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Things I Wish I Hadn’t Said in the Financial Aid Office

Not to gang up on the NYU financial aid office, but I too have stood in front of those teller windows many a time ready to throw down over a lost scholarship check or paperwork that the school forgot to process.

I was not quite as sharp as Mary at first. I would march up to those windows reciting my social security number, my mother’s income, my home address and my date of birth with immense pride that I managed to memorize all that stuff in the first place—sort of the way a five year-old responds when you ask him his age. All while the line of other students was typically within arms reach.

I got smarter around the same time that I realized that I shouldn’t throw my credit-card statements into the same trash as my Ramen wrappers. That’s when my financial aid office demeanor changed.  I began to lean way into the teller windows, sticking my head inside the square openings, practically whispering my numbers and fact bits into the tellers’ laps.

Or you can do the car salesman bit, which is what Mary just told me she did. Scribble answers on a piece of paper, fold it, and slip it underneath your hand to the window person the way you would when negotiating a car’s sale price.

Or better yet, now that you know these “private rooms” exist—which by the way no one ever told me about in my four years of invading financial aid officers’ personal space—use them!

 –Irina Aleksander