I’ve submitted my FAFSA and applied to the colleges I’m interested in, but I don’t know if I should apply these colleges’ scholarships and financial aid. For instance, UW - Madison offers these scholarships: https://scholarships.wisc.edu/Scholarships/findSchlr . Likewise, when you apply to UM - Twin Cities, they give you an account which has a “Financial Aid” tab under which you need to fill out some extra information that the FAFSA doesn’t give you.
So do I apply to these sorts of things even though I might not end up going to some of these colleges? If I got the scholarships and decided not to go to that particular college, would I just say, “No thanks”? Also, how do I work this out so far as time is concerned because I’m not entirely decided where I want to attend; do I just apply to all the scholarships for every college in the mean time?
Yes, absolutely. How can you decide to attend if you don’t know how much it is going to cost? For most students that makes a big difference in their final decision. And colleges give out the money as students apply, and then sometimes it is gone… if you wait to apply, you might lose out. Also, merit scholarships are often given to students as “bait” to try to tempt you into attending.
Colleges completely expect you to fill out all the FA information and scholarship info when you apply so they can notify you if they’ve awarded money. Note, though, that many of the merit scholarships offered by the colleges themselves don’t require extra paperwork – merely by applying, you become eligible. But each college is different, so you need to figure out now when they want for financial aid and scholarship paperwork, and get it all done. And they have deadlines – but I’d try to beat the deadlines where you can.
Colleges know that lots of students they accept (and make financial aid and scholarship offers to) won’t end up accepting their admission offers; the % of students who do attend is called “yield”, and is never even close to 100% for any school. So they know they are offering money to students who may or may not attend. When you turn down admission, that pretty much takes care of turning down any financial aid offered to you as well.
Agree with @intparent, Many students decide where to go based at least partly on the financial aid that they are offered, including scholarships. As such you need to apply before you know where you are going to attend.
Universities understand that many students will get scholarship offers from multiple schools, and that many will turn down their offers and go elsewhere.