Hello, how has your day been? This will be a bit of a long text so please do bear with me.
Well I'm on a bit of a conundrum. I was born in Brazil and immigrated to the UK in 2020 using an Italian passport to be able to live here. Under the EU Settlement Scheme, I am under pre-settled status.
During my A-Levels I was able to achieve three A*s and two As. I then decided to take a gap year, which I am right now, and was able to get unconditional offers from Cardiff, Warwick, Loughborough, Bath and UCL, the last being my first choice.
Since UCL is one of the best universities in the world, it would be a dream to study Psychology there for 4 years. However, London is very expensive of course, and in general I am quite poor.
My mom is a single mom and she only gets an annual wage of about 26k, while I have started working at Greggs a week ago. It would be crucial to be able to not only get the tuition fees, which I am eligible to (at least I think I am, honestly I can't even tell anymore), but also maintenance loans. The cheapest accommodation I could find had a monthly rent of like 700 pounds, for example.
However, I am not eligible to get the maintenance loans due to my pre-settled status, which is making me very worried. My mom will barely be able to support me, same as my brother, and I don't have any other family members in the country.
The course starts in September, and from now to then, I won't be able to save up that much from my Greggs salary as well as Universal Credit since I help to pay the bills at home. I will have to take a part-time job in London certainly, however I doubt that will be enough to cover food expenses and washing for example, with rent piled on top of it.
And that's ignoring the fact of how stressful working while studying will be in a highly competitive and difficult course, my stress would be so high that I could genuinely end up having a stroke trying to balance work and revising for exams, however, that's a reality that many other students face, and so, I just need a thicker skin, I'll need a part time job regardless.
I won't be eating out or really enjoying London at all due to the money restraints, however I am not bothered by that.
I just don't know what to do, I needed those maintenance loans and I will suffer without it, my dream is to study in UCL, but I have no idea how to proceed with these issues that have just arrived.
Any advice? Through my calculations, I'd have to use less than 15 pounds per week on food, not great but achievable. Just any ideas of how I can save up, or things I can apply to just to get a bit more money, such as through help from the university? Just how do I proceed? Anything is welcomed.