Ramon Montiel-García, 18, graduate of KIPP Northeast Denver Leadership Academy in Colorado.
Credit: Ramon Montiel-García
Ramon Montiel-García, a recent high school graduate from the KIPP Northeast Denver Leadership Academy in Colorado, he was accepted into his first choice school, Wheaton College in Massachusetts.
But with a sticker price of nearly $80,000 a year, including tuition, fees and room and board, Montiel-García, like many college applicants, needed financial help to keep costs down.
But like his peers, Montiel-García struggled with the new federal financial aid application.
Although his parents have lived in the US since 2001, they are both undocumented and do not have social security numbers, which was one of the many issues that plagued his users Free Application for Federal Student Aid. In the meantime, Montiel-Garcia completed a backup plan.
His FAFSA application was finally accepted in late April — well after the release in late December after another months-long delay. However, he said the aid package he received from Wheaton was not enough to get by.
“I should have paid $11,000 a semester, which is still a lot of money for me and my family,” he said.
Instead of attending Wheaton, Montiel-García enrolled at the nearby University of Colorado in Denver. He plans to live at home to keep costs down.
“I’m kind of disappointed that I didn’t get to go to that school, but maybe it was for the best,” he said.
FAFSA is still a hurdle
Even in normal years, how students choose a college depends heavily on the amount of financial aid offered and the distribution between scholarships, bursaries, work-study opportunities, and student loans.
However, in 2024, a failed one FAFSA The spread has increased the critical role of aid in college choices. Because of problems with the new form, financial aid award letters were delayed and some high school seniors, like Montiel-García, had trouble applying for any aid.
From June 28, only 46% of new high school graduates have completed the FAFSA, according to the National College Attainment Network, or NCAN. A year ago, that number was 53%.
Filing a FAFSA is one of the best predictors of whether a high school senior will go to college, NCAN also found. Seniors who fill out the FAFSA are 84% more likely enroll in college right out of high school, according to an NCAN study of 2013 data.
The FAFSA serves as a gateway to all federal aid money, including loans, work-study and grants, the latter of which is the most desirable type of aid because it usually doesn’t have to be paid back.
FAFSA issues forced hard choices
About three-quarters, or 76 percent, of students said the amount of financial aid they were awarded and the overall financial aid process were the top drivers in their choice of where to go to college, according to a survey by Ellucian and EMI Research. Solutions carried out in March.
This goes beyond parental influence, location, campus culture — even the degree programs offered.
“This year, we’re seeing such deep concerns about the cost of college, more so than in the last two years,” said Robert Franek, editor-in-chief of The Princeton Review, which recently ranks colleges based on financial aid awarded, he told CNBC. “There is a level of stress that is palpable.”
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Higher education already costs more than most families can afford, and college costs continue to rise. Tuition and fees, plus room and board, for a four-year private college averaged $56,190 in the 2023-2024 school year. at the state’s four-year public colleges, it was $24,030 per year; according to the College Board.
Experts predicted that problems with the new FAFSA would weigh heavily on enrollment, though it was initially unclear how much of a role it would play in decisions between schools.
Ellucian’s study found that 44% of 1,500 students surveyed said they would change their top-choice school if offered just $5,000 more in aid.
“It’s a surprisingly small amount when you look at the total cost,” Ellucian CEO Laura Ipsen said of the difference the monetary amounts made in the decision-making process.
The impact of the FAFSA on decision making
The challenge this year “wasn’t just the financial aid part, which is huge, but comparing different offers that come at different times,” said Eric Greenberg, president of Greenberg Educational Group, a New York-based consulting firm. “It had a big impact on how people made decisions.”
The past years, financial aid award letters they were sent around the same time as admission letters, meaning students had several weeks to compare offers before National College Decision Day, the deadline for most admitted students to decide on a college.
Because of extensive delays this year, some students will not receive their final financial aid letter until late August, the U.S. Department of Education said in a recent update.
Andrea Garcia, 18, is still waiting for that letter, though she has already committed to Emory University in Atlanta — and has filed a deposit. Because her parents, like Montiel-García’s, are also undocumented, she said the aid application process was problematic from the start.
“My parents were very stressed and, in a way, they felt guilty because of the system,” she said.
For now, Garcia is still considering her alternative, which involves staying closer to her home in Denver: “If Emory doesn’t meet my financial needs, I’ll enroll in a regional school that offers a full ride.”
Because of such delays, some students may even start their fall semester before they get basic information about how much it will cost, according to higher education expert Mark Kantrowitz.
This also signals “the first admission” by the Department of Education that the FAFSA won’t be fully operational until after the start of the 2024-25 award year, which began July 1, he said.
Filling the gap with other sources of help
Greenberg advises the students he works with to explore other sources merit aid, as much as possible.
For Ky-mani Murphy, 18, that approach is what made the difference.
The high school graduate from Riverdale Park, Maryland, secured several additional funding from the Maryland College Aid Processing System to afford his top choice school: Towson University.
“I really wanted to go to Towson,” he said.
But after his prize package from the school was delayed and then fell short of his expectations, Murphy said he almost gave up hope.
“At that point, I thought, ‘Wow, going to college might not work out,'” she said.
With the additional state aid, Murphy is on track to join Towson’s freshman class this fall with plans to study computer science.
“I’m really grateful to have the opportunity to go to a good college,” she said. “I’m really excited to see what’s going to happen.”
“I didn’t want to get into a lot of debt”
For most students, however, the FAFSA result comes on top of an already The complicated college admissions season and concerns about student loans forced a compromise.
From the beginning, Chase Hartman, 18, said he was more focused on scholarships than even the college applications themselves. However, the recent graduate was accepted to 17 schools, including his top choice, Duke University.
“I got accepted to Duke, but I was only able to get one-year scholarships,” he said. In the end, that was the deciding factor.
Hartman, who is from Tampa, Fla., qualified for the state’s Bright Futures college scholarship program as well as Lombardi Award, which essentially reduced his cost of attending the University of Florida to zero. It will start there in the fall.
“I didn’t want to get into a lot of debt in my undergraduate education, because I’m also thinking about going to law school or getting my MBA,” she said.
