Earn upto £3,500 for 30 minutes work!!! 'Access to Learning Fund'

Str4berr3

hey there,

can someone tell me if ALF for uni and college has the same procedures?

Its just that I am a lone parent studying a HNC course at a college and as it P/T I did not qualify for a grant for child care. and as its a level 4 course I don't get help from my lone parent advisor.

Anyway, after alot of trouble to find that a ALF did actually exist ( long story ) in my college I was told that there was no more money in the learning fund to apply. ( I triedto apply in October and the course started in September!)
Is that really possible for a reasonably large college with over 4 sites scattered around London?
I feel that there is a something not quite right with what the admin was telling me about there was no funding left and also the fact I felt they was trying to put me off the ALF ( even though it was meant to help me for childcare) before I was eventually told this.

So for the past 8 months I have been forking out the £95 a month for childcare from my Income Support in order to study this course. I did get a grant for £250 but it did'nt stretch very far with what I am paying plus travel cost.

bwgames

I would definitely recommend applying for this.

I just applied and got far more than I hoped for

Faz

Hi guys

I'd appreciate some advice on my situation please, I'm currently applying for the ALF through my Uni. I am hoping to 'press the right buttons' in order to get some funding.

I'm just finishing my second year and will be doing a placement year. The reasons I am applying are:

1. I'm starting a 12-month placement as part of my degree in July 2007. This requires start up costs, involves relocating from home to 100 miles away (so at a minimum, £600 deposit for a house, £500/rent month.. then all the expenses involved).

2. I come from a low income family, my father supports 4 dependants and mother is a house-wife. I receive the full student loan amount.

3. I am in debt to my father for £1800. This is due to me getting myself in a severe financial mess 2 years ago buying shares with borrowed money from a 0% credit card (very stupid i know). I lost £3500 have my father had to loan me £1800 to pay off the debt.


Now.. I have my student account and 2 credit cards, details and statements of which I will disclose in my application.

However, I also have a second bank account, which does contain more money, but I don't want to reveal it to the AFL. This is because it contains a mixture of my own part-time job funds, investments I have received money from, buying/selling stuff profits, and money that actually belongs to my father (He has tenants paying rent into my account). Therefore, because it's so complicated I'd rather not mention this account. It would also disadvantage me because I actually worked hard to earn some of that money.


I'm not trying to con the system or anything, but would appreciate any advice with regards to my application.

- Will the 3 reasons above be good ones to put down on my form?
- How would I go about providing evidence that I'm in debt to my father?
- Will they be able to trace this 2nd account that I have?

Thank you

silaslang

Str4berr3 wrote: »

hey there,

can someone tell me if ALF for uni and college has the same procedures?

When I applied in college I only filled in a one sheet form to claim and only had supply one piece of evidence but for uni it was a 5 sheet thing and had supply lots of evidence like birth certificates, bank statements etc.

Ashmil

Hi folks

I went in to my Uni (Glamorgan Uni) (I'm doing a Masters) to enquire about this, and they hadn't even heard of the ALF in either Student Services or the Finance Office! Why would this be??

My situation is that I have moved in with my partner (and her 10 year old son), who has a house, so while I do the course I am living rent free effectively, but I contribute to food and bills etc. To do this I am chewing my way through an 8 grand Career Development Loan.

Cash is tight, and I am not looking forward to paying the loan back... do you think it is worth my pursuing this ALF business?

Ash

Ashmil

Sorry, double post

silaslang

Ashmil wrote: »

Hi folks

I went in to my Uni (Glamorgan Uni) (I'm doing a Masters) to enquire about this, and they hadn't even heard of the ALF in either Student Services or the Finance Office! Why would this be??

My situation is that I have moved in with my partner (and her 10 year old son), who has a house, so while I do the course I am living rent free effectively, but I contribute to food and bills etc. To do this I am chewing my way through an 8 grand Career Development Loan.

Cash is tight, and I am not looking forward to paying the loan back... do you think it is worth my pursuing this ALF business?

Ash

Its always worth looking into as when I hit financial difficulties and researched what help was available I found other avenues for grants and bursuries which I will apply for next year. The thing I found was that it wasnt a majorly advertised by the uni yet once I found out and told other students they confessed to knowing and applying yet never offered up the advice freely. It seems like half my year knew about it yet never shared info or advice. Its MSE members that have provided me with the most advice.

Ashmil

Thanks for your reply - sure, I would like to follow this up, but my Uni are telling me they've never heard of the ALF! What do I do?

silaslang

Ashmil wrote: »

Thanks for your reply - sure, I would like to follow this up, but my Uni are telling me they've never heard of the ALF! What do I do?

Im not sure if every university gets teh funding but you could always check out and show them this page

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/EducationAndLearning/UniversityAndHigherEducation/StudentFinance/StudentFinanceFactsheets/DG_10034873

Allsetuk

my university has put me through months of stress where alf is concerned , thanks to posts like this "earn 3500 in 30 minutes " I know people who have lied and cheated to get this money and often through incorrect checks the university have given away this precious money to people with family support or fulltime jobs and not the ones who really need it .....i applied in october but as a single parent to a disabled son they offered me 1100 pounds. telling me to to reapply if my situation changed, my son was offically diagnosed in the past year but i cannot claim carers allowance as i am a student, uni finance took 5 months to make a decision and i kept asking them what was going on and they needed more and more evidence, i gave them every shred of medical and financial evidence , reciepts bills everything yet still they asked for me for more or they asked me to go in, which i couldnt as it was always when my son was on half term or was ill .....quite often id have to email 4times to even get an answer , since the end of march they have been promising a decision and ....then this weekend they wrote this standard letter saying i am not recieveing an award. The stress this has put me under by extending it for so long has made me write a letter to the vice chancellor of the university .im so fed up of the situation.