FSCJ will scam you. Avoid at all costs - especially if you have financial aid needs. I originally attended another state University and I thought I knew what my major was going to be right out of high school. That changed drastically due to financial hardship, family issues, and the economy's collapse. Because I was in such a regimented career path, I was taking 15-18 credit hours per semester and most of those credits would not count for anything other than electives if I switched programs. I transferred... Read More to FSCJ, faced more hardships, had to leave for a bit, and have now returned to horrible grades from dropping after the deadlines and a pile of classes that don't count for anything. All FSCJ is looking at for my GPA now are my failed classes. Virtually nothing else I took counts toward an AA or and AS or the Bachelors that I'm seeking. Online courses are new for me and, when I enrolled in college the first time, it was all done on paper. I didn't have financial aid before either so everything was new to me. FSCJ did not help me understand anything. For the better part of a year, I have spent at least 5 - 10 hours per week contacting their advisors (whether they be in student services, financial aid, financial services, or academic advising) to attempt to resolve major issues. This is time that would have been better spent working or studying. They do not explain SAP and its importance. I was told repeatedly by financial services, financial aid, and academic advisors that if I took a minimum of three courses in the summer and received A's in all three of them, that I would maintain SAP compliance and would continue receiving financial aid. I spoke to 2 different academic advisors (one who recommended I get an AA and then another who was more focused on business administration degrees who insisted that the AS track for the Bachelors would be better for me). The business administration academic advisor discouraged me from taking the courses I would need for the AA, never once bringing up that I would still have to pick up many sciences, additional Humanities, etc. courses during the second half of my degree (the Bachelors). In fact, she never even mentioned that I would be attending 3-4 years of classes. She made it sound as if I would have the Bachelors in 2 years if I just followed her plan. This was not true. Then, this same advisor suggested that I enroll in 3 summer classes to "take it easy" since I had not had a "good academic record" and the courses would be "challenging" for me. She enrolled me the three specific courses and then provided me an outline of future courses to take. Because I wasn't feeling challenged enough and because COVID was forcing me to stay at home anyways, I selected another course from my fall semester to take in the summer. It was a course that she had recommended. Of these four courses only ONE counted toward my AS or my Bachelors. During the summer semester, I was receiving financial aid on a probationary status because of my GPA - or at least that's what I was told. It was explained to me many times that I needed all A's in my summer courses to maintain my GPA so that I would stay in compliance with SAP. No one - at any point over 6 months - mentioned that I would inevitably fall out of SAP compliance because of my credits for completion percentage. All the classes (whether A's or otherwise) that I had taken prior to this summer semester were counted as "taken". And this is where it gets fuzzy. Some people told me that taking more classes that counted toward my degree (the AS) would "bump out" the classes that didn't. I think that was incorrect but I'm still not sure. I lost my financial aid after the summer semester and within 1 week of the start of fall classes. By this time, no one wanted to take responsibility for the misinformation and, instead, they blamed me for it. I was told that I "should have known" and that it was my "responsibility". Yes. It is my responsibility. That's exactly why I've spent so much time emailing and calling advisors! I was blamed for not asking "the right questions" at "the right time". Additionally, I was passed around from person to person for three straight days and, by the time I finally got to talk to someone who might have been able to help me, I was told that he couldn't because the deadline was the prior Friday (I was talking to him on Tuesday) and I would have had to speak to someone did. And I had. I'd spoken to over 6 people that prior Thursday and to a director at FSCJ on that Friday and none of them mentioned that Friday was the cut off. However, I was just "supposed to know that". Had they actually assisted me during that entire week that I was attempting to resolve the financial aid issues and figure out how SAP compliance was affecting me, I could have enrolled in a payment plan through FSCJ, started my classes, and then paid gradually - and I could have afforded it! Instead, I was removed from my courses, encouraged to do a SAP appeal (which went nowhere), and then ended up having to get a student loan halfway through the semester just so I could pile on classes in the C semester. After I spent even more time researching SAP compliance, I learned that I was required to meet SAP Compliance within ONE SEMESTER to ensure that I would continue receiving financial aid. Now here's the kicker. In order to meet both the GPA and the percentage of completion requirements, I would have had to take and pass with a B or better at LEAST 34 credit hours in ONE SEMESTER. It was impossible for me to achieve this! Additionally, even though that would put me back in the good graces for the completion percentage and GPA, it would not have put me in good enough standing for my total credit hours which would have been exceeded after one more semester of at least 3 classes. Therefore, I would have had to take 34 credit hours in one semester, get all A's and B's in those courses, and then finance one semester of a minimum of 12 - 