<p>I've spent the last week crunching to send all of my financial aid info to the 7 colleges I applied to. Translation:
[ul]Compiling all tax info for me and my parents
[<em>]Parents' 2007 tax returns, all pages, schedules and w-2s
[</em>]Parents' 2008 tax returns, all pages, schedules and w-2s
[<em>]CSS Profile
[</em>]FAFSA
[<em>]Supplemental financial aid forms for each college
[</em>]Non-tax filer statements since I'm not required to file taxes
[<em>]Noncustodial Parent waiver forms
[</em>]Counselor letter supporting my claim about noncustodial parent waiver
[<em>]Verification forms because the Dept of Education randomly flagged my application
[</em>]Making copies & having to review everything to make sure they had signatures[/ul]
Financial aid makes the admissions process so much more stressful! Is anyone having the same problem I'm having? All of this hard work better pay off, literally.</p>
<p>You are to be commended. It does take quite a bit of effort. The good news is that next year you will only be dealing with one school. :)</p>
<p>Here’s something to consider: 6 colleges are paying someone to look at your financial aid info, even though you won’t be attending any of those schools. </p>
<p>We all have to do a bit of extra work when it comes to financial aid! :)</p>
<p>how difficult is it to take one full set, go down to your local Kinkos and make 6 more copies and drop them in the mail?</p>
<p>Let’s see: To get someone else to pay for part of your schooling you have to collect info and make copies. Sounds like a good return on investment.</p>
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<p>Especially when one is applying to Ivies, and the pay-off may be in the vicinity of $200K. Hmmm, the average American works full-time for 4 1/2 years to make that kind of money, and you may get it for working on forms for one week. OP, you sound a little spoiled, imo.</p>
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If my parents had the capacity to spoil me, I wouldn’t be here ranting about financial aid.</p>
<p>LW,
You feel affronted by having to fill out forms for a week to get thousands of dollars in aid. If that reaction is not “spoiled,” then what is it? Entitled? Lazy? How would you explain your feelings?</p>
<p>OP,</p>
<p>The admission process is crazy enough and then, on top of that, the financial aid process where each school can want something different…and all those calculations. And your trying to keep up with your schoolwork, ECs, and have a 17/18 year old life. Breathe deeply, you’re almost to the finish line!! In a month you’ll be happy you made the effort!</p>
<p>Hang in there, the finish line is in sight! You’re not spoiled, just overwhelmed - as am I. But mostly nervous I have missed something. You can find alot of support on this forum but you can also have your head handed to you.</p>
<p>It is a lot of work and I am so impressed with the kids that do it themselves, my D had Mommy do the whole thing. I think a lot of the questions are impossible to understand.</p>
<p>OP, I commend you. I also filled out all the information on my own and did not receive assistance from my parents (they don’t speak very good english).</p>
<p>To the parents on here with a pessimistic attitude to the OP being spoiled…your kids are probably way more spoiled…I am sure you filled out all the paperwork for them.</p>
<p>Kudos to teens taking on this responsibility. I did D’s - not that she wasn’t willing, but I knew I could do it in less than half the time it would take her, and she just sat through a quick explanation and review. </p>
<p>Just wanted to mention to you that, as your FA awards come in, pay close attention to what you think you qualified for vs what’s shown. D’s recently received 3 offers and 2 of them were wrong! Look for incorrect Pell amounts, missing work study or expected Perkins (if your EFC is very low). Even had a missing ACG. A quick and polite phone call to FA resulted in revised offers. I think the funding levels and criteria have been in flux this year and, while it would likely be caught eventually, it’s distressing to look at the bottom line and have it be several thousand lower than anticipated.</p>
<p>sk8- Though not the OP I appreciate your advice - thanks for sharing.</p>
<p>LW, congrats on navigating the process on your own. That is a feat. </p>
<p>The snarky comments are just plain rude and the type that give CC a bad name. Read the kid’s thread, folks. All he said was it was stressful and a lot of work! </p>
<p>A featured thread here just a week or two ago was the NYTimes article about how the process of applying for financial aid was overly-complex. Obama has an initiative to streamline the process. And for heaven’s sake, CC has dedicated an entire forum to Financial Aid with a sticky on applications. Sheesh!</p>
<p>Actually Artemis, the OP said “All of this hard work better pay off, literally.” Noone likes a tone of entitlement. And to answer another poster, DD did all the work for FAFSA (including reminding me of deadlines). She stood over me while I put in my PIN for my signoff.</p>
<p>Erin’s Dad, congrats to your DD for completing the process on her own, too. </p>
<p>Respectfully, I am 100% sure everyone who completes the dad-gummed reams of paperwork hopes the effort pays off, literally. </p>
<p>We can all parse what each other says around here, but the applicant titled his post a “rant,” and honestly, I didn’t think it didn’t come off as entitled or whine-y at all. I took it as a “whew, I’m done, can we vent and kvetch together over the insanity of the process?”</p>
<p>Whatever. I can’t believe I jumped out to express a judgment about others’ posts–not like me! It’s just that I sure hate it when less-than-encouraging signals are sent to young people who are trying their best to manage the college application process on their own. </p>
<p>(Yes, my own personal bent is, every kid should be in charge of their applications from beginning to end, with reasonable parental support and assistance only on request. This presumes active GC involvement; if none, then parents may have reason to be more involved.)</p>
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WOW! Really?? You must live in a different world than my family. I believe that the application process should be a joint effort and that responsibility for the financial aid application process should be weighted by the complications of the financial information. My senior had exactly one number to report…his bank account balance. The rest was mine to do.</p>
<p>Sorry to be confusing, Lunar_eclipse. The reference to a GC was primarily with regard to the actual college apps, although some GCs are very knowledgeable about financial aid and can be a huge resource in that regard. Of course, as to financial aid apps, family financial information has to be supplied. But I fully expect the student to figure out what information is needed, ask the parent for the required information and work through the forms independently to the extent possible. And it goes without saying that there should be an open conversation about the family’s finances, expectations of what the family can provide in the way of money, what the student will have to come up with in the form of aid or otherwise, etc.</p>
<p>Erin’s Dad, I don’t believe your original post was too harsh. And if you have been selected for verification there is alot of waiting for requests from schools and different forms for different schools - not as simple a make 6 packets and mail them off. Plus the request for the information comes in on different days. Just for the record not everyone has a fax or copy machine at home and may not live close to a copy store. We can all be guilty for assuming at times - lets all take a deep breath and keep up encouragement and sharing information - thats what I come here for. I think the OP’s “pay off” was kind of playing with words, no?
TXArtemis - I second your posts!</p>