r/osap

I genuinely do not understand OSAP anymore.

My tuition isn’t even being fully covered, yet I see so many other people getting significantly more than me even though their parents actually have income.

My family is literally living off savings. I work 48 hours every single week while being a full-time student because I’m trying to help support my family and also save money for a medically necessary surgery.

I barely get 3 hours of sleep most days.

And when I try talking to financial aid, I get basically no help. I’ve even gotten the whole “that’s how we all did it” attitude.

No. It absolutely isn’t.

OSAP used to give people way more support. Everything is more expensive now too. Tuition, rent, groceries, gas, literally everything.

I’m not even sitting here demanding free money. They can keep the grants if they want. Increase my loans. I literally just want enough funding to cover my tuition so I can actually stay in school.

I am not a robot. I already work 48 hours a week while studying full time. What exactly am I supposed to do? Work 60? 70? When am I supposed to sleep? When am I supposed to study?

This cannot be normal.

I feel like I’m already at rock bottom financially, and somehow my tuition still isn’t even covered.

Why was school more affordable and OSAP more supportive for people before our generation, when everything they were paying for was cheaper than it is now?

And the private college situation makes me even more angry. How are there people going to certain private colleges receiving huge amounts of OSAP funding, while students at public universities who are struggling this badly can’t even get their basic tuition covered?

How does that make any sense?

Someone who is working almost 50 hours a week, studying full time, helping their family financially, barely sleeping, and saving for a medically necessary surgery apparently still doesn’t qualify for enough assistance to cover tuition.

What more are we supposed to do?

And then on top of all of that, you pay thousands and thousands of dollars in tuition just to end up with professors who have ratings below 1.4 on Rate My Professors.

So pay an insane amount of money, barely get enough financial support to stay enrolled, destroy your sleep and health trying to work enough hours, and then get a terrible education on top of it.

Nice.

The worst part is the complete lack of empathy from some of the staff. You explain your situation and instead of someone actually trying to help you figure out your options, you feel like you’re being dismissed or mocked.

I’m genuinely at my breaking point. I don’t know how much more a person is expected to handle while working this much, studying full time, barely sleeping, and still being told the support available isn’t enough to even cover tuition.

If anybody has been in a similar situation with OSAP where your funding wasn’t enough to even cover tuition, please tell me what you did.

Did you request a review? Appeal your assessment? Contact someone outside your school’s financial aid office? Is there anything else I can actually do?

Because I genuinely don’t know how I’m supposed to keep doing this.

Is there any news about Osap update regarding private colleges?
What is other Alternatives ?

As soon as the ban hammer came down, people started coming out of the woodwork. Not sure if it’s trolls, conservative pundits or people who read the title of an article and assume anyone on Osap is a scam artist.

Fact of the matter is there are 7 private career colleges out of 500 in Ontario that were under investigation. I and others have sacrificed A LOT to commit to a LOAN that needs to be repaid. It’s not a simple go to the bank and get a loc or loan, it’s not a pull up your bootstraps and get a job.

I and most people with Osap and grants are relying on these loans to survive high cost of living to achieve careers and pay these precious tax dollars back (that a lot of y’all are so worried about out).

I get the amount of money requires investigations but shutting the entire system down for everyone is not the right call. When covid happened everyone got a $2k cheque immediately that needed to be repaid AFTER the investigation was done. I and others who are in a program currently have made this commitment and are now left out to dry. There is more than 2 sides to this coin so there no reason to make first impression judgments

I’m looking for some advice or experiences from people who’ve been in a similar situation with OSAP.
For some background, I’ve attended a few different post-secondary programs over the past couple of years. I didn’t complete all of them, and I wasn’t academically successful in every semester. However, I’ve never received any notification that I was placed on OSAP academic probation or restriction.
I’m currently enrolled full-time in another program, but I’m considering either reducing my course load to part-time or withdrawing completely.
I recently received an offer for a different program at another college (dream program that’s been my goal this whole time), but I’m still deciding whether to attend the upcoming intake or wait until a later intake to give myself more time to prepare financially.
My biggest concern is how withdrawing or switching to part-time now could affect my ability to receive OSAP for my next program.
Has anyone been in a similar situation, especially with previous program changes or unsuccessful semesters?
Did OSAP place you on academic probation first, or did you end up receiving a restriction? And if you switched from full-time to part-time midway through a semester, how did that affect your funding?
I’m planning to speak with financial aid before making any decisions, but I’d appreciate hearing other people’s experiences! I’d also like to note that I’ve done a couple programs because the first one I knew I didn’t want to do as a career after experiencing it and then I thought about upgrading so I did pre-health but wasn’t really a fan of that and felt like I could upgrade at an adult day school for free but because I’ve been scared of the consequences of osap I switched into my current program.

I've been taking 60-80% courseload through my time in school; I thought this would be a non-issue but OSAP recently informed me this is the last year they'll cover for full-time studies. The amount of credits I need for my diploma would go into Fall 2027 part-time.

Basically, would I be able to apply to part-time funding even after full-time funding is over, or are they going to reject all funding applications for this degree?

Hi everyone! I’m a ECE full time one year student, and my classes are starting in January. I’ve submitted my OSAP application and received my grant and loan summary along with an estimated funding amount. I just need to pay the $250 college deposit. I wanted to ask: Will I receive the same amount that OSAP has estimated or can the amount change after my enrolment is confirmed?

Thank you!

Did anyone else receive this? What exactly does this mean?it read
You are receiving this message because you applied for Osap and attend full time in a private post secondary school. At this time all payments are temporally paused.

my portal on osap was showing pending school approval since aug 27, yesterday it changed to status on hold and under docs it showed cleareance documents needed because you might have restriced loans or soemthing which i dont. today i woke up too some notifcations showing my last year funding recalculated and all provincial funding in negative and my old applications show status of provincial in review you only elegible for federal at the time. is anyone else experincing the same ?

My NSLSC tracker says “Pending Release,” but it doesn’t show any amount being sent to my school. Has anyone else had this happen? Did the school amount show up later, or did you receive the full amount and have to pay your school yourself?