Parents Give Up Custody of Their Kids to Get Need-Based College Financial Aid • Hacker News Board

Re: Parents Give Up Custody of Their Kids to Get Need-Based College Financial Aid

#61

Post by riku_iki » Tue, Jul 30, 2019, 6:00 PM UTC

Someone1234 wrote: post #55

stickfigure wrote: post #41

It's odd to me that folks are calling this a scam. I'd describe it more as unintended consequences of a poorly thought out governance system. These "scammers" are using the letter of the law just the same way that accountants figure out how to use every possible loophole to minimize tax burden. Every role-playing gamer in the world is already familiar with the concept. The solution is to fix the system, ideally by fi…

The student is intentionally misleading the colleges about their financial status and the financial support they receive. They're literally declaring themselves financially independent while not being financial independent. That's outright fraud: > In law, fraud is intentional deception to secure unfair or unlawful gain This isn't clever maneuvering. It is unlawful deception.

> misleading the colleges about their financial status and the financial support they receive.

I think colleges don't care if students actually receive support from parents, they only check parents income/assets, and if parents refuse to provide support then student is in trouble. So giving up custody is a legal way to express this situation in legal terms.

Re: Parents Give Up Custody of Their Kids to Get Need-Based College Financial Aid

#62

Post by dsfyu404ed » Tue, Jul 30, 2019, 6:04 PM UTC

mox1 wrote: post #30

So it is ok for companies to do things like this with the tax laws, but not OK for individuals? There is no law against giving up custody of your child. Additionally, FAFSA says you must include parents wealth, so if you have no "parents", then you don't have to include them.

People who didn't circumvent the obvious spirit of the rules while complying with the letter of the rules are pissed off that there exist people who did just that, saved a bunch of money doing so and have an presumably clear conscience.

While I understand why these people are annoyed I don't have much sympathy. Always read and understand the fine print. Always read and understand the rules. If X is allowed and doing X would benefit you then you are shooting yourself in the foot by not doing X. If the people writing the rules don't like it then they have the power to change it. And no, I didn't take advantage of this but I knew of the loophole at the time, wish I did and I'm paying for my laziness every month.

Re: Parents Give Up Custody of Their Kids to Get Need-Based College Financial Aid

#63

Post by Someone1234 » Tue, Jul 30, 2019, 6:04 PM UTC

riku_iki wrote: post #61

Someone1234 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The student is intentionally misleading the colleges about their financial status and the financial support they receive. They're literally declaring themselves financially independent while not being financial independent. That's outright fraud: > In law, fraud is intentional deception to secure unfair or unlawful gain This isn't clever maneuvering. It is unlawful deception.

> misleading the colleges about their financial status and the financial support they receive. I think colleges don't care if students actually receive support from parents, they only check parents income/assets, and if parents refuse to provide support then student is in trouble. So giving up custody is a legal way to express this situation in legal terms.

> So giving up custody is a legal way to express this situation in legal terms.

That's a different situation than the situation the article discusses. These kids are still receiving support while pretending not to (for financial gain).

The colleges are now asking if the student is still on their parent's health insurance and or getting their bills paid by their parents to combat the abuse they've been seeing.

Re: Parents Give Up Custody of Their Kids to Get Need-Based College Financial Aid

#64

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Jul 30, 2019, 6:09 PM UTC

jseliger wrote: post #33

dv_dt wrote: post #4

It seems much fairer to universally fund zero or low cost tuition for public university (or trade school, etc) irrespective of wealth and people wanting the prestige or networking or whatever of private university institutions can then pay for that perceived added value. Instead, we have squabbles over the scraps of funding over current access and the enforcement costs of trying to keep one group from "getting ahead"…

It seems much fairer to universally fund zero or low cost tuition for public university (or trade school, etc) I like the inclusion of trade school: https://jakeseliger.com/2018/03/12/the-case-against-educatio... , as a lot of modern college education is bogus: https://jakeseliger.com/2014/04/27/paying-for-the-party-eliz... . I've been on the supplier side of it, and the extent of the corruption in the system is unde…

[deleted]

Re: Parents Give Up Custody of Their Kids to Get Need-Based College Financial Aid

#65

Post by godshatter » Tue, Jul 30, 2019, 6:09 PM UTC

matz1 wrote: post #11

More like money saving tricks to me, doesn't seem illegal.

Yeah, I'm having a definition problem with this one too. It appears that what they did was not prohibited by the system. Maybe not the most ethical way to go about things, but not explicitly prohibited.

