Agree with @1214mom. I don’t understand why we had to file a FAFSA to get the unsubsidized student loan when it’s not based on need and we didn’t apply for any FA this year.
Definitely the hardest part of the financial process was figuring out everything that I needed to do to get Fin. Aid. I am not a 1st generation college student, but I am a 1st generation American, so the FAFSA, CSS, EFC, etc. we’re all abbreviations that I had to find out about on my own before explaining it to my parents. Also figuring out that most schools don’t stack outside scholarships with need based aid was a bummer. Didn’t figure that one out till a couple of months after confirming my attendance.
I’m frustrated that the same merit scholarship (half tuition) that D was awarded last year has increased this year for incoming Freshman, but no increase for those who have been awarded it in prior years.
I’ve had to pay out of pocket because my university sat on some forms and wait for financial aid to reinburse. Happened at least twice. Got audited one year also. Some schools are smoother than others with fin aid.
Merit aid is significantly different. Offering subsidized and unsubsidized loans is significantly different.
We got FA packages from two schools, and one thought we could pay 25% more than our EFC, and the other 50% more than our EFC.
I have no idea why they even bother with an EFC if it does not have a relationship to what colleges offer in aid.
It’s like “you can afford 10K so we will provide you all but 20K - good luck!” - without the good luck part.
As for “first generation student” and “first generation American” - there might be some difference, but I can tell you that back when there was only a paper FAFSA plus parents who grew up in the 1950s would NEVER EVER let their kids see any financial info. Now the process almost forces you to let your kids see your full financial info.
I was kinda annoyed when I found out my kids would not get any (or much less) merit scholarships when they transferred to a four-year school.
Some colleges that include a student contribution in their package will allow merit to cover that prior to pulling down grants. That is a nice something if you are in one of those schools.
I was frustrated by the schools that didn’t use the CSS profile but had their own version you had to fill out and MAIL in. I was frustrated at the detail I had to hand over to complete strangers who may not even accept my child. I thought the FAFSA makes it too difficult to send to more than ten schools. You either have to call-in and add names or you have to wait a couple days and amend. Silly.
For my unreasonable frustrations, I wish there were more full-needs schools and that they weren’t so hard to get into. I wish that high merit opportunities weren’t so often in such expensive schools (looks great when your kid gets 30K a year in merit but when the school is 60K, it could still be out of reach.) I wish that the schools affordable with high merit had been more attractive in our specific situation. Like I said though, those are my unreasonable frustrations as the world can’t really work that way.
The terminology. I’ve been in higher ed a long time (working with low-income freshman). The terminology is confusing to them. The worst? The acronym EFC. Really? No one, not even the government, can tell an institution what it can charge. Those institutions would go bankrupt, and yet “Expected Family Contribution” implies just that. That number generated by the FAFSA needs a new name. Call it an EI (eligibility index) or something.
I hate that the confusion is never over. The complexity goes on and on. My D1 received a huge scholarship at HYPS . Hurray, but as she finished her freshman year, I realized that we probably have to pay taxes on it . . . I need to find out if she is best as my dependent, what to do to mitigate the tax impact, etc.
I find it sad that when some people find out their 6 figure income will result in a 5-figure EFC they complain about how “good” low income families have it in the financial aid process. Then low income kids with modest stats post wondering where all that money is because all they’re truly guaranteed is a ~$5k/year Pell grant & a ~$5500/year loan. It’s important to run the Net Price Calculators and know your own situation, not make assumptions based on someone else’s award because they’re all different.
And be aware that aid packages can change every year too. If Pell eligibilty changes, students can lose college based grants as well as state grants. My son chose to commute to our state school where we’re nearly full pay because we couldn’t afford the $20k out of pocket most schools wanted (even with the ~$30k/year grants) on our ~$60k/year income (so it doesn’t affect us), but families who are Pell eligible can be unpleasantly surprised if their financial situation changes.
That one frustrates me, too @austinmshauri . Spend some time with these low income kids, it’s not all roses. My institution has a scholarship that will pay the balance of tuition for in state students with a zero EFC, but things aren,t suddenly rosy. The local kids may not need loans if they can live at home, but they end up working a lot of hours to pay gas, buy a car, cover incidentals, buy books and supplies, some of them don’t have internet at home. But, yeah, they got it GOOD. Know what it’s like to live on an income that produces a zero EFC? many still have family obligations–taking or picking up younger siblings from school, fixing dinner, baby sitting nieces /nephews all weekend so other family members can work. But it’s the higher income family that was “punished” for saving.
