Please note that I am studying a distance learning course, so what I explain in this blog post is about my struggles with finance for distance learning rather than for a standard university.
Student finance can be a difficult process to go through as while I’m excited to start my university course with the open college of arts, I’ve faced some problems with the finance side of the course. When we first applied for the course, the people we talked to said that the finance won’t take long. Upon starting the funding in July, I didn’t know that it will take months to sort it out.
We started applying soon after I finished my A-level exams, hoping that I would be able to start the creative writing course in September when everyone is going back to school or university. Now we are in September and have to wait a month or so longer for the finance so I can start my course.
While you can start your course at the open college of arts at any time, I wanted to makes sure that I had the finance in place before beginning.
While you can start any course with the university, for the finance, you need to prove that you are doing the course because you struggle to go to a regular university. Student Finance England will need your birth certificate or passport to identify you, as well as proof of your disability, we used my Educational health Care Plan. to prove that while I was at school, I had some support. When you apply, they will say what papers they need.
It’s at this point we met our first problem. To continue with student finance, we needed to start the disability allowance, which we hadn’t started at that point. But to do the disability allowance, we had to complete student finance, so we were stuck in a loop until we called them and sorted everything out.
They also needed to know how much my primary carer is earning so they can decide how much I’d have for my course. We completed that, then student finance was asking for how much ‘null null’ was earning, which confused us. We didn’t know who ‘null null’ was! After another phone call, we got this sorted.
Student Finance- The phone calls
The phone calls to Student Finance and the disability allowance can feel stressful, as while your parent or carer can talk to the person on your behalf, you still have to be there during the conversation, offering information to make sure that they are talking to the right person. Then you have to say whether you want to talk to them or if you’re happy for them to speak with your guardian.
It’s essential to pay attention during these conversations, even if your parent or carer is taking the call because the caller will supply you with relevant information. Personally, I found these conversations a little stressful since you don’t know what the person on the other end is going to say. After the phone calls, I feel relief as Student Finance can sort everything out quickly so we can move on to the next part.
My situation now with Student Finance
Now, we’re waiting for me to go to an assessment that is booked in for early October. As such, I won’t start my course until late October or early November. The assessment can last between half an hour and two hours, which is why we booked mine in for the morning so the afternoon is free and I can have some downtime afterwards.
Student finance will determine from my assessment whether I’ll get any funding for my course and if I do, how much I will get. I’m stressing a little about the assessment as I don’t know what to expect, but I’m hoping that whatever happens, we’ll get some finance while I do my course and that my blog post will help others who are going through student finance.
While our struggles with Student Finance are over, for now, I still stress about the fact that I might not get any funding or extra support for my course.