early financial aid deadline

thumper1
Sat, 20 Dec 2008 16:10:46 +0000

You can fill out the FAFSA AND the Profile using estimates for your 2008 tax year. Tell your parents you can do this. You would submit these to the schools to meet the January 15 deadline. You should try to make your estimates as CLOSE to reality for the 2008 year as possible. For the FAFSA you will choose the “will file” option, meaning you WILL file your taxes but haven’t yet done so. Once your taxes are completed, for the FAFSA, you will go in and amend the figures to reflect the numbers on your parents’ and your 2008 tax returns, and resubmit to the college (you can do the Jan submission to Skidmore and then add your other schools for the Feb deadline when you amend the figures). For the Profile, you will have to remember to print out a copy of the Profile you submit. When the taxes are completed, you will have to hand write the corrections on the form and send it to the school in most cases. With the Profile it is best to call each school to find out what the amending policy is. Regardless…you will have to submit your estimated Profile to all schools as there is no way to change the form once it’s been submitted to the College Board.

BUT you CAN complete these forms using estimates and many many students do so. In fact, even though our deadline isn’t until February (for returning students) we ALWAYS complete the FAFSA using estimates in January and amend in Feb when our taxes are done.

Am I making sense?