pharmacy schools that classify you as undergrad -- financial aid

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I noticed some pharm schools (eg Pittsburg, Montana, St. Louis Albany?) and maybe others classify pharmacy students as Undergraduates. As an out-of-state student, does that make it harder to get the students loans necessary to pay the higher out-of-state tuition? Since you are classified as undergrad, is there less loan money available vs if you were classified as professional student?

Any experiences with pharm schools that classify students as undergrad would be really welcome.

My school classifies people as undergrads all years except P4.

It has been better in some respects and worse in others for me than being considered a grad student.

1)If you qualify for the Pell Grant (unfortunately I don't), you can get it in pharmacy school if you are an undergrad
2)Some states have state aid for undergraduate tuition, which is often more than the aid they give (if any) for graduate tuition
3)The federal loans you get as an undergrad are significantly less than as a grad student
4)Your parents can claim a tax credit for you if you're an undergrad. I'm not sure if you can claim a tax credit for yourself if you're a grad student.

Here is the finaid handbook for UNM
http://hsc.unm.edu/pharmacy/docs/UNM...ndbook2010.pdf

It talks about the amount of loans able to take out on pg 10.
First year is qualified as Undergrad. You are only able to take out loans offered to all seniors in college.
2-4th years you can take out the loans for professional pharmacy students + you can now take out gradplus loans.

thanks for the information and your experiences... i think that with the professional school classification, you can basically borrow up to the cost of attendance, so if say university of colorado out-of-state is going to be 38k (30k tuition +8k living expenses), gradplus will let you borrow up to 38k... but if you go to a place that classifies you as undergrad (even if you already have a BA), i dont know how you would borrow 30k-- do you do private loans? because i think the staffords only go up to about 12k...

thanks for your info and help!

I can't recall how much the professional loans are exactly for Stafford.

I think it goes like this.
8,500 max subsidized stafford.
33,500 max unsubsidized stafford minus subsidized.

So, typically 8,500(subsidized)+ 25,000(Unsubsidized)
These loans are given to all pharmacy students.

Anything over the stafford loans can be covered by Gradplus loans.
Just remember these loans are subject to a credit check.

*Remember I don't know the exact amounts but I believe those are them.

For undergrad classification I believe privates are the most common.

Originally Posted by bluesky000

thanks for the information and your experiences... i think that with the professional school classification, you can basically borrow up to the cost of attendance, so if say university of colorado out-of-state is going to be 38k (30k tuition +8k living expenses), gradplus will let you borrow up to 38k... but if you go to a place that classifies you as undergrad (even if you already have a BA), i dont know how you would borrow 30k-- do you do private loans? because i think the staffords only go up to about 12k...

thanks for your info and help!

That would make me cry. Private loans are a great thing, assuming you love debt.

You should ask the financial aid dept. of the school.

i was reading around and it seems like the aggregate limit for the stafford loan is $224000 which means this is the max you can borrow from stafford in your lifetime and the max you can borrow annually is 33500 hmmm
sometimes i wish i could be a resident of all the states

im from cali and the private schools here are basically 40k/yr and its near impossible to get into the uc's... i was looking at out-of-state and its basically 30k minimum while the in-state oftentimes is half that hehe

The plus is some states will allow you to apply for residency status after 1 year.

i think the link you sent from university of new mexico says that you can apply for residency in the second year-- that's actually a big difference because i think in-state was 16k while out-of-state was probably double that

i heard elsewhere on the forums that unm is hard to get in from out-of-state, and it makes sense since they are nm's only pharm school

thanks for your info though-- it was interesting looking through the pdf

Yea, being New Mexico's only Pharm school they show a huge preferance for instate. Typically out of the class of ~85 they admit only 10 OOS students. If you show ties to the state or are a WICHE state member you get second preference. Finally, it's all other OOS students. I can't remember the exact name but a SDN member was excepted this last cycle OOS.

on that topic of a school's preference for in-state students, i was actually wondering which state schools have less of a preference for in-state students. i was researching and visiting websites but i haven't really figured anything too conclusive yet.

i think the Texas schools are more able to take out-of-state students because Texas has a bunch of pharmacy schools, but that's not necessarily true either. i remember reading somewhere on Texas A&M's pharm school in south Texas, and I think they really prefer students who have a connection in Texas and stay and practice in south Texas. Then again, just because you are not from that area doesn't mean you would not stay there, or vice versa.

i was also looking at schools in colorado, wyoming, tennessee. i'm sure wyoming has strong in-state preference since they are the only state school, and colorado probably also.

If you go to www.pharmcas.org they have a list of schools and information about them. I just looked at colorado and it says. Instate preference is given. However, they admitted 48 OOS students out of 160. So maybe look through there or call up admissions offices to see if you even have a shot. It would suck to waste money on an app if they just toss your application in the circle file cabinet.

thats a good idea. i never thought about calling them up and asking about the school preference for in-state vs out-of-state. i'll check out that website too. thanks!