15 credit hours to get my financial aid back for the third semester where I would take another 12 hours and then I'd lose my financial aid again and have to finance the last semester, if any courses were still remaining. At no point was any of this explained to me. No one did any math to determine that it would be pointless for me to even bother with financial aid for the fall 2020 semester. It was my responsibility to do their jobs. Had I known this would have been the strategy, I could have applied for loans early. I could have worked more hours to cover some of the costs. But I didn't know. Every time I called in about notifications I was receiving about my financial aid status, I was always told that everything was "fine" and "not to worry about it". Apparently I should have been very worried! Additionally, three of those four summer classes do not even count toward my AS or my Bachelors. These are courses I was told that I had to take because they were "prerequisites". They weren't. I checked - after I'd already taken them. Therefore, these three courses would not have even counted toward that completion rate. They did raise my GPA, but what good does that do me when I cannot meet the other financial aid requirements and am not actually working toward my goal? Because of poor academic advising and poor guidance from financial aid and financial services advisors, I not only lost my financial aid, I wasted my financial aid on three unnecessary classes when I could have been taking something that mattered, and I am now in debt and having to enroll in five courses for the fall C schedule just to stay on track. Yes. I'm taking five classes that are each compressed into seven weeks just to make up for being unable to properly enroll in the fall semester and not having taken courses that actually mattered in the summer - all courtesy of my academic advisor. Additionally, I submitted a SAP Appeal which took a countless amount of hours preparing, only to have it rejected. Financial Aid required me to take a "SAP Appeal" course online. Why wasn't this assigned to me back in the spring when I was enrolling for summer? They literally had this information and withheld it from me. To make matters worse, I no longer trust my academic advisor. I spent over 15 hours figuring out my own degree path and, in doing so, started looking at ways to transfer out of FSCJ. But I can't leave. I'm stuck. To transfer to another school, I would have needed to complete an AA - the Associates that the business administration academic advisor told me would not be good for me. This is the same advisor that had me enroll in three pointless classes by telling me that they were essential prerequisites and failed to tell me about the impending financial aid doom. I also learned that more of my classes (the ones I have A's in!) that I'd taken back when I first started college in a different degree program would have actually have counted toward the AA, but not the AS. Therefore, had I taken AA courses over the summer, I would have been in a better position to transfer, would have been closer to being in SAP compliance, would have had a better chance at maintaining my financial aid, and would have started with a better GPA. Instead, I listened to an academic advisor who has now basically trapped me at FSCJ unless I want to spend another year taking classes for the AA. Through all of this I have learned the following about FSCJ staff: 1) They do not have the tools necessary to do their jobs well or timely; 2) They are either provided outdated training or insufficient training to do their jobs properly; 3) They have no one in a leadership position who will hold staff accountable for their actions; 4) They have no choice but to pass students around between any number of departments because no one department or group fully understands any part of the registration, advising, or payment portions of being enrolled at FSCJ; 5) They are unavailable during non-business hours even though their school is supposed to be built around people's busy work schedules; 6) They rarely take initiative to explore solutions; 7) They will avoid responding to inconvenient emails; 8) The staff that can be helpful usually blames the student for following instructions given by other staff members. Bottom line: There is zero accountability at FSCJ. I truly regret enrolling in this school. It is a nightmare. My transcripts are incomplete. I have lost my financial aid because of their negligence. I have lost precious time because of their inefficiencies. I have taken unnecessary classes because of their advising. I have somehow lost my AP Exam credits and now must pay to have those sent to FSCJ (even though they had them previously). I am somehow ineligible to enroll in College Algebra because I have to take a placement test, but I have a prior College Algebra attempt. I cannot seem to change my name despite multiple attempts to engage with their staff. (This resulted in my private loan having issues that I have been trying to resolve for the better part of two weeks now and cannot get a concrete answer or resolution from anyone.) I cannot get reliable answers over the phone from FSCJ staff and advisors. FSCJ is a stressful nightmare. They will misadvise you, trap you in their programs, and cost you more time and money. What I suspect has happened to me is that they knew that I was going to lose my financial aid, gave me easy but pointless classes for the summer so that I would get A's and make their school look better, enroll me in courses that had low attendance (because no one actually needs them for their degrees!) to fill a quota, have me take courses that would use up my financial aid so that I would have to pay for more courses, lock me into an AS so that I could not transfer, and, thus, milk money from me for an extra semester or two. I honestly think they scammed me. I just can't see it in any other light.
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