As the UCI community prepares for a new year, it is incredibly disappointing to see that the financial aid crisis continues to affect students going into the winter quarter. The Office of Financial Aid and Scholarships (OFAS) continues to put students in financial and emotional distress, and it must be resolved.
UCI forums such as r/UCI remain flooded with students expressing their confusion, stress and anger over their financial aid packages and the lack of accessibility in reaching OFAS for questions. A new stress students now face is the possibility of their classes getting dropped for the new quarter. While OFAS has stated that those who did not receive financial aid will not be dropped from their classes, many students have reported that their classes were, in fact, dropped.
OFAS has now lost the trust of the majority of the UCI community, and there seems to be no effort to rebuild it.
The long wait times for calling the office have also continued, with students placed on hold for multiple hours or put on unreasonably long waitlists. Although OFAS showed some effort to support students by announcing that staff would be working on a weekend back in September, the office’s unavailability to so many students now is inexcusable.
Similar to fall quarter, the fee deadline for winter was set at Dec. 16 and was not extended. At the beginning of the crisis, the community practically begged the school to extend the deadline to give students and their families more time to receive their aid and address their financial needs. It is clear now that UCI and OFAS did not listen and continue to push students into distress. It is to the point where students have shared on r/UCI that they have no other choice but to drop out because they simply cannot afford to pay for their education without aid.
How many more students will have to drop out or defer this quarter? How many more financial burdens and emotional distress will the school create? How many more hours-long wait times and endless waitlists will OFAS force students endure to get their answers? It is unclear when this crisis will ever be resolved, but it is very apparent that it must end going into the new quarter.
The next financial aid distribution for winter is scheduled for Jan. 6. The UCI community can only hope that it will be properly distributed — though many understandably have their doubts. UCI and OFAS must end this crisis if they want to support students during this distressing time in any way.
Editor’s note: Editorials should not be interpreted to reflect the opinion, thoughts or beliefs of any individual New University editor, staff member or affiliate.
