What is going on with my financial aid?

Many of you may have heard rumors about difficulties with the financial aid this quarter.  It is true, that the economic crunch is impacting the federal student loan program across the nation and has finally hit HJC students.

In August, HJC had numerous lenders providing student loans to our students. Because of the lack of credit available to these banks, many of them have stopped participating in the federal student loan program. Unfortunately, they have not made the decision to stop at the same time. This has caused many students to have to complete multiple Master Promissory Notes for different banks. 

The financial aid staff (Darlene, Patricia, and Lake) has been working hard to make sure they notify students as soon as they learn about a problem with a lender. However, we often don’t find out until a loan application is cancelled.

Please be confident that one of the financial aid staff will contact you directly if there is a problem with your loan. If you do not hear from them, you do not need to worry about the status of your loan….it is being processed as normal.

We are sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused you. This has been a difficult time for everyone, including the financial aid staff at HJC. We believe that the national credit crunch impacting the federal student loan program is finally manageable. 

Thank you for your patience during this difficult time. 

Need Microsoft Office Products?

Huntington Junior College students now have the ability to buy the full Microsoft Office suite of products (Word, Access, Excel, etc) for $59.95.

The software is not provided by the school, but directly from Microsoft. Please visit this website for more information or to purchase your software http://www.microsoft.com/student/discounts/theultimatesteal-us/default.aspx

4-Day School Week?

Students at Huntington Junior College recently had the opportunity to vote on the possibility of changing to a 4-day school week. This proposal would have changed Monday/Wednesday/Friday classes to meet only on Monday and Wednesday and extend the length of each class to match that of Tuesday/Thursday classes.

In total, 60% of the students supported the concept and 40% did not. Although this is a majority, the reasons the 40% voted “NO” were very sound. The reasons included:

·         Many students cannot make it to an 8:00 class or have to be home before 3:00 because of their children’s school or daycare schedule. This would prohibit these students from being a full-time student attending Monday/Wednesday.

·         Increasing the length class time from 1 hour  10 minutes to 1 hour 40 minutes would make the classes harder for some students

·         Increasing the number of days between class meetings (Wednesday to Monday) would make students more likely to forget material covered on Wednesdays

Given the reasons, and the failure to obtain at least 2/3 of the vote for the proposed change, the administration has decided to maintain the existing schedule at this time.

Please see Carolyn Smith or Cathy Snoddy if you have any questions or concerns.