SSI/SSDI and School

ladysolitary85

ladysolitary85

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Does anyone know if there are any special rules if I went to college in order to keep my benefits?

example: Have to be a Part-Time student/have no more than such amount of units.

Anything like that? If it helps I'm in California.
 
If you are entitled to SS benefit then check with V.R. to see if they can pay you for your tuition if you dont plan to work. :) V.R. usually approves if you have SSI or SSDI.
 
I'm a full time college student, part time employee, and still receiving SSDI benefits (I'm in Wyoming). DVR has paid for my tuition and some of the book costs.
 
there are no special rules that i know of. It doesnt matter where you live, whether you attend college or not to receive ssi/ssdi. school and SSA are two different things. It does matter however if you are getting unemployment here in NYS. If you attend college and get unemployment, then you dont have to look for a job if attending full time college and you just have paperwork filled by teacher/college. frisky is right -- you should be looking into your local VR for college expenses help for anything you can get. It varies on per basis of each student so you just need to call and set an appt and tell them your plans then go from there.
 
Financially I'm not worried about school, I qualified for the FASFA so I'm good there, I just didn't know if SSI/SSDI cuts you off if you become a full-time student or anything like that.

Since its my first time to college, I'm taking ASL 1 and elementry drawing & comprehension. I wanted to play it safe and make sure my financial aid for school is fully kicked in before jumping into the required classes.

I did go to VR, to update my VR counselor about going to college.... he doesn't seem to thrilled about that and thinks work would be better than going back to school and a waste of time (as people with degrees gets stuck with loans and no job offers). So as far as schooling goes with VR I'm not reaching out to them.

I am registered with the school disability department and getting live captioning commendation (think a note-taker but scripting everything being said in class and e-mailing me the copy)

Currently I stopped receiving unemployment, and my main focus is focusing on school.
 
I myself have attended ARC as a full-time student and worked part-time for the past year and I am still receiving SSI benefits. The Financial Aid department has been very good with disbursements. My best friend got his full disbursement for the Spring 2014 semester two weeks before classes started.

As for your vocational rehabilitation counselor, he does not seem to have considered the situation in full. It is very difficult to find stable long-term work, even for hearing applicants, as California's economy has had a very slow recovery from the Great Recession. Not to mention that more and more postings require an Associate's or Bachelor's degree AND between 1 to 3 years of work experience. Many fresh graduates with Associate's / Bachelor's degrees struggle to find work because they did not accumulate any or sufficient work experience over the time span of their academic endeavors, and this is exactly what I want to avoid. It is the key reason why I have chosen to continue working as I pursue my degree. Employers like "well-rounded" employees. And even if you opted to go work--depending on the field you wanted to work in--you would have to do continuing education units (CEUs for short) just for retention anyways and some of those CEUs are available at community colleges.

You may want to take advantage of the BOG Fee Waiver at ARC, as SSI/SSDI recipients automatically qualify. What the BOG Fee Waiver does is waiver all the tuition and fees for the semester (except for the $9.16, which is left over). You would only need to worry about books and supplies, that's it, which financial aid would cover. The Social Security Administration does not count any disbursements you receive from the Financial Aid department for your post-secondary education, as that is separate from any other income you receive (i.e., from your family or friends, from work, et cetera).

I think you will come to discover that CART (the live captioning service you referred to) is a very useful tool of material accessibility for your courses. Just keep in mind that extensive reading will be required for you to go through the CART lecture transcriptions.

ladysolitary85 said:
Financially I'm not worried about school, I qualified for the FASFA so I'm good there, I just didn't know if SSI/SSDI cuts you off if you become a full-time student or anything like that.

Since its my first time to college, I'm taking ASL 1 and elementry drawing & comprehension. I wanted to play it safe and make sure my financial aid for school is fully kicked in before jumping into the required classes.

I did go to VR, to update my VR counselor about going to college.... he doesn't seem to thrilled about that and thinks work would be better than going back to school and a waste of time (as people with degrees gets stuck with loans and no job offers). So as far as schooling goes with VR I'm not reaching out to them.

