Home Stretch: Parenting Kids from 16-21
dirt track date -- Saturday, February 22, 2003 -- 06:38:39 PMI thought this subject deserved its own thread because I have learned so much, and enjoyed reading so much, stories from TPW'ers getting their kids ready to leave home. I've NOT enjoyed the FAFSA stories, but I hope to learn more about the perils of applying for college.
Renamed on 7/24/03.
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Some college financial aid horror show...Nancy C's description was harrowing.
Free Application for Federal Student Aid
It is required by any school as the first step in the application process for financial aid. For many schools, it is the only application you need make. Some schools have their own forms in addition. It has been improved over the years so that only one parent need report after divorce. It can all be done on the web. The major headache is that reports are due to all schools by March 1st which means you have to file with the dept. of ed. enough before then to have the report get to the school by March 1. And you have to have your 1040 numbers from the preceding year. This year was the earliest I've filed my taxes as an adult because of the FAFSA requirements.
When you say only one parents needs to file after divorce, what does that mean? Does it mean that one parent does not have access to the info on the form?
I wish Nancy C. would show up here so I could kick her ass. I am pissed that Alex apparently applied to places that all have rolling admissions so SHE ALREADY HAS ALL THE INFORMATION THAT MATTERS TO HER. I am likely to kill Lindsay long before the most anxiously awaited letter arrives during the first week of April.
dtd, they require financial information from one parent only. The form says that the parent with whom the applicant spent the majority of time during the last year should provide information. Whichever parent reports must include information for the stepparent if they are remarried. Access to the submitted form is via PINs - both the student and the reporting parent get a PIN to sign electronically if they wish - or by secure email links with the student's SSN and DOB.
So how does the non-custodial parent's income and resources get factored in? I looked at the form and didn't see any place where it was obvious.
It doesn't get factored in. I presume someone got tired of kids getting screwed by absentee NCPs so they set it up so that only one parental unit must report. For us it was as good as it could get because we were able to choose which parent was likely to result in the lowest expected family contribution due to joint custody.
This bodes well for us...now I just have to hope that they don't change the rules in the next few years! We were assuming that BOTH household incomes would be factored in and that the kids would not get diddly squat.
It doesn't get factored in.
Are you sure? I thought I recalled the ex getting a separate form that also needed to be filled out. My form was the "master" so to speak, but I seem to recall that they also collected his data. I only remember this because I had to nag constantly for the fuckhead to send it in.
How much merit-based aid is available?
We've been assuming that we'd end up paying if not all, then mostly all of the college expenses for the 3 kids less the state-mandated contribution from my ex for J&C, which is his proportional share of an in state public institution. Looking over the forms, it may be that SD will qualify for some kind of need-based aid if her mom's income is the only one factored in. We're assuming her mom will not have any money to pay for college, but if her "contribution" is being the one to file so that SD is considered for need-based aid it reduces the burden on us to fund the whole thing.
This has been very encouraging--thanks Sunny!
Well, Lindsay was offered a merit scholarship at Indiana with her acceptance. I don't know if she's competitive for merit-based at NYU but their merit-based scholarships come from each individual school and she's likely to be more competitive academically in the School of the Arts than she would be in the School of Arts and Sciences. Every school has the category of Trustee/President/Dean's scholarships, usually for the top 1 - 5% of their admitted class. There are Robert Byrd scholarships that are merit-based and state administered. And then there's the whole host of outside scholarships from Rotary clubs, booster clubs, race-specific, major-specific (I had a chemistry research fellowship that paid tuition and books and was not need-based), etc. All of those awards decrease whatever need-based aid is awarded, though, so it's critically important for Lindsay to be searching those sources out because she's not going to get diddly need-based.
Once a kid is actually in college, there's no opportunity for merit-based aid, is there? Given that our daughter wasn't eligible for needs-based aid and our financial situation hasn't changed, there's no point in putting in the forms again this year, is there?
I got my fellowship at the end of my freshman year. It depends on the institution, I would guess. I would have her contact both the financial aid department and the department chairman for her selected major to find out about available funds for upperclass students.
My SATs and grades were stellar but it didn't do me a heck of a lot of good for freshman year because I applied very late and they had already given away their merit-based scholarships. My freshman year performance was excellent and I let it be known that my continuation had some financial strings attached to it and let the bidding between biology and chemistry begin. Chemistry won, to my great benefit.