Do colleges process financial aid before or after making an admissions decision?

If any admissions/financial services employees could weigh in here I’d appreciate it. I just got an email from a college I applied to about things I need to finish for my FA application for it to be processed. That got me thinking, wouldn’t it be kind of annoying to go through all the bother of checking people’s applications and processing them if many of those people won’t even be admitted? For elite colleges, that could mean calculating 4-10 times as many aid awards as there are applicants with need who will actually be admitted. Do they just check to make sure all the materials are in so aid packages can be calculated more quickly when a decision is made? Do they calculate a FA package for everyone before knowing admission status? Does it vary by school? Any experiences you’d like to share would be appreciated!

Schools need to have ALL of the required submissions to calculate an aid award IF younget accepted. Some schools do send reminders if there are missing pieces. Remember, once acceptances are determined…the colleges have only a small window of time to get those aid awards ready to send.

Most colleges do them simultaneously. Getting questions from FA doesn’t mean you are admitted. Not getting questions doesn’t mean you aren’t admitted. Yes, schools that get 40,000 applications may do 37,000 FA applications that are not used.

All schools do it their way, but most have the FA office working on files and admissions office working on files.

@abbidon We sent pages of docs to UVA for twins, who were denied (I know along with many other applicants). I’d still be curious to see an admission office and how many people go through the apps and supporting docs.

I was told by a school yesterday that emails about missing FA documents are simply sent automatically by their system. So, at least at that school, it means nothing to be contacted by FA.