Finance

First, two quick fun facts about student financing that I REALLY wish I had known to pay attention to during my first year of college:

Hampshire Bill Info


 * Hampshire legally cannot show your financial aid on your paper bill or on the Hub until the semester begins. You have to compute the difference for yourself. Don’t wait for Hampshire to send you your bill to pay for it.

Study Abroad?


 * Financial aid can be applied to study-abroad ventures, read more below.

When to apply for a loan/ When to pay
If you need private loans, getting approval could in theory take only a matter of weeks. However, if you aren’t approved, it can take longer for the bank simply to inform you of this fact because they don’t view you as a customer. Additionally, even institutions that use ’instant approval’ sometimes decide that they need more time for their decision, even when they do end up approving the loan. To make sure your loan’s promissory note is in before the final date of E-check-in (a simple online process which Hampshire uses to verify that you actually showed up, but which you can’t complete if you haven’t paid, and can’t officially register for courses if you haven’t done) try to apply for a loan in early summer. Financial Services is often reasonable with extenuating circumstances, but don’t push your luck, and try not to have your first days at Hampshire spent running around to various administrators.

Federal loan eligibility
Just because your financial aid statement doesn’t say that you are eligible for a federal student loan, that doesn’t mean you aren’t. Only Perkins loans must be explicitly ’awarded.’

Federal Student Loans

 * For federally subsidized student loans, Hampshire works directly with the government, meaning that you cannot apply for a Stafford Loan like you would get from a bank. To get a direct student loan you complete an easy online virtual ’loan counseling’ session, and you can sign your promissory note with your FAFSA pin. They use words that make it sound like you have to go talk to real live people, but it’s all very automated to the point where one almost feels incredulous that a decent chunk of money is actually going to be loaned after that process. It is, however, a good idea to contact financial services to tell them that you have completed the ’counseling’ and ’signed’ your promissory note, as in spring 2007, the website started having some errors in reporting. As always, it’s a great idea to print out the page that says you’ve completed the process to keep for your records. You can contact our loan counselor, Andy Korenewsky, by phone at (413) 559-6044; by email at loans@hampshire.edu, or even by fax at (413) 559-5585.
 * Complete the online loan entrance counseling here: http://www.dlssonline.com/borrower/EntrCounselingPage.do?cmd=doStart. They’ll tell you facts about the loan and give you a relatively easy quiz afterward before you can sign your promissory note, which Hampshire explains here: http://www.hampshire.edu/offices/3955.htm
 * Borrowing limits for a federally subsidized student loans as of July 1, 2007 (be sure to Google or ask for the latest numbers) are:


 * $3,500 for first-year students
 * $4,500 for the second year
 * $5,500 for each subsequent year


 * A glossary of terms used with direct student loans can be found here: http://www.ed.gov/offices/OSFAP/DirectLoan/glos.html

Parental Federal Loans (PLUS)

 * Federal loans taken out by parents (PLUS loans) need to go through another institution as an intermediary. Hampshire no longer seems to have such a list of such institutions online

Private/ Alternative Loans

 * Information about private loans for students and parents can be found here: http://www.hampshire.edu/cms/index.php?id=265

Understanding Your Loan

 * Chances are that you aren’t familiar with a lot of loan terminology, and if you’re looking into a private or alternative loan, that understanding can get pretty darn important in weighing your options. This page defines a lot of terms used in explaining loans: http://www.oasfaa.org/docs/resources/outreach/loantrms.pdf

Applying the Loan to Your Bill

 * When Hampshire receives loans, they automatically divide the amount between the next two semesters. If you are trying to pay for just the one semester at a time, you should explicitly inform Hampshire of this fact to make sure that the full amount is applied, even if the amount of the loan is precisely the amount you owe for that semester. Still, not all loans will even allow you to use them for only one semester, specifically federal loans. You should check first because it kind of stinks to find out that your loan has to be spread out over the whole year right before classes are going to start.

Usually the lender will send necessary paperwork to Hampshire once you complete your end of the paperwork, or in the case of federal student loans, this information should be sent out once you complete counseling and ’sign’ your master promissory note.

