Applied for Federal Aid But School won't let us have it because we tested low in Math?

Question

We are a homeschool family with twins who enrolled in a communtiy college. We applied for federal aid and we can receive it if are kids take a ablity test. They alreday took their placement test and we knew they would test out low in math.We were part of a school in Tennese who kept records of there work and at the end sent transcipts to the college. My son took the abilty test and passed everything but the math. The school will not give him the federal aid because of this. Does this sound right or am I just crazy

Answer 1

The reason why the school is telling  you this is because they are not recognizing him "graduating" from high school.  They admitted him as a high school dropout.  Perhaps you were not able to show records of him graduating to their satisfaction.... or perhaps the college has not received the transcripts.  Or when they did receive them, it was before the high school had listed him as "graduated".  (sometimes it just a matter of someone forgetting to mark him correctly in the system).

In any rate, if you can PROVE your son graduated from high school (by providing transcripts), him passing all areas of the "Ability to Benefit" test are waived.  Meaning he can get federal financial aid even if he doesn't pass the Ability to Benefit test.

It does not sound crazy, you just have to know exactly WHY they are denying AID and what you can do to fix it.  Call the school to confirm they received his high school transcripts and they are recognizing him as a graduate.

Good Luck.

from the Dept of Ed Book attached:

Ability-to-Benefit

One of the criteria used to establish student eligibility in order to receive Title IV program assistance is that a student must have earned a high school diploma or its equivalent. Students who are not high school graduates (or who have not earned a General Educational Development [GED] Certificate*) can demonstrate that they have the “ability to benefit” from the education or training being offered by passing an approved ability-to-benefit (ATB) test.

Answer 2

This sounds wrong.  I'd find a different school.  If a student does not have SAT or ACT scores they will administer a placement test.  

Since your son scored low on math what it typically means is that he needs to take a basic math class prior to college level algebra.

Basic classes like these do not count as credit.  You still have to pay for it but your son will receive zero college credit for it.

This is not unusual in anyway.  What is unusual is what your school is telling you.

I'd suggest a different school.  It smells fishy to me.

We have plenty of students who have to go this route and have no problem utilizing financial aid.