Students are flooding financial aid offices at colleges and universities in the Bay Area, hoping to get loans and grants to help them cover the cost of dramatic fee increases approved just weeks before school started.

Providing visible evidence of the impact of state budget cuts, students are lining up 15 deep, 8 to 10 hours a day at San Francisco City College's financial aid office hoping to obtain enough money to stay in school. In Pleasant Hill, Diablo Valley College has seen its applications for fee waivers reach an unprecedented 3,373 this year. Last year, it was 971.

Rhonda Johnson, associate director of financial aid at California State University Hayward, is seeing more students applying for loans.

"It is just a reality now that more families are borrowing," Johnson said. "There is always a threshold. For some students this (increase) could mean that this is it, that their budget cannot tolerate any more."

Until this year, California's public institutions had not seen fees increase in eight years. In fact, fees were reduced 10 percent during that period.

With a one-two whammy of a poor economy and fee increases, students also are increasingly asking for work study jobs -- federally subsidized positions on campus -- and are turning to private companies for help with loans and payment plans.

Indeed, the crunch is being felt nationwide. States dealing with budget crises have raised tuition by 20 to 40 percent. FinancialAid.com, a Web site that helps students obtain loans, has seen nearly a 200 percent increase in applications for federally subsidized Stafford loans in just the past eight weeks and expects the trend to continue into mid-September.

Michael O'Brien, co-founder and CEO of FinancialAid.com in San Diego, said that the cost of college had increased an average of 10 percent a year during the past decade while family income has grown just 3 percent annually. But this year, many institutions have hiked fees more steeply than in the past, with double-digit increases commonplace around the country.

"Anytime you have an unforecasted increase, people have to cover it somehow, " O'Brien said. "People who were on the cusp of (needing loans) have been forced to use it. There are more students applying, and they are all applying for the maximum generally."

On FinancialAid.com, applications for Stafford loans have risen from 1,657 in June to 4,887 in August for a total of 9,815 -- with California applications rising from 147 in June to 273 in August, for a total of 619.

The site has also received 994 applications for PLUS loans -- low interest federally guaranteed loans that allow parents with any income level to borrow up to 100 percent of the cost of education -- in the past 60 days, including 79 from California.

MAXING OUT
And students are generally borrowing the maximum amount -- $23,000 in subsidized loans and $23,000 in unsubsidized loans during college. On a subsidized loan, the government pays the interest until the student graduates. On an unsubsidized loan, the student starts paying interest upon receiving the loan.

"It is very disturbing to see a student graduate from a state institution and owe $46,000 in student loans," Johnson said.

At City College of San Francisco, students typically start lining up for financial aid the first week of classes. This month, fees were raised from $11 to $18 per unit and there was a steady stream of students even three weeks before classes started on Monday, said Jorge Bell, dean of financial aid at the community college. The increases mean that a full-time student taking a course-load of 12 units would pay $216 for the term.

And while the school normally has about 12,000 students applying for the community college Board of Governor's fee waiver, Bell expects closer to 15, 000 or 16,000 students to apply this year.

Ann Marie Petrillo is getting hit twice. She has to pay the fee increase for herself and also for her 18-year-old daughter who will start at City College in the spring.

"I'm applying for loans," said Petrillo, 33. "I am going through a divorce, and I'm a single mother of four. The fee increases do make a huge difference for me. I'm applying for as much as I can get, $3,500. It very much stresses me out."

Jessica Martinez, 19, a City College student who has a 1-year-old son said she already had a $4,000 loan and needed more to make ends meet. "It is just more that I have to repay," she said with a sigh of resignation.

DEMAND FOR WORK-STUDY JOBS
Brenda Jerez, director of financial aid at Diablo Valley College, said the fee increase was definitely making an impact.

"I guess some students sometimes will say, 'I can swing $11,' but $18 is detrimental to their pocketbooks," she said.

Jerez said more students were also coming looking for work-study jobs.

UC Berkeley, where fees went up 40 percent from last fall -- with 30 percent of the increase approved in July -- has not yet seen a rush on financial aid, but classes don't start until Monday, and many of the continuing students have not yet arrived on campus, said Cheryl Resh, director of financial aid.

"I anticipate more students will still file because until Oct. 15, if they file late, they can qualify for the partial fee grant for the coverage of 50 percent of the fee increase," Resh said.

The UC system is covering the entire fee increase for needy students with a family income of $60,000 or less -- about 40 percent of its 155,000 undergraduates -- and about half the increase for needy students with a family income between $60,000 and $90,000. The CSU system, which also raised fees 30 percent in July and 10 percent in December, is covering the fee increase for students getting institution-based grants and Cal Grants, about 32 percent of its 408,000 students.

OTHER OPTIONS
Some parents have to look for different options. Academic Management Services, a private company that provides loans and payment plans for students,

saw an 11 percent increase in calls from parents and students this year over last year through July.

"People have received their financial aid, but they want to know if there is anything else we can do for them," said Judith Grassi, executive vice president for the company. "These are unheard of tuition hikes, but people are devoted to sending their children to college. Now, it is just trying to get people the right information so they can make it work."

The company works with colleges to offer payment plans for students, who pay a $55 fee to sign up.

Cal State San Marcos in San Diego County is a new participant, signing up for the payment plan after the CSU system approved a 30 percent fee increase in July because financial aid officials knew that students were budgeting for one amount, and many could not come up with more money. The payment plan went into place Aug. 3, and by Aug. 15, 200 students signed up.

"There is definitely a need," said Syed Rizvi, director of financial aid and scholarships for Cal State San Marcos. "At least they know they won't be dropped once they are on the payment plan."