2024-25 FAFSA Update

As you may have heard there have been some big changes with the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) for the 2024-25 year. Many seniors may be anxiously waiting to file the FAFSA and start making decisions for the future. At this time, it looks like the FAFSA will be available on December 31st - this is the latest that is allowed by law.

With the FAFSA being pushed back to December (it usually becomes available on October 1st), this means that many colleges won’t receive the information until later, possibly not before the end of January. This has a lot of financial-aid offers concerned because it will delay student offers, which will result in significantly less time for the students to fill out the form and for colleges to prepare aid awards (https://www.chronicle.com/newsletter).

It is predicted that students will start receiving financial-aid offers in late February, at the earliest. One of the biggest concerns is that of low-income students. These students are often on the fence about attending college and they tend to require more time and guidance. Once students receive the financial-aid offers they can then compare packages and decide where to enroll and if they can afford it (https://www.chronicle.com/newsletter). It is important to encourage low-income students to fill out the FAFSA because it is predicted that the changes to the FAFSA could “help 610,000 new students from low-income backgrounds” receive Pell Grants (https://studentaid.gov/announcements-events/fafsa-support).

If you or your student are anxious to start planning for college you can use the Federal Student Aid Estimator to get an early estimate of what your federal student aid could be after submitting the FAFSA. Another benefit of the new FAFSA form is that it will take less time to complete; some applicants will need to complete as few as 18 questions, taking less than 10 minutes (https://studentaid.gov/announcements-events/fafsa-support).

If you would like help navigating the FAFSA feel free to reach out to me at info@atozeducationalconsulting.com or 612.735.1261.