It’s time to apply for student financial aid

If your child is due to graduate from high school in 2024 and is considering college or career/trade school, the re-designed Free Application for Federal Student Aid form (FAFSA) should have been available since Dec. 31.

 

To facilitate completing the form, apply for your Federal Student Aid ID. It will take two or three days to be sent to your email address. This way you’ll be able to sign your FAFSA. (If you filed a FAFSA in previous years, you already have an ID, so don’t get another one!)

 

If you’ve never filed a FAFSA before, apply for your FSA-ID at studentaid.gov/fsa-id/create-account/launch. Do this only if your student is a senior in high school and will start college after July 1, 2024. You will need to provide your social security number (SSN), email, and phone number. One parent and one student should apply for their own Federal Student Aid ID. You and your child should not share your FSA-ID under any circumstance. If you are a parent with more than one child in college, be sure to log in with the same FSA-ID for all children. Thanks to the new 2024-25 FAFSA, you will need to file only one FAFSA for all your kids in college.

 

Keep your electronic ID and password safe because you will file a FAFSA every year. It will raise confusion if you apply for a second or alternate ID. With a FSA-ID, parents and students will be able to sign their FAFSA, sign their loan promissory notes, and view their federal student loan balances and payments.

 

Be aware that on the 2024-25 FAFSA form, parents are called “contributors.” A contributor is anyone required to complete a FAFSA form and provide consent and approval to have their federal income tax returns transferred from the IRS to the FAFSA form. Then contributors need to sign the form with their FSA-ID. Typically, the signers include the student, the biological or adoptive parents, or stepparents. Contributors on FAFSA are determined by the dependency status of the student, their tax-filing status, and their marital status. Most high school students are dependent.

 

The income tax returns will be used to determine federal aid for the student. Being identified as a contributor on FAFSA doesn’t necessarily mean financial responsibility, but parents will be required to provide their personal and financial information, or the student will not be eligible for federal financial aid – except for the unsubsidized loan. 

 

On the new FAFSA, even if parents refuse to contribute, dependent students can borrow up to the limits of unsubsidized loans, or up to $5,500 in the first year. 

 

Students will not be eligible to receive the subsidized portion of the loan (up to $3,500) nor the Pell Grant, if they were eligible. It’s essential that low-income families file this form! Even if you think you may not qualify, it’s better to file FAFSA in case your financial situation changes. Let’s say that the wage-earner loses their job. Then a FAFSA is already on file with the college, and a financial aid administrator may be able to increase funding, either via federal aid or their internal institutional aid. There are more plusses than minuses for filing FAFSA!

 

If you’re curious about what amount of federal aid you would receive, use the federal student aid estimator at studentaid.gov/aid-estimator. You can use this amount at any college of your choice.

 

C. Claire Law, M.S. IECA Certified Educational Planner helps students find colleges that fit them academically, socially, and financially.