From the information spliced together, it appears that corrections can be done at the end of January when the FAFSA submissions are processed.
We added all the schools when son and I did the form. He has 19, which is a lot. Should we have waited to add the schools? Thanks for all your good advice!
We received confirmation with a âSAI cannot be calculatedâ and likely no pell grant. Will the SAI be updated later?
No - I meant to add additional schools. For example, a school the student decides to add after completing the FAFSA. Or schools in excess of 20, which some students do have.
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Does it give a reason SAI canât be calculated? People have been getting an SAI, although itâs estimated at this point. And some whose SAI canât be calculated are given a reason.
Thank you so much. It says" We canât calculate your SAI. Continue reading for more details.
The SAI is not a measure of how much student aid youâll receive or how much youâll pay for college. Schools use your SAI to determine your federal student aid eligibility.
Based on the eligibility criteria, you donât appear to be eligible for a Federal Pell Grant. However, you may be eligible for other federal, state, or institutional grants; scholarships; and/or work study programs."
Responses like the one you received have been reported here. I honestly donât know what the issue is, but the student will get an email later this month telling them what to do if they need to fix something on the FAFSA. For now, you can only wait (sorry).
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We did too. It says student must sign, but she canât because they are still reviewing her Fafsa ID. We are giving it another week or so and then will check again.
We get the âin reviewâ message. She submitted Fafsa ID twelve days ago, it says it takes about three days but obviously they are backed up. But every time I log in to check progress we both get an email saying âyour Fafsa ID has been changedâ so maybe that keeps resetting the process. Iâm leaving it alone for a week or so and wont be logging in.
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I have gotten that notification, too, and it is frustrating. I donât always get it when I sign into my draft FAFSA - just sometimes. It makes no sense to me.
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My daughter just tried to login to finish her saved 2024-25 application but the page is blank. I tried logging into my parent account and was able to pull up my information. Does anyone have any suggestions? I tried calling the âhelp centerâ but they arenât accepting calls right now because of âextremely high call volumesââŠThis is the most frustrating thing.
Have her log in here: https://studentaid.gov/. Iâve been able to log in that way & access my draft FAFSA when I couldnât log in using the FAFSA link.
It didnât work. The draft button was there but after pressing that button it took her to a blank page. All of the drop down menus are there but when you click on any of them the page is blank. Whatâs strange is it says that the last update was today, but she hasnât been able to logon. I, however, logged on early this morning and had to re-sign my contributor page for the 3rd time, so maybe that transferred over. Thank you so much anyway!
Try again tomorrow, and again Monday if need be.
Can someone explain SAI to me like Iâm a fifth grader? I had thought it was simply the new EFC but based on an updated calculationâŠBut now Iâve read somewhere that itâs not the EFC, but rather just a baseline number used to determine need-based aid eligibilityâŠAnd I can understand how it can be used for that, too, but how does it differ from EFC (aside from formula to calculate)? Is this an estimate of what I will have to pay or not? If not, what does the number I was given actually mean? How will this number be used by university financial aid offices, etc?
Edited to add:
I just saw this above and this is similar to what I have read elsewhere and what has me confused. What exactly does this mean?
The EFC was never a measure of how much aid a student would receive or how much one would pay for college. The EFC was used to determine federal aid eligibility (Pell Grant, SEOG, and maybe eligibility for federal work study and subsidized loans assuming the student has financial need).
I do not think SAI and EFC are really different on how they are used.
Yes, some colleges that only use the FAFSA will use the SAI (as they did the EFC) to determine awarding of their need based institutional aid.
The EFC should always have been viewed as the minimum you would pay for college. Sai is the same.
@kelsmomâŠam I way off?
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OK, I guess that was essentially how I saw EFCâŠI mean, I saw it as a ballpark amount, rather than a minimum amount. So now that I have this SAI numberâŠI should assume that when a college determines need-based aid, they will base it off this number, but the catch is that they may or may NOT meet it? And in that sense shouldnât be understood as an estimate for out of pocket cost?
Colleges that donât meet full need are not under any obligation to meet yourâŠfull need. And they often donât.
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What I read is that the name was changed because of the confusion that people had with EFC. They thought EFC what they would owe.
âAlthough the name change from Expected Family Contribution (EFC) to Student Aid Index (SAI) might appear to be a minor detail in the context of the major overhaul of federal student aid in 2021, the U.S. Department of Education decided to switch the name for an excellent reason: accurate terminology will expedite the entire process. For decades, Expected Family Contribution (EFC) was widely misinterpreted as the total amount a student would be expected to pay, so the term was criticized as a misnomer that misled applicants and their families about the true cost of college. The subsequent confusion slowed down an already difficult application process and often upended financial planning for collegeâ
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I like this formula:
An applicantâs eligibility for needs-based financial aid is determined by subtracting both the Student Aid Index (SAI) and Other Financial Assistance (OFA) from the Cost of Attendance (COA). The difference between the COA and the SAI plus the OFA will be the applicantâs financial need, as follows: Need = Cost of Attendance (COA) - Student Aid Index (SAI) - Other Financial Assistance (OFA
But as stated above Colleges often donât meet full need.