Filling Out the FAFSA Part I

It's That Time of Year Again

By Matthew Bullington

It’s that time of year again.  With April 15th rapidly approaching, Americans are beginning to review their records for the year in preparation for filing taxes.  While you have that information handy you should go ahead and complete the FAFSA.  If you have a son or

daughter heading off to college this fall then the FAFSA is a necessary step in the process towards securing financial aid of just about any kind.  Let’s take a quick look at the basics of what the FAFSA is and when you need to submit it.

First a quick introduction to the FAFSA.  The FAFSA, or Free Application for Federal Student Aid, is a financial need analysis form provided by the Department of Education.  The form is filled out every year using information from your tax returns, and is used to produce an estimate, known as the Expected Family Contribution (EFC), of how much the family will be able to contribute financially to the student’s education for the following academic year.  This estimate is in turn sent out to the colleges and universities you designate, and is the basis for any need-based financial aid.  Need based financial aid are monetary offers in the form of loans, grants, scholarships, or work-study based on the difference between your family’s EFC and the cost of attending that university.  In addition to need based financial aid, the FAFSA is also considered an essential part of the application for virtually all federal scholarship dollars, including merit scholarships.  For these reasons completion of the FAFSA is essential if you intend to apply for any grants, loans, or scholarships provided by the state or federal government.

So when do you need to have the FAFSA completed?  The application cannot be completed any earlier than January 1, since it is dependent upon your earnings for the previous year.  The website advertises a June 30 deadline, however this is just the federal deadline.  Most states and even some individual schools have their own deadlines for when the application must be completed by to be eligible for financial aid consideration.  Those dates vary widely, and for some states can be as early as March 1, so determining the applicable deadline early is essential.  For a listing of the state deadlines, click here.  As you can see, in some instances the deadline may occur prior to Tax Day.  While it is not necessary to have your taxes filed prior to sending in the application, it would definitely make things easier to have done so.

My recommendation would be to determine the deadline for your state or the university you are considering, and go ahead and complete both your tax returns and the application prior to that date.  Then you can sit back and relax while everyone else rushes frantically to complete their returns on-time.  Okay, so maybe you won’t be relaxing, but at least you’ll have a peace of mind that you have finished one more step towards completing a successful college application.

Matthew