Paying for college

Ah, yes, the three words that strike the most fear into the minds of 17-25 year olds currently pursuing higher education.

So: I applied to a college and got in (yay!), BUT I didn't realize that the scholarship/grant applications were due, like, five months before I knew I got in. So I didn't apply to any, and consequently I didn't get any. Luckily the college is relatively cheap so I was able to pay for the first semester with money I had saved up, but I'm missing ~$1500 for the second semester. Minimum wage in this state sucks (It's the U.S. federal minimum wage, $7.25) and I'm having a hard time finding a job as it is.

I applied for the FAFSA, but I'm hesitant about accepting a loan with interest when there's still chances for scholarships/grants/work and save up. It's also not a ton of money anyway (which I think is totally rigged, but it's not like I expected the government to be super helpful).

I visited the university's financial aid center (which is an oxymoron) and the financial advice was not the least bit helpful. Not even, like, references for second-party sites where I could apply to things ("Well, we had a second-party site, but it didn't work well so we axed it a few years ago"). The general consensus was, "well, you paid for the first semester already, best to get a job and avoid debt the second semester. We're offering jobs on-campus that pay $12/hour!"

A bit about me: I'm 22, this is my first year at college (I was out working those four years following high school). I was a good student in high school (4.1 gpa and everything) but never took the SAT or ACT. Both of my parents graduated from college, are married, and combined make about $150k, but due to a variety of reasons cannot help finance my schooling (I also never expected them to). I'm extremely blessed to have a grandmother lives close to campus and said I could stay with her as I start school, although I can't live here forever.

I'm a generic white guy, bilingual in Portuguese, second generation American on my father's side, and altogether pretty funny. I'm studying anthropology, not because I have a specific career in mind, but because I'm passionate about learning about the world and different cultures around us. I originally wanted to be a film director and/or writer, but literally everyone in the universe thought that was a bad idea and wholly reliant on luck and industry connections (which is true).

A very rational part of my brain says I should abandon the idea of a career I'm interested in and only study for a career that would be lucrative. Passion is overrated when rent, car payments, food, utilities, insurance, and children are in the next ten years of my life, especially when cross-examined with inflation, housing market trends, and increasing wealth disparity. People say "No no, you should be happy in your career," but I say that happiness in your career doesn't matter as much as stability in your home.

There's a second part of my brain that says I should dedicate my time to stopping environmental change because I can feel the Earth's slow decay every waking moment and I feel genuinely nauseous about what mega corporations and evil fossil fuel lobbyists are doing to our planet, but that might be more of a perpetual existential thing than a career lol

My overall question is: Is there any sort of resource at all that I can use to help pay for college? Scholarships, grants, writing competitions, OnlyFans, Elon Musk's trust fund, literally anything at all that I should know about that's out there rewarding money to non-high school college students? I calculated that $100k is my end sum to finance education and board and food and a car when all is said and done.

Second resultant question, how can I make $100k?

Also, should I change gears and just study something with the sole intent of securing a high-paying job? They say college is an investment, and there's no better return than a high one.

When I think about this sort of stuff I want to die and stay up too late applying to online jobs (another scam, I think literally everything is out there not only to pauperize the working class but also drive them insane), it's now 2 A.M. and I need to go to bed because my head hurts, I'm definitely not in the best mindset to be thinking about the future right now. I'll probably reread this in the morning in complete embarrassment.

Any thoughts, recommendations, funny gifs, would be more than welcome! I'll probably end up going into massive amounts of student debt and graduating for a job that pays too little anyway, but I'd like to test the waters for how screwed I am firs