Applying for College — the Financial Aid Paper Chase

Checking my email each morning, I am usually feeling some trepidation. My voicemail gets forwarded to my email if I miss a call. Have I missed a customer’s call?  Have I missed a phone call from the doctors who are treating my Dad? Phone tag consumes so much time and energy.

But this morning, I had an email from a financial aid officer at one of the universities to which my 17 year old has applied.  She didn’t understand my faxed explanation and wanted further clarification. There was a not so subtle implication that I filled out the forms wrong.

Did I really fill out the online profile wrong? I decided to throw myself at her feet (figuratively speaking) and beg for mercy.

Our phone call turned out to be very cordial. I answered her questions about our circumstances (which are a bit out of the ordinary.) She advised me that she would have completed the profile differently but she would make notations and get back to me if she needed it in writing.

After a HUGE sigh of relief, I went back and reviewed the financial aid application printout. I checked various web sites for definitions. My answers still looked like they were in the right spots. How did applying for college financial aid get so complicated?!

If you are a recent graduate, you know what I am talking about. But, if haven’t yet had the fun of applying to colleges for yourself or your children, you have a surprise coming. The good news is that, between university endowments and federal grants and loans, the chances of your child (or you) graduating from a top notch school are better than ever before.

The bad news? The forms are complicated and peppered with sensitive financial questions that can be tricky to answer.  Forget about privacy. If you want any kind of financial aid, you get to put your personal and business financials on view for every college you would like to attend.

Parents, if your child is living at home, you have to provide your tax returns and W-2s, too. Divorce doesn’t exempt the non-custodial parent from sharing in the show and tell either. And, if you own a business like we do, expect to share the business returns. (Our CPA confided that he found the Business/Farm Supplement more complicated than it needed to be.)

Be prepared to get your taxes done very early. One college wanted our tax returns on January 1! (They did accept 2005 returns with 2006 estimated information.) The most lenient due date we have is March 1, 2007.

Why so early?

Most colleges want to send the financial aid offer with the acceptance letter in mid-March or early April. So, we alerted our CPA back in December that we had to have our personal and business taxes done in January to meet these deadlines for the online and document submissions.

The online process in brief:   The entire financial aid process starts with the FAFSA , the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, which determines your family’s required minimum financial contribution. The intent of the FAFSA is to level the playing field for the applicants. No matter what college or university you apply to for financial aid, your family’s basic contribution is the same, based on the student’s and the parents’ income. Most state universities and some private colleges work just with the FAFSA. Like its name says, it is free. Then, you send copies of your signed tax returns to the college financial aid office to confirm the online application.

Other private universities have their own financial aid forms, but most have now gravitated to the CollegeBoard’s CSS Profile. (I find it odd that no one has questioned the CollegeBoard’s monopoly on the college entrance process. They have expanded beyond adminstering tests to collecting financial aid information and brokering loans to parents for college expenses.)

The Profile asks many of the same questions that are on the FAFSA plus additional questions customized for each private university that uses the Profile. For an additional handful of schools, the CollegeBoard collects the relevant tax returns via the IDOC service. And, of course, the CollegeBoard collects a fee for each Profile you forward. (Gotta admire that business model.)

All of the information gets forwarded to the financial aid offices. The staff use it to provide an aid offer for each student accepted for admission by the university. The vast majority of these aid offers are “need based” (determined by the FAFSA augmented with the Profile.) “Merit” aid or scholarships based solely on high school achievement are fewer.

Low income students get the most aid; well-to-do families ($100, 000 annual income)have to pay their own way. The majority of us in the middle (or in high cost areas of the USA) struggle to get the forms filled out right to get as much financial aid as reasonably possible.

While you can hire a consultant to personally guide your famly through this process, we chose to take a less expensive route and use Tuitioncoach.com. This new web site is a great knowledge base of  information to navigate the complex questions in both the FAFSA and the CSS Profile.

The expert behind this new web site is Dr. Paul Wruble. We first encountered Paul at a free seminar at our son’s high school. He is an educator by training, was a principal at one of the highest ranked high schools in California and is determined to help as many students as possible get great college educations.

The Tuitioncoach.com web site is packed with Paul’s insights and understanding of the financial aid process. For the $59 annual membership, you have access to even more detailed information on applying for aid and how to negotiate for a better deal at your first choice school.  (I didn’t even know I could ask for a review!)

It’s a great resource. Our family highly recommends it.