Financial Aid Confidential

For high school seniors applying to college, March and April are typically the months when admission decisions and financial aid award letters arrive in the mail. These letters detail how much aid you will receive from each school. Financial aid packages can influence your school choice, and obviously you want to get the best package possible from each institution. To help you better understand how to get the funding you deserve, Careers and Colleges went right to the source—financial aid directors from American International College, Berkeley College, Iona College, and Westmont College. We asked them to explain the process, give us some tips, and advise us about the pitfalls.
What are the most common mistakes students make in the financial aid process?

Berkeley: The biggest problem is thinking there is no aid for you and not applying at all. Every student should fill out the FAFSA, no matter what you think your need is. A lot of institutions use the FAFSA to award institutional aid, which is not always based on need.
AIC: Often people don’t fill out the FAFSA correctly, which causes a delay. I’ve seen everything from students leaving fields blank to not giving the appropriate tax information from their tax returns to incorrectly reporting their “tax paid.” Not applying on time is another common mistake, so be aware of individual college deadlines.
Westmont: Students and families often have trouble identifying untaxed income for the year. This is an essential part of deciding how much aid you get. Also, make absolutely sure the information on the FAFSA is true. The government has a verification process. If you have been dishonest, you’ll lose out on funding.
Iona: One of the most common mistakes is using a company or service that charges a fee to fill out the FAFSA. They all guarantee some type of aid—but all students are eligible for loans. Plus, filing the FAFSA is free, and these services often make mistakes.
Do you have other advice on filing the FAFSA?
Berkeley: File as early as possible. Certain funds—federal SEOG grants, Perkins loans, and institutional aid—are limited. Colleges get an allocation and once they’re gone, they’re gone. Don’t put off filing because you haven’t done your taxes yet. Fill out the form using estimated income information.
Westmont: Never rule yourself out. At Westmont, I see students who were hesitant and then are pleasantly surprised. We only require the FAFSA, but students must file it by our priority deadline of March 1. Also, students should file electronically; about 90% of our students now file on the Web. Apply early for your PIN number as well.
What advice can you give on getting private scholarships?
Iona: We recommend searching the Web for outside scholarships. Students should check with their parents’ unions at work as well.
AIC: Applying for scholarships—writing essays and filling out the applications— takes time. But if you don’t do it, you may miss out on some opportunities. Berkeley: Scholarships aren’t going to drop in your lap unless you’re a top student. It takes work, but aid is available for even the average student.
Westmont: We also recommend that students use online scholarship search engines—especially those that do not charge. Check into local scholarship foundations. Our local foundations do a marvelous job finding funds for high school graduates in our area.
How does institutional aid work at your school?
Westmont: We award $8 million a year, and we’re relatively small with 1,200 students on our campus. Our full-tuition scholarships go to students who apply early action. We have other academic awards, creative performing arts scholarships, and athletic awards. We offer two transfer-student scholarships as well.
Iona: We offer a variety of academic scholarships depending on high school averages and SAT scores. To receive these monies, you must file the FAFSA.
Berkeley: We give out about $14 million each year. Almost every student who applies gets some institutional aid. Just because you’re not a 4.0 student, doesn’t mean you’re not going to get any. We also have a matching scholarship program. Any student with an award from an outside source may receive a match up to $1,800.
AIC: The admissions office looks at all candidates to see if they are eligible for an academic scholarship. We also have a big athletic scholarship program for a school our size. We have scholarships for football, basketball, hockey, volleyball, lacrosse, tennis, field hockey, and soccer.
Do students take advantage of state aid?
Westmont: More families should take advantage of the California state grants, which can be as much as $8,322. The deadline is March 2.
AIC: Unfortunately, students often miss the deadlines for state aid. To receive state aid in Massachusetts, you must file by May 1. Returning upperclassmen in particular forget that they have to apply each year, and that’s a problem. Half of our students file after May 1 and lose that opportunity.
How do loans fit into your overall aid picture?
Iona: Fifty-eight percent of our total undergraduate population receive aid. Of those students, 48% of their package is comprised of loan money.
Westmont: Our loan volume has doubled over the past five years. Five years ago a typical loan might have been $5,000. Today it’s $10,000. We don’t include parent loans in our packaging. We feel it’s a little misleading to include a PLUS loan because it fulfills the need up to 100%, but we do let students know they are available.
Berkeley: We encourage families to apply for a PLUS loan before an alternative loan because PLUS has a good interest rate and favorable repayment terms. But some parents would rather have their kids carry the debt burden. More and more each year, parents seem less able to contribute to their children’s education. The best use of a private loan is when the parent is unable to contribute, and the student is limited by federal guidelines as to the amount of federal Stafford loan funds he or she can borrow.
How do you feel about students working to pay for college?
AIC: I really like to plug the work-study program. I think it’s invaluable for students. They can really hone job skills, and wherever we can, we try to match the work to their major or course of study. Many financial aid administrators started out as work-study students.
Westmont: One third of our student body works on campus, but many work off campus as well. Working can potentially hurt your aid package, but it is not an issue with students at our campus. If you earn more than $2,440 a year, your wages are included on the FAFSA, and that can raise the amount you pay for your education. Working can be a fantastic way to help pay for college; you just need to be aware of how it affects your aid.
Iona: I definitely think work-study is a great opportunity to earn money on campus. Many times, students are employed in offices for their whole college career and can use that experience on their resumes.
Do you have any suggestions on how to trim costs while in college?
Berkeley: Visit the student affairs office to try to find a carpool home. Take advantage of all student discounts. Also, if you have savings for college, it is usually better to keep them under a parent’s name rather than your own because your parents have a higher asset protection allowance than you do. [The dependent student is expected to contribute a greater share of his or her personal income than the parent.]
AIC: Want to lower your costs? No credit cards! I’ve seen students who have left school because they’ve gotten in over their heads with credit card debt. Some other tips are to buy used books and live within a budget. Sit down and write out a plan based on what money you actually have coming in.
What advice can you give students about working with their parents on the financial aid process?
Iona: The advice I give parents and students is to make sure that the students get involved in the process. Stu dents often say to me, “My parents do this for me.” Well, if students are borrowing money, they need to understand that it is often a loan they must repay—not their parents.

Article by Don Rauf and courtesy of www.careersandcolleges.com