Aaah, yes. The rosy myth of poverty. You’ll hear it everywhere- its’ so great to get housing vouchers. It’s so wonderful to be on food stamps. Wow, those Medicaid folks have it easy-peasy. Here I am in my nice house in a great neighborhood with wonderful schools and boy, sure do wish my kids were living in a homeless shelter so they could write a great essay and waltz into Harvard on full aid.
I agree, we know people from all walks of life but somehow, only the wealthiest of our friends have kids at Stanford and the Ivies. Yes, they are full-pay but they also had a life filled to the brim with opportunities, private schools, college coaching and spared a lot of the day-to-day distractions like having to do their own laundry (not saying all rich kids live like this… just the ones we personally know heading to the Ivy leagues.) Great kids and their parents should be proud to provide for them as they do. I just sorta hate to hear the crap about poor kids having it good in this ONE single way from people who can’t seem to acknowledge the hundreds of other ways their kid had it better.
I have a frustration to add… aid in public schools is so black and white. If you are on the cusp, you have to really consider what the better deal is… a private school with a more sliding financial aid scale could be the better long term option than a public school where an annual raise at work will bump you out of qualification before the kid finishes.
Interesting read, as a financial aid professional. I have been on CC a long time, and hearing the frustrations over the years has really helped me in my job - it helps me to know what folks don’t understand. I still plan to write “that book” someday … the one where I explain how financial aid works in terms that others can understand. But I wonder if, even after reading it, people would hold onto their magical thinking. I say this because I am completely blunt with my grad student applicants about how aid works at our school. Yet, they are somehow still surprised when they get their aid offer when admitted. I think they live on the hope that magical unicorns will bring them pots of gold to pay for school, and they are disappointed when the award letter tells them exactly what I told them to expect.
But yes, there is much about the process and the system that is frustrating. Some can be dealt with by increasing communication with families earlier in the process. Other frustrations are just part of “the way it is.” Still others are the result of overworked staff. And then there are the schools that sugar-coat things to make things seem like they are the opposite of being viewed through a rear-view mirror.
My frustration is even when you think you have figured it out, it changes and you don’t. My daughter had 5 forms of FA last year, and it seemed no person at the school could answer questions about more than one. The FA office knew nothing about the athletic aid (athletic dept), the merit aid (admissions dept), the state grant (that was ONE person in the payment dept), Bright Futures (a different person in a different dept). Then there was the lady who shredded the application to appeal the FA because she though the forms were wrong, but they weren’t so I had to redo them. I really think a student needs an ombudsman to coordinate all the different departments at the school. In DD’s case, they are all in the same building, on the same floor, but only the Bright Futures lady can do BF, only the Admin officer can do merit, etc.
Then figuring out the taxes! More fun.
But the biggest frustration of all is the fiction that the filing and information of forms belongs to the student and the parent isn’t really a part of it, isn’t supposed to file anything, and every button you hit requires you to swear the you are the student and have filled out everything even though you are at college and your parents are 2000 miles away and have the tax info, and your parents will probably be in jail by next year so you’ll qualify for lots of aid! It took me 3 attempts to get my new FAFSA ID and 3 more to get my daughter’s. It never asked for the former PIN and I don’t know why, but for my other daughter it did and her approval went through right away. My kids don’t know how to complete these forms without my help. What would they do if I didn’t exist? They’d get help from the school, but they’d be independent and wouldn’t need my info. Parents are expected to pay, to provide all the income and asset information, to summit documents, but otherwise are not allowed to apply for financial aid.
Good one! I sure as heck didn’t want to be the parent who’s ostensibly trying to enjoy a Saturday afternoon while the kid comes in every 15 minutes and says, “Dad! Now I need this! Do you have it? Where can I get it?” It was easier on me to just do it myself.
Idoc was the worst. What kind of system has you upload docs on a checklist but not say what doc is what? It also took forever. I hope next year they’ve made some major improvements.
Using IRS data retrieval and having EFC double because it treats a retirement rollover (no income) as income. Then spending 2 months (so far) appealing major cuts to financial aid, filing multiple extra documents, just to show my income really didn’t increase.
Having to complete all the extra FA forms, supplements, provide tax returns, etc., for schools that don’t end up asmitting your kid. Seems it would be a lot less work for the FA office if they only asked for the forms and info AFTER they made the admissions decisions.
And in subsequent years, waiting until late May to see how much your changed income will change the FA award, at the school your student now loves SO much… nail-biter! (2 years down, only 2 to go, so hard when self-employed with fluctuating income… when business is good, worries about decreasing aid loom!)
I am frustrated with Work Study - just because you receive it doesn’t guarantee it, and those jobs are highly competitive in some schools. It will pay for my kids’ books/expenses, and if they don’t get jobs, things are very tight for them.