<p>We are Out of State (OOS), and although I believe my son could have qualified for A&M Honors with a 4.25 wGPA, SAT of 1380/1600, and 6 AP’s, we totally missed the Honors app deadline. Anyway, He has been admitted for the Fall 2010. </p>
<p>Our Financial Aid portal (FAP) still reports “Total Aid: $0.00”, with “no financial aid in an offered status.” We spoke with Marcus in Financial AId earlier this week, and he said he thought “regular” Scholarships and Financial Aid, which may include OOS waivers should be posted to the Financial Aid portal by Wednesday or Thursday. Has anyone received an OOS waiver yet, as shown through the FAP?</p>
<p>I’m wondering if there’s not some sort of delay in these awards being posted as there was with the Honors awards. We have received no emails or letters notifying us of any scholarships.</p>
<p>Our aid amount also says 0.00, but when we click on the fall term heading, it is actually a link that takes us to another page that lists my D’s awards. It took me a while to figure that out. So you might give it a try.</p>
<p>When I click on the Fall 2010 heading and go to a screen that shows “Award Summary for Academic Period 2010-2011”, with a section for Offered Awards, and another for Accepted Awards, both say “You have no financial aid in an offered (or accepted) status.”</p>
<p>Did you receive a separate email or hard copy letter notifying you of the awards that you now see on the Financial Aid Portal Award Summary page?</p>
<p>My dd’s page is finally showing 2 awards promised in her initial letter, but not the OOS tuition waiver and no NMF awards. They must still be working on it, but she’s going to call later today to check unless we hear otherwise. </p>
<p>Wondering, however, if anyone has ever heard of a NM Finalist not getting all the awards related to being a Finalist?</p>
<p>Old Person: Did you file the FAFSA? If not, that is why is says incomplete. You do not have to file the FAFSA to get scholarships. My son’s says incomplete also because we did not file the FAFSA, but he has scholarships listed. Hope this helps. :)</p>
<p>Needavacation: My son is a NMF. Under the offered awards, there was a button that said something like “begin process”. When you click that a letter pops up stating “…You will be accepting only the President’s Endowed Scholarship at this time.” It goes on to state that the DEA and NMRA scholarships will be added to account’s as info about finalists and their number one choice is made available by the NM Corp. We sent a copy of our finalist letter which stated A&M as #1 back in January. My son’s account only lists the President’s and the Merit Plus. I think there is some sort of official notification that NM must also send before those others are added. It sounds to me like they are not posting scholarships on an individual basis. I seems like they are posted by scholarship… everyone getting scholarship “X”, then everyone getting scholarship “Y”. This could be a long process! :(</p>
<p>I think A&M has not posted the NMF scholarships on Howdy because they have not officially offered them yet. They have only told the NMFs that they WILL get the scholarships IF they designate A&M as their first choice by the deadline, and the deadline is in late April. If you designated A&M by March 1, then A&M was notified of that on March 2. But because NMFs can still change their minds until late April, official offers won’t be made until after that date. I have confirmed this with NMSC and the two colleges my S is torn between. So, even though he had designated a first choice by March 1, we have been assured that his first choice school will not jump the gun and officially offer a National Merit Scholarship until after the April date has passed. This is all very confusing!</p>
<p>pierrechn: you are missing the point they are trying to make (either that or you just want to try and counter every minute statement these people are making). They are saying that fafsa isn’t as straightfoward as one would think. People with high incomes in six figures can get more aide than someone else making less because of the way these famalies chose to save their money. If it were a perfect world, and every family saved the appropriate amount of money for college, then yes the family with lower income would have the advantage in the financial aide game. Thats the point they are trying to make by mentioning six figure salaries.</p>
<p>Disposable income is made up of two things: savings and consumption. The family with a high salary will sometimes “consume” more than they “save” because they are somewhat confident that their good economic fortunes will continue, while other famalies with smaller incomes will save more than they consume. This saving goes towards many things including school. Therefore, if you have to disclose all information about your financial status then this extra saving will be taken into account meaning that the family with a lower income may get less. It doesn’t have to make sense. There are people every year taking advantage of this system when they shouldn’t necessarily have to.</p>
<p>Thank you bringbackpluto - I did not file the FAFSA. However nothing is listed under financial aid. Maybe snail mail. Has everyone been able to see their scholarships?</p>
<p>But I also do not know what is exactly disclosed on fafsa, so if in fact it is only income and tax information then I would have to agree with pierrechn. I can see their argument IF more than just this information must be disclosed.</p>
<p>Aggieengineer: Thanks for coming to the rescue. The FAFSA & the CSS Profile are both very complicated. Yes, you have to disclose everything including home equity, how much you contribute to your IRA, etc. For example, if your parents contribute 5K to their IRA this year, the FAFSA views that as $ that could have been used for college. Certain untaxed income such as welfare benefits, AFDC, workers’ comp, VA benefits, nontaxable combat pay for military, and living allowances paid to members of the military and the clergy all are considered income. The IRS may not consider them taxable income, but the FAFSA does. I could go on, and on. There is much more to it than what is listed as your adjusted gross income on your taxes. Under the FAFSA each family has an income protectoin allowance. This is the FAFSA’s idea of how much money your family needs to house feed, and clothe itself during one year. They believe that a family of 3 with one in college can do all that on about 20K a year. This amount is determined by the US Govt figures for the poverty line and does not take into account the cost of living in your part of the country. So, it will cost a lot more to live in SF than it does in Lubbock! I will not bore you with all the details…needless to say, there are some who are between a rock and a hard place. They don’t make enough to get “free money” as pierrech calls it; however, there is no way they can pay without assuming a huge amount of debt. Hope this helps. :)</p>
<p>@old person - Nothing showing in the financial aid portal nor anything in the mailbox, or email inbox as of 2 pm eastern time today. We’re OOS, so I’m not sure if that’s adding to the delay. It’s frustrating to say the least.</p>
<p>For anyone wondering about the status of their financial aid awards, scholarships, loans, etc. and why things may not be showing up in the Financial Aid Portal on Howdy.</p>
<p>In several areas I’ve read and have been told that award letters will only be sent to those students who are receiving awards. I emailed <a href=“mailto:scholarships@tamu.edu”>scholarships@tamu.edu</a> about that on Friday and received this reply:</p>
<hr>
<p>Howdy,</p>
<p>All student will receive a letter because all students should be eligible to at least receive the Stafford loans even if they don’t receive any scholarships. I’m hoping that by the end of this week the portal will reflect these offered awards. Please let me know if you have any further questions. Have a great day.</p>
<p>Thanks & Gig’em,</p>
<p>Rebecca
Financial Aid Advisor
Scholarships & Financial Aid
Texas A&M University</p>
<p>PO Box 30016 | College Station, TX 77842-3016</p>