WORK STUDY

 * Numerous jobs are available both on and off campus. Off-campus jobs can frequently be more interesting and make for a more impressive resume but obviously come with travel commitments and are generally more demanding than, for instance, an on-campus monitoring job. Contacting potential employers before the school-year by phone or e-mail is a fine idea, but most people wait until the beginning of the year. If this is your first time, it’s best to come to campus with at least several potential employers to contact, since you’ll be juggling the job search that with orientation week, any other financial snafus you might have, and meeting all the fabulous folks here. It’s just a matter of less worry.


 * Research your job interests early and make early contact. Off-campus employers only pay a small percentage of your wage, so they are often enthusiastic about genuinely interested work-study candidates.


 * Your work-study commitment can be applied directly to your bill by filling out a form which you should be given on your first day at Hampshire, even before you actually get a job. This form is also available in the office of Student Employment in Blair Hall. This form will ask what percentage of your bill can be deducted at a time and the maximum amount they can take from your bill. You can also simply inform the Business Office that you want to pay for a portion of your tuition with workstudy money, and you can pay the amount yourself later in the semester. However, the maximum amount of tuition money you can defer via workstudy is $500.


 * Before you can be paid for off-campus work-study, you also need to get a form from financial services which you will fill out with your employer. You will have to monitor your time with two-week paper time-slips that can be deposited in either a box in the mail room, or with financial services. On-campus employment uses the Hub to track time. Even if you work off campus, the Hub keeps track of your payment history should you ever need to refer back to it.


 * The Office of Student Employment is on the intranet here: https://intranet.hampshire.edu/cms/index.php?id=4704. It even has job listings. Click on ’Work Study on Campus,’ ’Work Study Off Campus,’ or even, ’Non-Work-Study Jobs’ to see them. These sections will list jobs that may be full, so make a great big list of things you could be interested in. Do not make the mistake of thinking that the ’Open Jobs’ list is comprehensive of all student employment to be had.


 * Information about student employment for international students is available on the intranet here: https://intranet.hampshire.edu/cms/index.php?id=8339

Paying Hampshire Quickly

 * Sometimes you need to pay Hampshire post haste. Hampshire uses an online service that allows you to do this, CashNet. CashNet does charge a 2.9% service fee on the first $3,000, and 2.15% on all funds thereafter. Be aware that CashNet accepts only American Express, MasterCard and Discover/Novus but does allow you to pay by ACH (writing down the numbers off of a personal paper check). Please, for the love of all that is holy, do not put a significant amount that you can’t pay back soon on a credit card unless you really want to be in completely unnecessarily excess debt. Hampshire also accepts wire transfers.

Tuition Management System

 * Sometimes people need to pay Hampshire a lot of money within the year, but not quite in a lump sum. Hampshire uses the Afford Tuition Management System. Their website is here: https://www.afford.com/index.aspx?di=z5avap55g41sb5n2zwfblf55

Paying Hampshire by Mail and other Traditional Formats

 * The other ways to pay Hampshire like the old-fashioned postal service are given here: http://www.hampshire.edu/cms/index.php?id=8618

TAXES

 * As long as you personally made under $52,000 in year you are filing for (and I’m betting you did), you have the opportunity to file your taxes online without having to pay for the service. The IRS has a list of private companies you can file with free of charge at this site: http://www.irs.gov/app/freeFile/jsp/index.jsp?ck Not all services provide free filing for all states, so look for one that will accommodate work you might have done in all applicable states.
 * Certain information about taxes and employment for international students is available on the Hampshire intranet here: https://intranet.hampshire.edu/cms/index.php?id=8338

MORE INFO

 * The general spiel that Hampshire covers for financial aid is available online at: http://www.hampshire.edu/cms/index.php?id=86

Other contact info: Phone: 413-559-5484 FAX: 413-559-5585 Email: sfs@hampshire.edu Campus mail: Box SF Postal Service:

Student Financial Services Hampshire College Amherst, MA 01002-5001

Overnight delivery:

Student Financial Services Hampshire College - Blair Hall 893 West Street Amherst, MA 01002

The phone gets really busy as the semester approaches and e-mail is a bit clogged too. Again, handling things as early as possible is the best approach. If it’s too late for that, then I hope we’ve managed to answer your question.