Can anyone shed some light on how ABSN tuition/financial aid/excess hours work?

[Analgesic]

Hello,

I just graduated with my bachelors and I'm looking at several ABSN (Accelerated Bachelor of Science in Nursing) programs in Florida. Does anyone have an idea how financial aid works? I'm certain we just qualify for loans as long as we didn't hit our aggregate amount but not 100% sure.

Also, do we have to deal with Florida's excess surcharge hours? I read that financial aid stops after 180 hours? Is this true?

Anyone with experience with Florida's policy please let me know! I appreciate all the help.

[meanmaryjean, DNP, RN]

Why don't you ring up the school's financial aid office? They would be the experts for your rather complex question.

[nem90, BSN, RN]

I'm in New York at NYU for my ABSN so i don't know how it differs from Florida, but it's a very expensive school so I hope I can help with all the financial aid stuff I've had to deal with.

- Federal Loans: First off, it depends on whether you're considered a dependent, or independent student. Every student has a "Lifetime limit" of how much federal aid you will get for an undergraduate degree. For an independent student like myself, we get a total of ~$55,000, and I think dependent students are ~$32,000. Subtract however much you spent on your first degree and that's how much financial aid you'll get from federal loans.

- Pell Grants: Unfortunately we don't qualify for Pell Grants since they are only for first degree students.

- Nursing loan: I don't know if this is a national thing, but I found out about something called Federal Nursing Loan, and it is completely separate from all other federal loans (I get about 6k a year). I asked my school about it and was able to apply through them, so I'm not sure how you can go about getting it at your school, but you should look into it.

I know I'm from NY so all your Florida specific questions I'm of no use, but I hope this helped some! Good luck with everything!