Not sure if I’m in the right forum but I do need help with the NPC. Thanks in advance for taking the time to read my questions.
My husband and I file jointly. Here are sample NPC questions I am not sure about, In parenthesis are NPC pop up guides.
How much did your parents earn in wages, salaries, and tips in the most recent tax year? (IRS Form 1040 line 7)
this is understandable- no prob
How much did parent 1 earn from work?
(IRS Form 1040 lines 7, 12, 18 ) but line item 7 is same as above (both income combined) line 12, 18 are 0 or is this the Social Security Wages or Regular wages on our W2s?
How much did parent 2 earn from work? Same comment as above
How much did your parents contribute to non-taxable retirement plans and/or receive in untaxed income and benefits, such as child support for the most recent tax year? for a complete list of items to include. (IRS Form 1040 lines 28,32 )
Our 1040 has 0 on lines 28 and 32 however our W2s indicate on the side our 401k Contribution. So I’m not sure if our tax preparer made a mistake and put in 0
Also, should we limit our 2daughters’ applications to schools that are within our financial safety without counting possible Merit? I’m not sure if it is worth applying to 60K schools. Both have 4.7/4.8 GPA but have not taken SAT’s yet and moving in the direction of ‘Art’ . We are 1st generation immigrants.
So, you’re just asking these questions for the future, right? You’re not filing FAFSA now? Right? You don’t have a child starting college in the fall, right?
I don’t have answers to your FAFSA questions since I’m not that familiar with FAFSA, but surely folks here will chime in.
Have your kids take the SAT and ACT as soon as they can for you to get an idea of how they’ll do.
Art schools are terrible with aid is you need a lot. Some give aid for portfolios, but you could still end up owing for a huge chunk. However, univs that have Art depts might give good aid.
What is your home state?
Yes, apply to a few safeties, but also some reaches “just to see”.
BTW…as wonderful it is to be artistic, it is an area where people find it hard to support themselves as adults. I would encourage the DDs to maybe double major or something so that they have a “back up” in case they can’t support themselves with Art. Certainly, do not let them borrow much or anything as Art majors.
The questions on FAFSA for 2 and 3 instruct you to break down the total wages of each parent. If together (line 7) you make $100,000, but one parent makes $60,000, put that for question 2, and then $40000 for question 3. Yes, you need to put the 401k and/or IRA contributions, whether or not they are on your 1040.
The NPC are just estimates, but for them to work you need to put down good numbers.
Please read through the threads that are pinned at the top the page. (You’ll see they are marked with what looks like a push pin.) You’ll find lots of helpful information there.
As a rule, you should be looking at three types of schools:
(1) schools that are affordable without merit aid;
(2) schools where merit aid is guaranteed automatically based on your daughters’ GPA and SAT/ACT scores; and
(3) schools where your daughters’ GPA and SAT/ACT scores make an award of merit aid highly likely. Look for schools where their GPA’s and test scores are very, very far above the average for that school. They need to be high enough, in other words, for the school to be willing to pay to have your daughters as students.
Both girls should take the SAT no later than their junior year of high school (and I always recommend Fall of the junior year), so you know what their scores are, and so that they have t time retake the test, if necessary, to raise their scores.
They should also prepare for, and try to do well on, the PSAT (administered Fall of junior year). A good score on the PSAT will give them many, many possibilities for generous merit awards.
One other thing. The Net Price Calculators are currently set for students enrolling in fall 2015. The schools will update them during the summer 2015 for students enrolling in 2016. Need based policies DO change from year to year sometimes.
If you are running these calculators now…but your kiddos aren’t starting college until 2016, make sure you do them again fall 2015. The numbers very well could change because the financial aid policies change.
For art schools merit may be based on Portfolio review. Make sure they visit portfolio days, etc.
As mentioned above - look at colleges/university that have good art departments and meet full need.