I read somewhere that to receive even merit scholarships such as the Presidential that you must send in your financial information.
Is this correct? I already submitted my FAFSA a while ago and just submitted a ‘Scholarship Application’
I do not qualify for financial aid. I find it odd they would require financial info for merit aid.
Some colleges do require financial aid forms before they award merit. If a student qualifies for any need based aid, the college could choose to reduce the amount of merit aid they offer that student. In NYS, low income students can qualify for both a Pell grant of up to $5k and a state tuition grant of up to $5k. That’s ~$10k that a college doesn’t have to give out of its own coffers that they wouldn’t get if the student didn’t file the forms. Since not every family knows what aid is available, it’s easier just to make everyone fill out the forms.
@austinmshauri Do you know specifically about GaTech? I don’t really want to send in CSS. It sounds like a lot of work like getting all my mom’s business’ financials and she is not a full owner so getting all of that would be tricky.
You’ll have to check their website or give them a call to be sure. The forms can be tedious, but if you get some money it may be worth it.
From what I can tell, Georgia Tech has a form you need to fill out for any kind of scholarship. Then, if you would like a need-based scholarship, you also fill out the CSS Profile and the FAFSA. But you don’t need those for merit aid- I know my parents aren’t filling out the FAFSA because we never qualify for merit-based aid, I have older siblings and they had scholarships (not GA Tech though).
Also, at some schools it’s good if you DON"T file any forms for need-based aid because then they know you can pay for it. It may not matter at GA Tech but it does at a lot of smaller private schools. I’m OOS so I guess I think it’s to my advantage if GA Tech thinks I can afford that OOS tuition.
FWIW my kiddo (who applied EA) got a notification last week saying financial info was incomplete; he logged onto Buzzport and was directed to fill out an aid survey (took about five minutes, if that), after which it said his info was complete. I think that’s standard protocol before they start looking at aid of any kind.
Did they specifically ask you to fill out the CSS? I’m pretty sure my son did not. They require the FAFSA and their little survey, AFAIK. The FAFSA covers anything you might put on the CSS. It would be redundant to require both.
Georgia Tech’s website answers your question. https://www.finaid.gatech.edu/scholarships You must submit both FASFA and Georgia Tech’s own scholarship application. These documents are necessary if you are seeking merit money including scholarships from local alumni clubs. Three years ago when my DD was a first year, we had to submit those two documents and the CSS profile to get a very small merit award. This year it looks like they have done away with the CSS profile requirement.
I suggest you complete the necessary forms in the hopes that you receive some type of merit money. During the year, additional scholarships will be come available which you can apply for and it appears that those documents are always part of the process. For example, each January my DD qualifies for applying for scholarship from GT Women in Engineering. (About 1800 students qualify and they award it to 144 students(, So far she has been awarded it twice and it appears as an award on a financial aid letter even though we do not qualify for financial aid. Even though it is not a large amount, all these little scholarships add up to make GT affordable for our family.
Good luck.
I just filled out the GTech scholarship app form (only took a minute or so) & it says if you are only seeking merit aid you do NOT have to complete the FAFSA This is different than I thought based on the info I had seen before on their financial aid page. Of course I have already completed the FAFSA the other day but had not sent it - now it seems the FAFSA is not needed for any school on our list.
@CA1543 Ahhh thank you. It’s honestly very confusing on their website.
I just hope they don’t see my family income and say “this guy doesn’t need help, DENIED”
@CA1543 Idk if we have to submit the FAFSA to each college on our list in that case, but it does need to be filled out for Hope/Zell Miller for in-state students.
Coming back to this thread to report that after being told his info was incomplete, and filling out the survey on Buzzport and being told it WAS complete, a few days later he received another “please fill this out” email directing him to the CSS.
This makes zero sense to me (and holy cow, was the CSS ever a headache compared to the FAFSA!) but it was implied that consideration for any aid – either merit- or need-based – wouldn’t be done without it. We don’t anticipate him receiving aid but hedged our bets, anyway. :-??
@yankeeinGA See that is why I started this thread. I’ve gotten two emails from them telling me my application for scholarships application is incomplete, even though I’ve done the little scholarship things and submitted my FAFSA.
I think it is saying if I want to qualify for financial aid, but I’m not sure… I’m only in it for the merit aid.
Yeah, I spoke too soon with my first reply, and I agree that they’re sort of vague about whether it’s required for merit. You could contact your financial aid person (they give you a link to figure out who it is in the alert emails) to ask, I guess, or just bite the bullet and do it. My kid would rather fill out a form than talk to a human (haha) so that’s how it went down for us. 
I’ll call GaTech Monday to see what they have to see and report back here
I can confirm the only requirement to be considered for merit scholarships is to apply early action by Oct. 15.
My FAFSA submission won’t hurt me as the financial department doesn’t share info with the merit department.
Here is what it said on the 2017-2018 Financial Aid Application my mom filled out:
"Please check below if you are applying for institutional programs where financial need is not a criterion (the FAFSA and/or CSS PROFILE will not be required).
(Checked) Institutional scholarships - restricted to only a limited number of non-need based programs"
So that also confirms what you said @Jpgranier . My parents didn’t fill out either the FAFSA or CSS Profile.
Just remember that if you’re in-state and planning to receive HOPE or Zell Miller, you’ll have to do either the FAFSA or the GSFAPPS. (If you’re not a GA student, I’m sure that made no sense at all, and you can disregard!)