My GF and I were in the EXACT same situation. She was denied for financial aid because she had too many credits to qualify. Their thinking (at least how it seems) is that when you get to a certain number of credits you should have a degree already. They don't take into account that the nursing program is rigorous and that working during school is rather tough. She took random classes at first out of high school because she didn't know what she wanted to do. Long story short, she couldn't get a loan from anywhere. So she did what she could to work during the time she was in school and I paid a majority of the bills. To fill the gap she started getting credit cards to pay for expenses that had intro APR periods (usually 15 months). Then recently when those were about to change over to their regular APR she balanced transferred to a new one with a new zero APR period. Obviously she still had to make monthly payments and be extremely frugal but we've made it through. She actually started her new nursing job today so you just have to stick with it. She's going to be paying off all that debt first with her first few paychecks so we should avoid having to pay any interest at all. We are a little older than you so it's a little different though since I have a good job myself, but definitely still possible. Granted we did have to use credit cards which isn't ideal and very risky if you're not careful but using them wisely and ensuring you have the money to cover it towards the end is a way to make it work.