<p>Dh and I got help from an agency this morning to fill out the FAFSA. We used 2008 tax numbers to meet an early college deadline and will update later. We learned that:</p>
<p>1) He had transposed two numbers in ds's SSN when he gave it to ds for college apps. Oops. What the easiest way to fix that? Just call every college?</p>
<p>2) It only let you send to 10 colleges. There must be a way to send it to the 11th on ds's list. Can someone explain how? I bet if I search cc I'll find it, ;) but I put it here to remind myself of everything I need to follow up on. </p>
<p>3) Our EFC. I don't get the specific ins and outs of it. Is there a rule of thumb for how much most people really have to pay when compared to their stated EFC? Because we're lower-income ds qualifies for Pell, and I find our EFC almost manageable, but know it's not written in stone. How does the gap get met? Let's say Big Name Private U costs $50K (all this is made up). Billy gets $25K in merit aid, $5K in Pell/competitiveness grant, and family has an EFC of $5K. Does college just say, Hey we really want your kid so we'll give you $15K in financial aid/workstudy? Does the college say, We think you can really afford $10K a year, based on CSS, so we'll give you $10K in grants/workstudy/loans? I'm guessing both those scenarios are likely.</p>
<p>4) Also, are public schools any more beholden to accommodate a family's EFC tham a private school? I've read on cc where people negotiate with private colleges. Do publics negotiate at all?</p>
<p>You will have to contact the colleges to correct the SSN.</p>
<p>When you file FAFSA yourself you wait until it is processed then you go back in and delete the original schools and add the new ones. Of course you must make sure when you correct FAFSA to reflect your actual 2009 tax returns that you send the updates to the original schools you listed and have deleted.</p>
<p>
[quote[If I want to apply to more than ten schools, what do I do?</p>
<p>You can only select up to ten schools at a time to receive your application information. Once you receive the processed Student Aid Report (SAR), you can:</p>
<pre><code>* Select Add or Delete a School Code and add more schools by submitting a correction to your FAFSA information.
</code></pre>
<p>TIP: If you make further corrections after adding the new schools, the schools you removed from the original list will not receive these corrections.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>
Public schools are often less likely to meet full need as they may not have their own funds to award and rely on federal and state aid. Federal aid is not usually enough to meet the full cost of most 4 year State schools. My daughter has 0 EFC and without a good merit based scholarship (which was awarded without knowledge of financial need) she would be gapped even with all the federal grans and loans she is eligible for.</p>
<p>When you have a low EFC, the hope is that your student has high stats and can focus on schools that meet 100% of need. In general, these are only top colleges. Even better, and fewer, are schools that meet 100% of need without student loans. These are typically very top colleges.</p>
<p>All of the rest, including most state schools (UVA and UNC are the exceptions I know of) do not meet need.</p>
<p>You are correct that with most schools, how much aid you get will be determined by how much the school wants your student. If the student isn’t top college material, you would generally look at schools where their stats fall near the top in hopes of getting adequate aid.</p>
<p>At my daughter’s public for this year her award included a partial Pell, a partial merit-based scholarship, subsidized and unsubsidized loans (Stafford and Perkins), work-study, something the called a “tuition waiver” for $1000, and Parent Plus loans.</p>
<p>If you include the Parent Plus loans (about $4000 worth) it didn’t leave a gap. (But I guess, technically, that is the gap, since parent loans don’t count toward “meeting need.”)</p>
<p>My son’s school is a private that meets full need w/o loans. We pay the amount they determine we can afford (in our case it is nearly identical to the FAFSA EFC), he is expected to contribute from his summer earnings, he has work-study, and the rest they cover with institutional aid. Most privates, however, either do not or can not provide this much aid, so it wouldn’t be a typical situation with privates.</p>
<p>I don’t know about “negotiating” with publics, but at least at my D’s school they do say if you need an adjustment to your aid package to come meet with them and they’ll see if any adjustment can be made. Mostly these adjustments would be increased loans, however, if they are able to do that.</p>
<p>Re: the agency who “helped you” with the FAFSA. I sure hope you didn’t GIVE them your PIN or the PIN of your student. NO ONE should have these but the individual whose name goes with the PIN,</p>
<p>Re: the error, I believe you will need to deal with the SS number issue. In fact, if your kiddo’s social doesn’t agree with his name, I have to wonder IF it will be processed at all. I do not think it will (someone can correct me if I’m wrong). Actually I “thought” that if an error like this happened (name doesn’t match social), there would be some kind of immediate alert from the FAFSA folks. Maybe I’m wrong about that. Schools file the FAFSA by social security number, not by student name.</p>
