Applying for Financial Aid

[Buttered Toast]

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Are we supposed to apply after interviewing so that the fin aid estimate is included with an admissions letter? Or do we wait until we are accepted before applying for aid?

Thanks!

 

[Slave to the Game]

Call your school.

For FAFSA, you won't need to do anything until next March.

 

[Revolution9]

I think we wait until accepted.

 

[Ismet]

You will get information about all of this. You can't even do FAFSA right now.

 

[theonlytycrane]

For applicants aiming to start in 2017, do we apply in March 2017 for aid?

Sorry for the noobie question!

 

[Fluffy123]

I am also curious about this. We submit the FAFSA in March and then the schools award us FA packages? How does this work?

 

[kraskadva]

Actually the FAFSA just changed this year - you now fill it out in Oct (so like now) for the following academic year, using the prior prior year's taxes.

 

[theonlytycrane]

Actually the FAFSA just changed this year - you now fill it out in Oct (so like now) for the following academic year, using the prior prior year's taxes.

😵 so we should fill this out asap? does this factor into aid from schools as well?

 

[kraskadva]

😵 so we should fill this out asap? does this factor into aid from schools as well?

You should probably fill it out soon-ish, but I wouldn't freak out and feel like you have to do it tonight. But definitely soon after you have an acceptance.
And it does (or can) factor into aid decisions - particularly the need based ones...

That said though, this is the first year for the change, so even though the FAFSA is a bit different, I don't know that all the schools are going to rush to change up/accelerate their fin aid review procedures. So even if you fill it out now, they may not look at it until spring, when they typically looked at it in the past. But that's speculation on my part.
It was mentioned to me during the fin aid presentation when I interviewed to go ahead and fill it out in the fall. And then the next comment was to not freak out if we didn't hear anything from them for a while. So...take that as you will.