I got an email from my son’s college explaining the 2024-2025 FAFSA won’t won’t be available on October 1 as usual because of the FAFSA Simplification Act. It got me thinking about the general calendar for high school seniors. I extracted key events from our detailed guidance for juniors seniors:
Event
Dates
Notes
Common Application opens
August 1
Early Decision applications due
October through December
Most schools are either November 1 or November 15.
Early Action applications due
October through December
Most schools are November 1, November 15 or December 1.
Regular Decision applications due
November through February
Varies by school.
Early Decision II applications due
December through February
Most schools are either January 1 or January 15.
Regular Decision notifications
February and March
Most schools announce by April 1.
College Decision Day
May 1
Deposits due for the school students will attend
Most seniors will have already taken the SAT and/or ACT as juniors, but some might plan to take those tests in an attempt improve their scores. Many seniors will also be taking AP tests.
Test
Date
ACT
September 9
SAT
October 7
ACT
October 28
SAT
November 4
SAT
December 2
ACT
December 9
Advanced Placement
May 6-10
Advanced Placement
May 13-17
There are also deadlines for scholarships and financial aid. Note that each school has their own deadlines for financial aid.
Event
Dates
Notes
National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC) semifinalists notified
Early September
College Scholarship Service (CSS) Profile opens
October 1
FAFSA opens
December
Usually opens on October 1, but it will open in December for 2024-25.
National Merit Finalists (NMF) notified
February
Update first choice school for NMF
March through May
NMSC winners notified
March to mid-June
FAFSA due
June 30
Please note that schools usually have earlier deadlines!
What milestones did I miss? I’m opening this post up for edits or feel free to leave a comment below.
CSS Profile opens 10/1, as usual. Filing deadlines are specific to college and round of admission
Likewise, FAFSA deadlines are college/round of admission specific, even though FAFSA won’t be available until December.
Also, although technically the final FAFSA deadline is June 30, if one wants a financial aid package in a timely manner they have to make each school’s FAFSA deadline for the round the student applied.
List first choice school for NMF status - typically March - May 31 (again, college specific)
Note that February is misspelled in a few places in the original post.
That June 30 deadline is June 30 at the end of their college academic year…not June 30 of the high school year. The FAFSA can be filed any time before June 30 of the academic year…although all filings must be complete and processed before the actual academic year for your college ends.
Re: deadlines. Deadlines for everything are listed on every college website…and those deadlines vary wildly. You should make note of the deadlines that you need to adhere to…and do NOT miss them for either applications or financial aid.
Things to really look for…
Any priority deadlines for things like scholarship considerations, financial aid, honors colleges, etc.
Deadlines for early action and early decision if those are what you are doing.
Yes, the June 30 deadline is June 30 of the financial aid year (so June 30, 2025 for the 2024-25 academic year). That’s the date by which the FAFSA has to be properly submitted - that is, everything has to be in line so that it will process without rejecting. And by that time, it will only be valid for Pell (assuming the student is Pell eligible). It will be too late to borrow loans. Loans have to be requested and certain steps must be completed while the student is enrolled at least half time. So while the technical deadline to file the FAFSA is June 30, the practical deadline would be earlier (with the exception of Pell). And if the FAFSA is selected for verification, there are deadlines for that to be completed, as well.