<p>Re: your questions about your aid…each school has its own policies regarding the amounts of financialaid dispersed. Most public universities do not guarantee to meet the full need of their students. Actually…most private schools don’t either. There is a short list of schools (I’m guessing less than 100) that guarantee to meet full need for their admitted students. The rest do not make this guarantee. SO…you may find some schools to be more generous than others.</p>
<p>But first…get the social error changed. I certainly hope you didn’t pay for the help you got preparing your FAFSA.</p>
<p>No, it’s an agency for lower-income families so no charge.</p>
<p>The number on the FAFSA is correct. Our worrry is that ds was given the wrong number by his dad when submitting the Common and ApplyTexas apps. Ds is gone all day so he needs to check when he gets home.</p>
<p>So is it your HUSBAND"s SS that is wrong? If so, you need to call the schools and find out what to do to correct this on the application.</p>
<p>My son transposed two numbers on one application to undergrad school (this was before the common ap was common) and this school did not award him a scholarship we KNEW he should have received. When he called to inquire, they told him they couldn’t process his aid because of the differences in SS on the FAFSA and application…but this was the KID’S social…not the parents,</p>
<p>No, it was ds’s. It might not even be an issue if ds got the number himself out of the file where we keep originals; I just don’t know because I don’t know his Common App info to check (I guess I could prowl through his e-mail, but there’s not a lot we can do until Tuesday anyway, so I’ll wait). But this a.m. while we were at the agency, dh read the number out of the planner where he writes everything down, and I noticed he reversed the first two numbers (no doubt because with the numbers reversed it’s how HIS SSN begins – think 12 vs. 21). Anyway, if ds at any time asked dh what his SSN is, dh would have told him wrong, and dh is SURE ds asked him at least a couple of times during this whole college app process.</p>
<p>Thank you, compmom! I noticed in ds’s e-mail he had stuff from College Board about the CSS, so I figured there’d be some kind of confirmation from FAFSA.</p>
<p>OH…I think I get it now. You THINK your son may have entered his SS number incorrectly because his dad had it incorrectly noted in his book. </p>
<p>Didn’t your son print or save any copies of his applications? The SS number would be on there so you could verify it.</p>
<p>Also, isn’t the common ap available for review online? I thought it was. Your son should be able to verify this immediately.</p>
<p>Anyway…to answer your question…if your son’s social is wrong on his applications, he will need to change it to be correct or his financial aid application will not be processed (the socials need to match as I noted in my post above. DS reversed two numbers on a college ap, and had to contact the college).</p>
<p>Update: Ds1 has his SSN memorized now. Phew. It is correct on the Common App and CSS. However, when he tried to check his ApplyTexas info it said it was no longer available. These were his first apps since one of the schools he applied to was rolling admissions. If there’s going to be a problem, this would be where it is.</p>
<p>Any Texas parents/kids have ideas for how to view that info?</p>
<p>I have no idea how to view the ApplyTexas info.</p>
<p>I would have son compose an email to his admissions rep at each Texas school. Have him explain that he found that his SS# had been misrecorded on a file at home and he wanted to verify that the correct number was indeed on his application but that it is no loger viewable online. Include the correct # and ask that they confirm his application status.</p>
<p>I would also follow up with a phone call, but would not rely only on the phone call.</p>
<p>If the application has the correct #, no worries; but if they cannot find the file under the correct number, you may have to supply the incorrect # to locate the file, and ask for the correction to be made.</p>
<p>*Because we’re lower-income ds qualifies for Pell, and I find our EFC almost manageable, but know it’s not written in stone. How does the gap get met? Let’s say Big Name Private U costs $50K (all this is made up). Billy gets $25K in merit aid, $5K in Pell/competitiveness grant, and family has an EFC of $5K. Does college just say, Hey we really want your kid so we’ll give you $15K in financial aid/workstudy? Does the college say, We think you can really afford $10K a year, based on CSS, so we’ll give you $10K in grants/workstudy/loans? I’m guessing both those scenarios are likely.
*</p>
<p>It really depends on the school and your home state. Some home states have extra aid for their students. Some don’t, so they’ll give gaps or expect loans.</p>
<p>As for privates…some have big endowments and some don’t. Some meet need with little or no loans, and some give gaps or expect families to take out big loans.</p>
<p>Most schools (private or public) cannot meet need of their students - which is why many FA packages contain loans and gaps.</p>
<p>Is your child applying to any financial safety schools? If not, he needs to.</p>
<p>Does college just say, Hey we really want your kid so we’ll give you $15K in financial aid/workstudy?</p>
<p>There are some schools that do this IF that student fulfills some need of the school - such as having outstanding stats or is needed for diversity numbers. Of course, some schools don’t have the money to do this even if they really want the kid.</p>
<p>Youdon’tsay, we got the e-mail from FAFSA quickly, like the same day or next day, and also the SAR the day after that. I would call the FAFSA 800 # if you don’t receive a confirmation e-mail within a few days of filing. When I called about another issue with the FAFSA, they were helpful.</p>