I posted this in the FA forum but though, if it wasn’t here in the parent’s forum yet, that it was worth sharing here too:
This is great news! It had been previously recommended to list alphabetically so the schools didn’t assume the order listed was order of preference (as it commonly was!)
http://www.financialaidtoolkit.ed.gov/tk/announcement-detail.jsp?id=fafsa-comments#list-of-schools
Great news. Sending the list of colleges really served no purpose and caused anxiety.
Its about time!!
great news!!!
It is outrageous that they ever did!
It only really became an issue as “level of applicant’s interest” became more commonly considered in admissions, and admissions readers found that FAFSA school order correlated to “level of applicant’s interest”. Presumably, it did not matter and no one cared or looked previously.
It was an issue here on CC in 2006 when DS applied to colleges!! And I was then specifically coached by CC parents to submit each school separately when submitting the FAFSA. Could that have been a factor in his acceptances by 13/15 colleges? Who knows?
It certainly is NOT an issue that no one cared about previously!!
Thanks federal government, for listening and responding to our concerns about this (yes, I wrote a letter).
It probably happened only because … schools could NOT care less about that list. In the meantime, it is not bad for yet one more mythical tale to be put to rest as some did cling to the impact of that FAFSA listing.
Fwiw, I am solidly in the camp that it NEVER did matter a bit. There is just “stuff” on CC that is impossible to drive a stake through. Well, people are again able to jump on the “Not more than X SAT tests” for one more of those issues that only compounds the anxiety of students and the obsessive parents.
Hint: if the school really wanted the information, they’d simply ask! Do you know many people who withhold information when they think it might hurt the chance by not answering? After don’t the believe that postcards are recruiting signs!
/yawn
I for one was not going to take the chance that it might matter.
maybe it did, maybe it didn’t- who knows? But it was a worry for me as my talented, quirky top stat DS had to cast a wide net for FA purposes.
Now at least parents have one LESS thing to worry about.
I’d say that’s a good thing…
Is this really official? The link doesn’t seem to be working anymore, or they removed the content. Does thia mean it will not implemented next year for 20s6_2017?
This link says still the case: http://www.financialaidtoolkit.ed.gov/tk/learn/fafsa/updates.jsp
@xiggi – I’d disagree that the listing of schools was never used against students:
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/10/28/colleges-use-fafsa-information-reject-students-and-potentially-lower-financial-aid
Mentions several enrollment management consultants who work with this data for clients:
McGuire Associates: http://www.maguireassoc.com/our-clients/3056-2/ – lots of colleges on their list
Rufallo Noel-Levitz - no client list, but with more than 125 full time consultants, I’d guess a pretty wide swath of colleges.
Dropping the list is a positive change. Now I’d like to see Profile do the same.
@OHMomof2, Thank you, that link works. Some says we still need to list state schools first, does it matter?
According to the link above, states (programs not colleges?) do still see the list, individual colleges do not.
Does anyone know if CSS profile school list is visible to colleges?
I doubt it, as those are submitted one at a time anyway, not in a list. If you need to make a change to one you submit early in the cycle, for instance, you can’t even do it online, you have to do it manually with the college directly. SO I’ll guess it isn’t.
Completed the FASFA and connected to State AID for 2016 and apparently they CAN SEE the list of colleges? Confused. As stated in the article… State agencies that award financial aid, however, continue to have access to the full list of colleges a student provides on the FAFSA, including the ordering of those institutions. See https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2016/01/07/states-cry-foul-over-us-plan-curtail-access-fafsa-student-data