I am registered with the school disability department and getting live captioning commendation (think a note-taker but scripting everything being said in class and e-mailing me the copy)

Currently I stopped receiving unemployment, and my main focus is focusing on school.
Click to expand...
 
sphenix said:
I myself have attended ARC as a full-time student and worked part-time for the past year and I am still receiving SSI benefits. The Financial Aid department has been very good with disbursements. My best friend got his full disbursement for the Spring 2014 semester two weeks before classes started.

As for your vocational rehabilitation counselor, he does not seem to have considered the situation in full. It is very difficult to find stable long-term work, even for hearing applicants, as California's economy has had a very slow recovery from the Great Recession. Not to mention that more and more postings require an Associate's or Bachelor's degree AND between 1 to 3 years of work experience. Many fresh graduates with Associate's / Bachelor's degrees struggle to find work because they did not accumulate any or sufficient work experience over the time span of their academic endeavors, and this is exactly what I want to avoid. It is the key reason why I have chosen to continue working as I pursue my degree. Employers like "well-rounded" employees. And even if you opted to go work--depending on the field you wanted to work in--you would have to do continuing education units (CEUs for short) just for retention anyways and some of those CEUs are available at community colleges.

You may want to take advantage of the BOG Fee Waiver at ARC, as SSI/SSDI recipients automatically qualify. What the BOG Fee Waiver does is waiver all the tuition and fees for the semester (except for the $9.16, which is left over). You would only need to worry about books and supplies, that's it, which financial aid would cover. The Social Security Administration does not count any disbursements you receive from the Financial Aid department for your post-secondary education, as that is separate from any other income you receive (i.e., from your family or friends, from work, et cetera).

I think you will come to discover that CART (the live captioning service you referred to) is a very useful tool of material accessibility for your courses. Just keep in mind that extensive reading will be required for you to go through the CART lecture transcriptions.
Click to expand...


Thanks so much for your input :) I have a hard time juggling work and school (have tried in the past, didn't do well) which is why I'm wanting to dedicate my time as a student. For now, I'm just going in for two classes then once I know the FASFA kicked in I'll go for more classes in the next semester.

I look forward to trying out CART! I wish they had something like this when I was in high school!
 
ladysolitary85 said:
Thanks so much for your input :) I have a hard time juggling work and school (have tried in the past, didn't do well) which is why I'm wanting to dedicate my time as a student. For now, I'm just going in for two classes then once I know the FASFA kicked in I'll go for more classes in the next semester.

I look forward to trying out CART! I wish they had something like this when I was in high school!
Click to expand...

That's why most or all of my courses are online, as there is more flexibility for due dates with assignments and major papers (i.e., due on Saturday or Sunday instead of a weekday). It saves time and gas having to go to face-to-face courses. I find that I juggle school and work better with the online option. Of course if I was required to attend a face-to-face course, I'd try to do it at night time or on the weekends (ARC does have some Saturday classes).

I never had CART in my high school and I discovered it for the first time my freshman year of college. I absolutely love it. Just so you know, you need at least 6 units to qualify for financial aid. If your two classes are 3 units each, then you're all good to go! :)
 
sphenix said:
That's why most or all of my courses are online, as there is more flexibility for due dates with assignments and major papers (i.e., due on Saturday or Sunday instead of a weekday). It saves time and gas having to go to face-to-face courses. I find that I juggle school and work better with the online option. Of course if I was required to attend a face-to-face course, I'd try to do it at night time or on the weekends (ARC does have some Saturday classes).

I never had CART in my high school and I discovered it for the first time my freshman year of college. I absolutely love it. Just so you know, you need at least 6 units to qualify for financial aid. If your two classes are 3 units each, then you're all good to go! :)
Click to expand...

I'm all good there! ASL is 4 and I think the art class I'm on the waiting list for is 3 units. Part of the reason I'm going on campus vs online is partly because I have social anxiety and I'm trying to break that issue.
 
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