Looking for advice on how to proceed where we have been admitted to two schools that are not moving the 5/1 commitment deadline. We will require both merit/need aid for our first choice school, and have been told it will likely be at least the end of next week before we see a package (4/19) and extensions will be looked at after that. She has the scores for merit, but it is bundled with need and not guaranteed. Our second school is in-state with lots of merit and will come in below SAI. (No need aid) We have already paid a housing deposit for #2, but do not have priority & are missing scholarship/housing opportunities because we havenât paid the enrollment. If this were a waitlist situation, weâd be jumping into choice 2 with fingers still crossed for number 1. Is it accurate that we still canât deposit at number 2 without withdrawing acceptance from number one? This is awful for my child.
Legally you are in the clear I think. Not a lot they can do about it.
Ethically, given the situation you are in, I think itâs fair to deposit and still keep the other option open. If anything, their insistence on longstanding deadlines/rules/etiquette in a very unique situation seems more ethically compromised than anything you might do.
Not that they are bad people. I firmly believe they are doing the best they can in a weird situation.
You can do the same.
They might keep your deposit. But if you are ok with thatâŠ
Iâm sorry for the situation you are in.
I agree you can put down the deposit at #2 while you wait for FA for #1.
Agree 100%
Thank you for the bid of reassurance. We are having flashbacks to freshman year of high school when everything was going in and out of lockdown and school options were always in flux. Itâs so hard to see so many kids who dreamed of senior year excitement and announcements having to carry this extra anxiety. Unimaginable what the schools have to sort through, too.
Thanks for the help. It makes me less nervous to have a few experienced opinions weighing in.
FWIW, we are in a very similar situation and will be doing the same thing come April 29th or so. No choice, unfortunately. I told my daughter to expect that things could change even as late as July. I think the important thing this year is to make the best choice you can given the data in front of you, protect those interests, and proceed along that path until you are given a reason to consider anything else.
California opens up CADAA for families with undocumented parent/parents (these mixed status families have not been able to file new FAFSA.) CADAA has normally been reserved for âdreamersâ and allows students to qualify for California grants at state colleges.
Deadline is May 2, and ultimately will still need to file FAFSA to get federal grants.
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Information from NASFAA:
*ED is also aiming to make student corrections available broadly next week. The department is in the final phases of testing student corrections, and some students may be available to make corrections for brief periods of time over the next few days.
Once corrections are broadly available, the department said it will communicate publicly that students who need to make corrections can do so by logging into their accounts. ED noted that the corrections process should only take a few minutes for most students and contributors. Institutions and states should expect a new ISIR transaction within one to three days of the applicantâs submission of a correction.
Currently, as many as 16% of FAFSAs require a student correction, according to ED, and some students may need to send their applications to additional institutions or make other student-initiated corrections.
Most of the required student corrections â 95% â involve six issues, ED said. Four of the issues are that the FAFSA is missing a studentâs signature, a parentâs signature, consent and approval from the student to retrieve federal tax information (FTI) as required by the FAFSA Simplification Act, or consent and approval from the parent to retrieve FTI. The other two issues involve dependent students choosing to only be considered for eligibility for Direct Unsubsidized Loans or âmaking selections on the FAFSA that place them in a provisionally independent status at historically high rates.â While the latter two issues may not always require corrections, the high response rates indicate that a high proportion of the positive responses may have been made in error.*
However, it also noted:
*And the department on Friday announced that it would be reprocessing all affected ISIRs â including those where students would potentially see a decrease in student aid eligibility.
According to ED, about 30% of FAFSA forms are potentially affected by known processing or data errors. Two-thirds of these affected FAFSAs (or about 20% of all FAFSAs) are affected by two of the three tax data issues ED identified last week, related to education tax credits and amended tax returns. ED said it plans to reprocess these ISIRs and begin sending them to institutions by May 1*
This means that students will be able to make updates before all issues are reprocessed. So itâs possible a student will be able to update their FAFSA ⊠and then ED will reprocess it. So you could get a new SAI & then another. More importantly, students need to be careful when adding schools. Donât erase any schools youâre still considering if youâre adding more schools. The vast majority of students should have their choices down to 20 or fewer schools by this point, though. Just replace definite noâs with the new school codes.
Does this realistically mean there is little chance that schools will be able to finish their packages before May 1st? I was on a call this week where our school anticipated packages rolling out beginning 4/22, but also acknowledged they are waiting on the list of FAFSA forms with processing errors to holistically ration out institutional grants. I am completely confused as to whether this is actually still possible.
My studentâs file still says âprocessedâ with no errors, but we have received nothing to show that schools are in receipt
of data. (The non-refundable commitment and housing deposit date is still 5/1, and they are holding firm. There was a suggestion that case-by -case extensions could be granted, so we are asking.)
So ⊠the answer is that it depends. If the school is able to process âgoodâ FAFSAs - that is, ones that the Department of Education indicates donât need any reprocessing (or that donât appear on EDâs list of FAFSAs that need reprocessing ⊠whichever list gets sent) - they can do an award letter that hopefully wonât change. I say hopefully because every time we turn around, some other mistake is unveiled. And I say if the school is able to process based on EDâs lists because not every school has the manpower or system capability to process in dribs and drabs from a list. Some will have to wait until reprocessing is complete & run all awards at once.
If a school says they can get an award by such and such a time, I would think that they probably can. Iâm guessing that schools are not promising if they arenât pretty darn sure they can do it. The calls when the timeframe passes are too time consuming ⊠they will likely want to make sure that they can deliver if they provide a done-by date.
If you are not sure you will be able to respond to schools by the date they want you to respond, itâs wise to request an extension.
Thanks!
My Dâs account says performing planned maintanance so we canât make corrections , we have missing signature on our form
We have to wait 
, our form was submitted Jan8th
Just keep trying every so often.
We are in the same boat. So frustrating!
I was able to add signatures to my Dâs application just a few minutes ago in case you want to try again now
I was also able to make corrections about 20 minutes ago. I tried off and on all day and finally got in.
Thank you! We just got to submit our missing signature as well. Hooray! Good luck to all!
My daughterâs is now open for corrections. All I need to do is add schools but I canât find where to do that. Now I have an open correction, but it only has a button for financials or demographics.
You can only make the changes through her account. Federal Student Aid
Thanks. Their FAQ didnât answer that question 
. If I leave the correction open and donât submit it will the original version get sent?