I gave a financial aid talk to college and career center volunteers at our high school recently. One question stood out: “This is a lot of information to absorb at once. Can you break it down into some specific suggestions by grade?” Two ideas are important here: College planning is a process that should start well before senior year, and there are things that can be done at any point to make things go more smoothly when the time comes to start applying. So here goes. Continue reading College Prep by Grade
Category Archives: FAFSA
Pell Grants
Pell Grants are one of the largest federal gift aid programs, with over $28 billion going to students with high financial need in the 2017-2018 school year. While that is certainly a lot of money, the program is in fact fairly limited. Continue reading Pell Grants
Why File the FAFSA?
Every year, a large percentage of the eligible population fails to file a FAFSA: the Department of Education estimates 40% of high school seniors do not file it and 25% of college students do not renew their FAFSA. And yet, there are plenty of compelling reasons to do so. The obvious one is access to financial aid. Here are some other reasons: Continue reading Why File the FAFSA?
Special Circumstances
Special circumstances refers to anything in the applicant’s financial situation that is not reflected on the FAFSA or CSS Profile. The Profile has an actual space for applicants to detail special circumstances. For FAFSA schools, applicants may have to appeal their aid award and go through the Professional Judgment (PJ) process. If this might apply to you, you should understand the decision-making criteria and process so that special circumstances you’re detailing are in fact special circumstances in the financial aid world. Continue reading Special Circumstances
FAFSA for Divorced Parents
This is a big topic so for today I’m going to focus on general rules. Keep in mind the FAFSA rules are different from the CSS Profile rules; below is FAFSA only.
The custodial parent for the FAFSA can be different than the custodial parent in the divorce decree and/or different from who claims the student as a dependent on their tax return. The FAFSA defines the custodial parent as “The parent that you lived with most Continue reading FAFSA for Divorced Parents
FAFSA Questions
I get a lot of good questions sent via comments or email and thought they might be of interest to others besides just the person who asked. So here goes: Continue reading FAFSA Questions
529s and the FAFSA
529s are a source of a bit of confusion when it comes to filling out the FAFSA. Here are some common issues:
529s for multiple children: All of the parents’ 529s get reported on the FAFSA as parent assets. Let’s say you have 3 children, ages 17 (the one whose FAFSA you’re completing), 15, and 12, and you have a 529 account for each with balances of $12,000, $10,000 and $7,000. You would report $29,000 in 529 assets. Continue reading 529s and the FAFSA
Common FAFSA Mistakes
The Department of Ed lists common FAFSA errors in a recent blog post. Here’s a cheat sheet on the ones that seem to generate the most confusion: Continue reading Common FAFSA Mistakes
FAFSA: Hurry Up & Wait
FAFSA Worksheet
Now that everyone is excited about the FAFSA, it’s nowhere to be found. Not last year’s, not this year’s. If you want a head start on collecting info, here is last year’s FAFSA Worksheet. Swap 2017 for 2016 and 2018 for 2017 and you’ll see exactly what documents and other information are needed.
And of course, the concrete step you can take today to prepare for the FAFSA is to get an FSA ID. Parents and students each need one. For married parents, only one parent needs to create an FSA ID.
