theirs and send the rest to the student. In this case a check for around $1750. Any loans would come on top of that. In some cases it can pay to go to school. Remember that the concept behind the grants is to facilitate going to school. Things like child care, gas, living expenses are considered legitimate expenses and you have some of those expenses even if your fully online.

So yes, your friend is likely telling the truth.

[jp77840]

Yes. Only if the university is regionally accredited or nationally for that matter. Check with your institution.