Re: Parents Give Up Custody of Their Kids to Get Need-Based College Financial Aid

#66

Post by protomyth » Tue, Jul 30, 2019, 6:11 PM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #50

t-writescode wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This depends on the degree. My computer science degree had CS classes all the way from freshman year, and I think the pre-requisite graph required at least 3 years, so the standard ‘2 years of core classes for an associates and then 2 years of degree-specific courses’ wouldn’t have worked well for people like me and it would have taken me 5+ years of relatively light classes to finish college with a degree rather tha…

> My computer science degree had CS classes all the way from freshman year, and I think the pre-requisite graph required at least 3 years, so the standard ‘2 years of core classes for an associates and then 2 years of degree-specific courses’ wouldn’t have worked well for people like me Community colleges often have CS programs, they don't just offer GE. They may not have equivalents for all of the courses in a parti…

Some states, like North Dakota, have common course numbering to make sure the credits can transfer from the community colleges to the universities. If the local community college doesn't offer the specific class, you can often get a distance learning option through the community college.

Re: Parents Give Up Custody of Their Kids to Get Need-Based College Financial Aid

#67

Post by jandrewrogers » Tue, Jul 30, 2019, 6:15 PM UTC

This addresses a real public policy failure: students with no financial means are denied all financial aid because eligibility is dependent on a third-party with no legal obligations. Imputing that a person has assets to which they have no legal title or right is indefensible policy. Imagine if receiving welfare assistance was contingent on your neighbor's income being sufficiently low and the kind of incentives that would create.

The policy assumption that parents will financially support their adult children is false for a non-trivial percentage of the population, and leads to bad outcomes for those people. People that fall into this crack are often left with no recourse when it comes to public assistance, which leads to loophole hacks like the one in the article.

Re: Parents Give Up Custody of Their Kids to Get Need-Based College Financial Aid

#68

Post by dsfyu404ed » Tue, Jul 30, 2019, 6:15 PM UTC

DanBC wrote: post #58

Hang on, are they actually giving up custody? What happens if the child is hit by a car, is unconscious, and needs medical attention?

If nobody has custody then those decisions are made by next of kin which would be parents/siblings/children. I forget the specific order (maybe varies based on state law and context?) but it doesn't really matter for functional families since parents and siblings will generally be in agreement about those sorts of things.

Re: Parents Give Up Custody of Their Kids to Get Need-Based College Financial Aid

#69

Post by protomyth » Tue, Jul 30, 2019, 6:15 PM UTC

GVIrish wrote: post #57

jimbokun wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can go to a community college for much less money Agreed. > and all kids aren't required to go to College to earn a good living. This will need a citation. My understanding is that the gap between between college graduates incomes and non-college graduate incomes continues to increase.

There are plenty of skilled trade jobs that pay as well or better than a number of undergraduate degrees. Electrician, aviation techs, construction managers, plumbers, radiology tech, LPN, and dental hygienists are all jobs that pay as well or better than some of the lower paying bachelor's degree careers. So that would be your history, english, biology, psychology degrees, etc. Here's a chart of salaries by 4 year d…

Obviously once you get into engineering degrees, computer science, finance, law degrees, and the like, no trade school or community college degree can compare.

Well, I wouldn't be so sure of that. Quite a few of the vocations can make more than what you mentioned. It is variable, much like the pay of a computer science major depending on market.

Re: Parents Give Up Custody of Their Kids to Get Need-Based College Financial Aid

#70

Post by riku_iki » Tue, Jul 30, 2019, 6:16 PM UTC

Someone1234 wrote: post #63

riku_iki wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> misleading the colleges about their financial status and the financial support they receive. I think colleges don't care if students actually receive support from parents, they only check parents income/assets, and if parents refuse to provide support then student is in trouble. So giving up custody is a legal way to express this situation in legal terms.

> So giving up custody is a legal way to express this situation in legal terms. That's a different situation than the situation the article discusses. These kids are still receiving support while pretending not to (for financial gain). The colleges are now asking if the student is still on their parent's health insurance and or getting their bills paid by their parents to combat the abuse they've been seeing.

> That's a different situation than the situation the article discusses. These kids are still receiving support while pretending not to (for financial gain).

could you provide citation?

I think article says exactly that some students want to separate from parents through guardianship concept and try to push this through court, but colleges investigate and flag such cases internally.