College Counseling
December letter to parents: applying for financial aid
Dear Senior Parents
Enclosed please find the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA), information for registering with the CSS/Financial Aid PROFILE, the federal publication “Funding Your Education” and the Vermont Grant Application. The last is sent to Vermont residents only; residents of other states should contact their state’s Department of Education to learn about any state financial aid programs. Some Vermont information, separately enclosed, is useful for deciphering the lists of federal grant and loan options. I’m also enclosing a summary of financial aid information from “Putney College Guide,” also available on the Putney website under College and some materials from FastWeb on the FAFSA
The FAFSA cannot be filed until January 1, 2005 - but should be filed as soon as possible after that date. Filing electronically is best. As the instructions indicate, information can be estimated; even though the FAFSA instructions recommend completing your income tax before filing the FAFSA, it is neither necessary nor advisable to do so. Don’t even wait for W-2 forms, for example, but glean the information from your last pay stub(s) of 2004. The FAFSA requests roughly the same information as a 1040, so it actually can work as a dry run for filing an income tax return.
The June 30 deadline for processing the FAFSA may get it through the computer, but be advised that Federal (and college) funds have largely dried up by then. The FAFSA form goes to a computer data processing firm, which crunches the numbers; all information is read by an optical scanner. Leave no blanks; give no answers that deviate from instructions (N/A is not acceptable in place of a number; -0- is more acceptable). VSAC (Vermont Student Assistance Corporation) will answer all questions about the FAFSA from the parents of any Putney student, no matter where resident; simply call them at 1-888-253-4819 and ask to speak to someone in the Grants Program. VSAC has a very good reputation for reliability and service.
In the financial aid application process, the CSS/Financial Aid PROFILE is not required by all colleges, as is the FAFSA, and is not free. You register with the PROFILE via the Internet : www.collegeboard.com. Some colleges have their own application forms for financial aid, and they will send them directly to you either together with the application forms for admission or upon request.
For help in searching out scholarships, the best website is www.fastweb.com. You have to register with them, but there is no cost to you. There is also plenty of advice about filling out the FAFSA, writing scholarship application essays, and so forth. Many sites have worksheets for estimating the expected family contribution; one is http://apps.collegeboard.com/fincalc/efc_welcome.jsp. A useful all-purpose site is http://www.princetonreview.com/college/finance/.
Common wisdom dictates that you save a copy of ALL college financial forms, bills, payments and so forth. As a parent who has been through this labyrinth a few times, I cannot emphasize enough the necessity of xeroxing.
Best wishes to all of you who wrestle with this part of the college application process.
Yours,
Jennifer DesMaisons
College Counselor
Notes on the FAFSA, CSS Profile, and other forms
FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid)
1. Electronic filing of the FAFSA, and the CSS (College Scholarship Service) Profile, is processed twice as quickly as the paper version.
2. If you file the FAFSA by mail, use the postcard enclosed with form to get an acknowledgement that your form has been received; once a truck trailer full of FAFSAs was lost … and only those awaiting the return-receipt postcard had a clue whether their form was among the missing. In general, be aware that you should also receive acknowledgement that SAT or ACT scores have been mailed, that the CSS Profile form has been received, and so forth … if you receive nothing of the sort, call those agencies to verify what has and hasn’t been done.
3. The student will receive a Student Aid Report from the central processing system. The information reported on the SAR must be checked for accuracy – particularly since it is advisable to complete the FAFSA well before W-2 forms have been received and tax forms filed. Estimated information is fine on the initial FAFSA because there is the possibility of correcting the SAR. The student and one parent must sign the corrected SAR and return it to the address listed.
4. The data you provide on the FAFSA will automatically be sent to the appropriate state agency as indicated by your address: be sure that VT doesn’t look like UT or NM like NH … and so forth.
5. College codes can be found on the FAFSA website (www.fafsa.ed.gov), from college materials, from VSAC or another state’s agency. The codes must be used; colleges’ addresses are not sufficient.
6. If your student is applying for financial aid at more than 6 colleges, the schools with the earliest deadlines should be listed first. Then a corrected form may be filed with the codes for the other schools on it, or a second FAFSA may be filed with all the same information but with different college code numbers. Some colleges will accept a xerox of the FAFSA or the SAR as a temporary measure, but they will usually insist on a report from the central processing service before finalizing any aid decisions.
Other forms
Colleges may also require the CSS Profile, which is not free, and/or its own financial aid forms. The CSS Profile should be filed as soon as possible; if it is required and hasn’t already been filed, register right this minute! Check with each college to ascertain its requirements.
APPLY AS EARLY AS POSSIBLE
XEROX EVERYTHING
