The Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA, has opened and allows students planning to attend secondary education a streamlined process to receive aid including federal Pell Grants. However, smooth sailing is hardly how most students would describe the process.
The FAFSA, which is usually sent to the public in mid-October, wasn’t sent out until Dec. 30, a whole two months after it was promised. This is in the government’s allotted time to begin accepting applications, however, the first few days were riddled with problems.
The program was only available for a few hours a day while the site was performing maintenance and trying to keep up with high demand from eager high school and college students. A bar at the top of the site would appear saying maintenance was being completed, but no information was given out saying when they thought the site would be up and running again or when they believed the site would be bug-free.
The site now seems to be running at full capacity, but issues persist, including repeating questions and some filers simply being blocked from answering important questions. Senior Grace Kendal tried to file the FAFSA earlier this year and faced trouble during the process when entering information which has left a bitter taste in her mouth about the process.
“It makes me worried that the information won’t be accurate or used correctly,” she said, “and just overall skeptical of how effective the process was.”
Overall, the program has been set up to give the most students a chance to receive aid. More students than ever are able to receive Pell Grants and contributors’ 2022 taxes can be automatically transferred from the IRS to the FAFSA form, creating a much easier experience for those filing. Students can also add up to 20 schools on the application and broaden their horizons for college choices.
Even with all these changes, however, there are still some students like Gengjie Xie whose necessary information has fallen through the cracks.
“[There is] a lot of information that I do not know how to fill out, and it’s just some stuff that I don’t remember,” he said, “like the first question, ‘When did I become a resident of Indiana?’ I just don’t know.”
Not only is this information necessary for students like Xie to apply for financial aid, it is also crucial to their ability to attend college with as little debt as possible.
“I applied to some scholarships, [but I] haven’t heard back from any of them so right now I’m just really relying on FAFSA,” Xie said.
For any student in a situation similar to Xie, Kendall or is simply in need of assistance when filing the FAFSA, Rebecca Shull, college and career counselor, is offering a FAFSA Filing Night on Thursday to aid families through the process. The night will be hosted by Shull and aided by financial experts from Ivy Tech, Marian Univeristy and the Indiana Latino Institute.